Jacobs Algebra ^^ this is a thread from 2018 that discusses differences between the original 1979 version, and the newer Masterbook version

And, at some point, please consider popping back in to let us know what you all decided on, and how it all worked out! 😄

Yes, as with everything, you really need to check with the specific college for their specific policy. Since it didn't sound like there was a specific future college/university selected at this point for the original poster, I just felt it was safer to make that point very strongly so that there would be no accidental slip-ups. 😉

ALL COLLEGE transcripts MUST be submitted when you apply for admission to a university. Failure to do so is, in essence, a form of fraud, and universities frown very heavily on that. Consequences can include: - student losing scholarship monies from the college -- and possibly even be required to pay back scholarship monies awarded and used - student may be kicked out of the university - student may even be stripped of a degree earned at the university (if the deception is not discovered until later) ANY CC or university courses taken, whether as DE while still in high school, or as a college student after high school graduation, WILL show up on that transcript from the CC -- which you are required to submit when applying for admission to the university. So, if wanting to do CC courses towards an AA, or courses in a CC/University art program, do them as DE, while she is still a high school student. That way she maintains freshman eligibility. If you mean taking courses for audit, rather than for credit -- be very careful. Many colleges still will count for audit classes as knocking the student out of freshman eligibility and into transfer college student status. And audited courses also show up on the transcript, and all transcripts are required to be submitted when applying to the university. I would highly recommend speaking directly to the university and find out their policies on all of these details -- and get it in writing of what they will/won't accept or allow. It is NOT worth the risk to try and "hide" any college classes a student took during a gap year.

Beowulf! So fun! A few things my co-op class has had fun with as go-alongs with Beowulf: - Benjamin Bagby performs Beowulf in the original Anglo-Saxon - images from the oldest surviving manuscript - Animated Beowulf -- 28-min. video nice introduction to the story, as the art is in the style of the Anglo-Saxons, and the language, while in prose rather than in the original epic poetry style, echoes a lot of the lovely images from the work - Beowulf Pronunciation Guide - Beowulf Resources -- website - Sutton Hoo website -- Anglo-Saxon burial site in England, from the time of the writing of Beowulf - Sutton Hoo artifacts -- images of some of the Anglo-Saxon grave goods / artifacts - The Dig -- Netflix feature film about the discovery of Sutton Hoo

For clarity: the person living in San Rafael said that it was almost a guarantee in SAN FRANCISCO that you'd get a car window smashed. The San Rafael resident said that had happened to them each of the last several times they had gone to San Francisco. The San Rafael person said that when they do have to go to San Francisco, they leave nothing in the car AND fold down the back seats so would-be thieves can SEE that there is nothing in the trunk. This was said by the San Rafael person this summer, so their San Francisco experiences were fairly recent. Just passing on experiences, in case it helps. So glad to hear that others have had GOOD experiences in living near the Bay Area. 😄

Speaking of the refinery, I stumbled over this review by someone who lived there and wrote about their experience, back in 2008: "I lived in Martinez for 6 years, and I have mixed feelings about it. I liked our house and our neighborhood (Westaire), but we didn't feel like Martinez had much to offer. Yes, the downtown is kind of cute, but it's pretty much dead during non-working hours. There are also very few (good) restaurants in Martinez. We always seemed to have to go to Concord, Pleasant Hill, or Walnut Creek to eat out. I don't know much about the schools, but I don't think they are all that great (not as good as Walnut Creek, anyway). I also don't know about the safety of the refinery, but it's an eyesore. Actually, every once in awhile, there would be a ''shelter in place'' alert. A horn would blow or you'd get a phone call to shut your windows and stay inside. I think this was due to soot being spewed out. I guess I didn't worry much about it, but maybe I should have. Some people love Martinez, but I just didn't. We lived in Walnut Creek before moving there, so maybe I'm biased, but I wish we had stayed there, or moved to Pleasant Hill instead. That said, Martinez is more affordable than the other nearby cities, which is exactly why we moved there in the first place..."

Oakland (30 min. away) and San Francisco (40 min. away) are listed as 2 of the top 3 CA cities with the highest homeless population rates. From news articles, it looks like homelessness is on the rise in Martinez as well, and the small city has had increasing difficulties accommodating needs in the past few years. Not meaning this as judgment, but there are a lot of difficult, non-family friendly issues that frequently orbit homelessness, such as unaddressed mental health issues, drug use, and crime. Friends recently were visiting in San Rafael CA, and were going to go into San Francisco to sightsee, and were told straight out to not drive or park their car on the street, as their windows would be broken by those looking to take valuables.

