Creekland's ds - Covenant College, Union University, Calvin College - all acceptances at this point. Deb in NZ's dd - Bay of Plenty Polytechnic (begin Feb 2010) Liza Q's dd - Saint Francis College - attending. Kings College, St. John's University, Brooklyn College - accepted Sharon in MD's ds-Drexel University -attending; UMBC-Meyerhoff program, UMD-College Park-College of Engineering, Messiah College- acceptances Susie-Knits ds1 - Rose-Hulman, Valparaiso, U of Evansville, TN Tech - acceptances TransientChris's DS- George Mason U,attending; Hillsdale College- attended, Abilene Christian, Hampden-Sydney, St. Olaf- accepted

http://cty.jhu.edu/index.html We found it to be a good program for us. We never had the resources financially to attend their camps, but he did take a couple distance ed classes and we attended a couple of their family programs.

The only online courses we did were in computer programming through CTY. Our son took two courses in programming through them...and I think they were pretty strong courses. Probably worth 1/2 to 1 full credit each realistically. He enjoyed the challenge and they provided a couple of pretty strong references for him in the college apps/scholarship race.

My intention was to use Notgrass for both the History and English credits.... However, it so happened that my son had the opportunity to take an American Lit class through our co-o/academy that same year....so my Notgrass experience wound up being just the history component. We did US history, by the way. I used Notgrass's baic text with most of the supplementary history readings, this was before the newer edition. I added The Teaching Co video lectures from the History of the United States Second ed.....it was a wonderful pairing. I did use some of the writing prompts...but not that many. I created my tests by typing up questions from Notgrass and adding my own essays and stuff form the vids we watched. I think it worked out pretty well. I can provide the actual syllabus if you send me your email by pm....it is WAY to big to post.

We lost my MIL to a very aggressive breast cancer two summers ago. She only missed one mammogram.... God has a plan, and His plans, timelines, and events are all for our good... even when we don't understand or like the plan. I will truly be praying for all of you...this must be so hard on the kids.... :grouphug:

We live in Md...close to UMD College Park. I know I have some local prejudice against the school...but....it is a party school...no doubt. It is also supposed to be a very good architecture school...probably not that easy to gain admissions either. It is a LEP program there which means limited enrollment program...but you probably know that Drexel is a good option, in my highly opinionated opinion.....that is where my son is. He chose it for the Co-op program and the opp to do research as an underclassman. (he is in engineering). He also choose Drexel because it fit him like a glove. I really think that is an important thing to consider. WHat school makes your son's eye's light up? We also were blessed with a significant scholarship at Drexel...which we believe was God's way of opening that specific door. They were willing to bring the cost of attendance in line with our in-state options. Worked for us! I'd be happy to share more details about the campuses at UMD and Drexel if you are interested. I'm very familiar with both.

Good Core start...I see 4 credits...if I am not misunderstanding.... you shoud be targeting at least 6 for college prep IMO (which some may disagree with...we did 7-8 per year) I see a History credit for Notgrass and an english credit either from Notgrass or Notgrass plus the other language arts things....that is two so far I see a math and a science credit....what about foreign language, music, art, others? I think the Notgrass is great for History and Lang arts...I don't think it really is sufficient to count as a full credit for Bible. If I were using it for my English or Language arts credit, I'd supplement with something that woud help anaylze the books...some not all....they use for the lit component. HTH!

I feel that it is best to try to follow the typical pattern of the lab sciences being counted as 1 credit for the course with the lab. That is what is expected of typical high school courses. I think that if we award extra or additional credit for labs we run the risk of looking like we are padding the transcript. So, even though, as Jane rightly pointed out, an AP level course has a ridiculous amount of work in it, I'd still count it as 1 credit and list it as Bio w/lab etc....

I'm so very happy for you all!!!!

It changed for us over the course of high school. For example, I was far more involved in "doing" school with him as a freshman than as a senior. Our days were longer than I think they should have been because he was always a dawdler. I would expect to spend 1 hour per day for each subject credit though. Which for us meant at least 8 hour days. I kept up with him in math through most of precalculus so I could help him. I also kept up with science through physics. I did not keep up with him on that for his senior year in Apologia Advanced Chem. We also always did Bible and History together. I taught co-op kind of physics with several families, so that was very hands on and I also had other kids do labs here for Chem I. So I guess the answer is that I was very hands on for the majority of it, but that was my choice, I wanted it that way. During his senior year and a little of the second half of jr year, I shifted a bit more into college counselor mode. I did tons of research on programs and scholarships etc. If I were to change anything, I would have spent a bit more time with him that last year, I feel like I missed a bit of it by not doing the Chem labs and not staying up on all the history reading....but I couldn't really have done it differently and managed to do all the college stuff. Does that help?

