Join a group on Facebook called "Raising Aviation Teens". They are a wealth of knowledge I've found whether USAFA or commercial flight school or just PPL. There are several Aviation lover groups on FB that are helpful but that one I like the best. DH's cousin graduated from USAFA - it is SUCH a cool place. He played volleyball there (he's 6'7"!). He had initially wanted to be a pilot but that went south, but he did enjoy his time there though he's not such a fan of AF life now. I grew up in Air Cadets (Canada) and private flying lessons, and my kiddos were part of Canadian Air Cadets until we moved back to the US and we *just* discovered Civil Air Patrol (similar but less intense) - wishing we had found CAP pre-Covid 😞

For those of you in CA (or better yet, SoCal) - what are the Charters that you use? We are using K12 right now (through Oregon before we moved...) but I'd love to look into the charters here. I don't mind jumping through hoops for this year (possibly private school next fall...)

We are in Los Angeles (well Santa Monica to be exact).

We're from Corvallis!!! :D DH is working in CA though for the next year, so we are only in Corvallis about every other month to check up on our house. :( But we'll be home for good next September! How does one find the Social Groups? I'm new to posting - spent several weeks just absorbing all the threads before I decided to post. SO much great info on here!!!!

We are temporarily living in Santa Monica. :001_smile: Our home is in Oregon, but we will be in Santa Monica until September 2013 most likely for DH's work. Been here 8 months now.

I'm new to posting on this board (been reading for a while) - so forgive me if this isn't the best forum for this, I wasn't quite sure where to put it. My son just finished 4th grade (as far as a school would consider him). He started the year in private school, we moved and he homeschooled most of the year, and has been doing 5th grade work. So in the fall he'll be likely starting 6th grade work (we work through summer). Next year (2013-2014 school year) he'll be returning to school in the place we moved out of (temporary move). My son has his heart set on Aviation High school up in the Puget Sound, WA area. They have a application online and we were looking through it to see what they'd expect. He'd be applying early in his 8th grade school year. Yes it's very premature to be 'planning' for this when he's about to start his 5th grade school year, but right now it's just a goal we are working towards and if it keeps him focused in the meantime, then great - even if we don't wind up sending him there come high school. They ask for things like: have you taken an Algebra course, have you taken high school math courses, have you taken other high school level courses (and earned credit). If we are homeschooling, how does that work? Our state doesn't require us to keep detailed records even. If he goes back to his old private school, I don't think they'd have the option to take high school level classes or work ahead like that (small school, in a town with only 2 public, 1 private high schools - none are linked to his private elementary K-8 school). I hate to make him go to another school since he's moved around so much already. But it might be something we need to do? Sorry to ramble. I can't sleep. Ideas, plans and theories keep racing around my head. If anyone can help clear up how you take higher level courses for credit, and prove such for his high school application - that'd help!

I agree!!! I would love to see that as well. OP - Try looking at Lego Education (they will send you a huge catalog too). WeDo is a good kit, and Mindstorms is great (WeDo is like a entry to mindstorms for younger ones whereas Mindstorms is probably better waiting until closer to 8). Get a 300:1 set from Radio Shack or something similar. My boys LOVE theirs.

We just completed using K12 this year, and won't be re-doing it for the fall. DD is 6, boys are 8 & 10. We will be using Right Start Math for them (I want to use and love MathUSee but we tried it last year and I just had so much trouble with it:confused:). They also have gone to Kumon but might go to Mathnasium this fall as a supplement/motivational tool. Science we already have NOEO 1 (Bio, Chem & Phys) - but will probably only use Biology or Physics from them. I want to use RS4K Chemistry. DH is a programmer and they work on HTML in frontpage, Alice.org, Scratch, Mindstorms, Snap Circuits. The kids also attend Play Well Tek Engineering classes 1x week. I like the Engineering is Elementary materials but am SO overwhelmed with what to buy. Any suggestions??