- jewelry making kit - sun catcher kit - candle making kit - soap making kit, gemstone soap making kit, etc. - card making kit, birthday card making kit - sewing kit - origami - bake and decorate a special cake or cupcakes Just an FYI: 10 Things I Hate About You has language, partying with underage drinking, and teen drunkenness; it is not really "cute" or "girly" IMO -- it is useful as a contemporary teen adaptation of Taming of the Shrew. Girly movies more geared for an 11yo: - Tangled (2010) -- Disney animated - Cinderella (2015) -- Disney live-action - Enchanted (2007) - Kitt Kittredge: American Girl (2008)

There are a few threads on the topic of taking a gap year linked on PAGE 6 of the "College Motherlode" thread pinned at the top of the WTM College forum. Also linking for you here: Let’s chat about gap years Revisiting the gap year conceptTalk to me about a gap year after high schoolGap year ideas: have we lost our minds (specifically a wilderness experience) When to apply for college when a gap year is being planned? Gap year and financial aid A few key things to consider in taking a gap year, when the student will go to college the following year: • Do NOT take ANY college classes -- for credit OR for audit -- from a university or community college or other That automatically kicks the student out of freshman status into "transfer student status -- which loses the student eligibility for freshman scholarships -- which are the most plentiful awards / largest awards / renewable awards (good for more than 1 year). • Talk to the future college Some will want the student to apply during the 12th grade year as normal, and be accepted, and be offered a financial aid package FIRST, and then will want the student to follow the school's process for deferring entry by a year in order to take a gap year. Other colleges will not grant deferments, so you need to find out if she can wait a year and apply as a freshman (again -- having taken NO college classes during the gap year). • Go into a gap year having FIRST made a plan Make sure you and the student have outlined expectations of what will happen during the gap year -- is the student going to self study? do volunteer work? get a job? learn or work on real-life "adulting" skills? or... ?? In your situation... a few thoughts: - I've known several families with a 16yo, too young to send to college; so they have the student "walk" the graduation ceremony with their peers, but do NOT award the diploma. For the following year, the student continues to live at home and does all dual-enrollment (college level) courses. At the end of the year, the parents award the diploma, and the credits transfer to the future university, so the student still entered with freshman eligibility for scholarships, but was already going in ready for more advanced courses, and with the gen. ed. courses knocked out, so ready for core concentration course focus for the degree, and able to graduate college in less time. - I understand that Law degree programs really like having students come in with a wide variety of Bachelor degrees -- Science, Economics, History, Political Science, etc. -- because that allows for a lot of helpful background info depending on what kind of law the student decides to "specialize" in. For both reasons above, would your daughter be willing to consider this option? Especially if the DE was all coursework that could be applied toward a future minor or towards doing a double major? - Again, how about "walking graduation" and then doing a year of DE -- and getting her Paralegal AAS degree? That would make her more employable at a higher salary and in the field she is potentially interested in WHILE she goes to college to earn her Bachelor's degree. There are online Paralegal AAS degrees, so no need to be on any college campus, if that is a problem. - Or, if DD is adamant about graduating high school this year, and sending her to college next year is not in her best interest, then how about using the gap year to either work -- in a law office, if possible -- or doing student internship work -- again, in a law office, if possible. You would possibly need to work with a law office or place of business to create an internship program for DD. - Or, what about spending a gap year where she sets up and runs her own business -- baking, for example. Just some rambling thoughts, and hopefully others will jump in with more ideas. BEST of luck! Warmly, Lori D. ETA: - Or, what about a year of a combination of activities to deepen/extend her knowledge/experience: + working part time + actively pursuing personal interests -- like writing towards a project (a novel, or creation of a blog or newsletter, or whatever the type of writing is that she is interested in) + self-studying in art, literature, history + volunteer work - OR, what about she plans and accomplishes a big year-long project as either her no-classes senior year, or as the gap year if you go ahead and award the ? Something like a managing a group community project, or a business venture, or teaching a course, or...? What a fantastic activity that would be on a college or job application. 😄