For the first two years of high school we used Kay Arthur's material called "New Inductive Study Series." We choose one OT and one NT book per year to work through. Then for Jr. and Sr. Year we did David Noble's world view course, with the DVDs from Sumit. It was very good and worth spreading out over two years. I wanted to keep our Bible courses to 1/2 credit per year...roughly 1/2 hour per day. I feel that the inductive courses from Kay Arthur laid a good foundation in how to read and study his Bible and that the David Noble material was good for the Jr.and Sr. years as he had more maturity to discuss the material. It would not hurt me to go back through it again myself!

I do hear what each of you are saying and asking as I shared many of those same concerns. I do think it is important for older teens to be involved in larger group settings, with their peers as well as in the mixed age type of groups. One of things that I think is unique about most homeschooled children is their ability to relate well with people on various age levels. My son can happily converse with little kids and seniors as well as his peers. That said however, I think that it is important that they hang out with groups of kids their own age....not necessarily huge groups, but learning to be part of a peer group in terms of age is important as well as peer groups by interest. We solved this problem by having him be involved in his church youth group and a dance team. In our particular case, our church youth group is enormous so he got used to crowds of kids his age as well, but I don't see that as necessary, just a benefit. We were part of a homeschool academy where he went to classes once a weeks. He took only a few courses there, but it gave him a taste of classroom settings, taking notes from a lecture, participating in group discussions and so on, in a friendly, supportive environment. We believe, from talking with him, that these things helped him with the transition to college. It had always been our intention to add a couple CC courses, but when the time came, it just didn't fit our families schedule and since we did have the academy at our disposal, we just let that one slide. But I think it would have been a great alternative. As for the question about worldviews and apologetic and other deeper level discussions, I didn't really see this surface much with my teen until his Jr. and Sr. years. I think that a lot of that is a maturity issue. Even then, I'd say it was much stronger in the Sr. year. I do think it is important to engage them in Socratic dialog...or just plain old "what do you think about that" and then take a Devil's advocate position or help them to learn to think through a defense of what they believe. We also have encouraged our son to say some thing like this if he is not sure how to defend on the spot...if he is challenged..."You know, I don't agree with that, it seems wrong to me, but I'm going to have to take some time to think that through and then I'll be happy to go over my reasoning with you." It can buy you time..I know I need to do this myself because I am not swift on my feet in a debate. I hope some of this helps....I'll be glad to post more should anyone have particular followup questions. I think the only thing I would do differently is that I would have made the second year of chemistry lab happen...we did rather let that one slip. HTH

Messiah is a great school as well....sounds like you may have some tough choices ahead! DS was seriously thinking about Messiah as well. It was in his top 4. Hey, one thing that I think is great about Messiah is it is extremely close to Roundtop Ski resort....a very nice little local hill....best snow in the area. I think it is about 15 minutes from the school. :lol:

If it is a particularly competitive school and you are looking for an edge to difference your son. Some folks come up with creative ideas to make their student stand out in the crowd. However...remember that admissions officers are, for the most part, buried in piles of applications....you don't want to do anything that would potentially add to the work load in a negative way. What school are we talking about here? That may help us to answer you better. We sent a DVD to our son's school, but not for admissions, it was for the music dept, by way of audition.

What a wonderful reason to change your name! May your quiver be blessed in the new year!

:cheers2: Have a great New Year's celebration!

That is great news! Super congrats to Erek! Job Well Done!

I always try to buy maximum memory when I get a new device of this type...it's not like you can add another stick of RAM on these! :D

I believe we coughed up close to 200 for the 4 gig plus notebooks...

It is super cool...you basically can take notes with this pen on their paper, it records the audio of the lecture and digitizes the notes as well. You can upload it to your computer and see your notes and hear the lecture at any point that you want to. So let's say you missed an important piece in a lecture....rather than have to go through the whole thing to find what you missed, you go to that point in the note and tap with the pen and hear it. that is my poor synopsis of what it does. Way cool!

This is wonderful! What a grand celebration and how extra sweet to be able to share it with her intended! I love hearing from everyone who has been here all along the way! :grouphug::cheers2:

This is just spectacular news! What a very merry Christmas you shall have indeed! I can't even begin to say how happy I am for you! A small brag for us....DS earned a 3.86 for his first quarter. He is so happy there, I hope with all my heart that your son finds his perfect fit as well. It has been worth every minute of research and travel expended to find the right place for him. You must be on cloud nine, at least, right now!!!! Super congrats!!! :party:

here is a link to a newsletter that has an article about the NMSQT as the last page article. http://http://www.prepmatters.com/ht/a/GetDocumentAction/i/113661 according to this you won't hear from the Merit scholar folks till next fall. Sorry to not have happy news for you!

http://http://www.collegeboard.com/ Should start showing up TOMORROW! yay!

Super dooper mega congrats! you must be so proud of him and he should be beaming too! Hot Dog, doesn't that just make your day?!!!!