Just to clarify, I see Figuratively Speaking (FS) as just one possible way of learning and practicing seeing some of the devices used in literature. We NEVER analyzed literature by literary device (in other words, NOT like doing a "word search puzzle to find devices and check them off a list, lol.). We were definitely in the more informal camp, and with lots of discussion, as it arose naturally-- or not, lol. With 2 laconic DSs, sometimes I *did* have to ask a few leading questions to get DSs to tell me what they were seeing in the work. Often it was just a short statement like "hey, that's a lot like Star Wars there," and me asking "how do you mean?" I tend to refer to what we do when reading some of our literature as "digging deeper," rather than "literary analysis". But because "literary analysis" is the term most frequently is used to talk about discussing lit. or digging deeper into lit at the high school level, even though it's not really the same thing as theformal college-type of "literary analysis" (discussed up-thread), I think most of us just go with "literary analysis" when we are talking about doing something beyond just reading to find out what happens next. 😉 No. They didn't do that until high school, and even then, literary analysis essays were only a small part of the overall writing we did in high school. DSs only wrote about a few works of lit. during the high school years -- mostly it was discussion. As a side note, our writing in high school consisted of a lot of different types of "assignments" for writing such as: - oral presentation with slideshow - science labs - research paper with citations - real life writing -- resume, cover letter, various types of business letters - essays for schosarshipship applications or college admissions - "opinion" papers -- take a topic, decide on an opinion, then build an argument of support - various types of essays: cause and effect; personal narrative; definition; process ("how to") - etc. Windows to the World's unit on writing the literary analysis essay is the clearest, most specific step-by-step instruction I've seen. Designed for gr. 9-12, or for a strong reader/writer 8th grader. It starts with teaching annotation, then goes in to how you use some of your annotations as support in writing the literary analysis essay. The last half of the program covers 8-10 of the major literary devices and how they work, but also how they deepen the work. A high school literary analysis essay would look like NOT narration or a summary of the story. It would look like whatever the student's idea is (beyond the simple plot, or "what happened"), being explained, developed, and supported with points and examples from the work. It might be a character analysis. Or a comparison of some sort. Or writing about a theme that is at work in the lit. Or explaining a "key quotation" in the work. Or how/why the author built a certain mood or created suspense. Or an exploration of an aspect of the author's writing style. Or... At heart, a literary analysis essay is seeing something in the work and writing about that, using specific examples from the work as support. Like any type of persuasive writing, you have an opinion, or claim, or contention, or have drawn a conclusion about something (which is the claim part of the thesis statement), and then the body of the persuasive essay develops an argument of support for that claim, through points/reasons, which are in turn supported and fleshed out by evidence (examples from the work). Teaching the Classics is designed to teach you the teacher how to dig deeper with Socratic questioning. Many people watch the videos alongside their 8th or 9th grade student and they learn/do together. SWB also has an audio lecture on What Is Literary Analysis and When to Teach It -- and here's the conference hand-out that goes with it.

Informal appreciation of "craft" -- a writer's style or how a writer chooses to use language and develop the characters and story -- is also a lovely yet often underrated part of looking at literature. Not like you have to dig really deeply, unless you want to, but just pointing out beautifully written passages, or scenes that are very powerful, is a valuable part of literature studies, IMO. For example, I still remember being so delighted and surprised by both DSs (who tended to be laconic when it came discussion ;)), when they each, independently and unprompted, mentioned how much they appreciated Fitzgerald's writing skill and style in The Great Gatsby.

Sounds like you're doing great. 7th grade is a nice time to consider adding in Figuratively Speaking, and doing it casually, orally together for about 20 minutes, 1-2x/week, to start learning literary devices that are some of the "tools" of analysis. For more practice using the literary elements covered in Figuratively Speaking, scroll down in this thread to my post, and then further down to Alta Veste Academy's post for specific literature for discussing the devices: "Figuratively Speaking paired with short stories"

Yes, also just clarifying... The bolded was us as well. In the elementary grades, discussion was always very informal and came up naturally. It was not guided analysis. We started learning about literary devices along about 6th/7th grade, and we did use excerpts of some lit. guides starting in late middle school/high school for some books. Not every book. In high school, DSs wrote about some books. Again, not every piece of literature we read in high school.

Check out this webpage: Minnesota homeschool statutes and state dept. of education info about homeschooling It looks like most of your questions will be answered if you click on that link at the bottom of the page: Home-School Questions and Answers -- it downloads automatically as a PDF onto your computer.

Yes! Maybe as smaller crotched baby blankets! PS... It looks like if you do cross stitch, that could be an alternative... Geometric Triangles Temperature Cross Stitch Temperature Counted Cross Stitch Digital Pattern Heart Temperature Cross Stitch

Temperature Amineko Cat Temperature Amigurumi Giraffe Bohemian Wrap ETA -- A friend of mine did a crotchetd temperature blanket, and it came out really neat! She said that while she mostly did it as a row a day, there were times when several days or a week passed before she could get back to it, and she would just find the temperatures for those days to know what colors to use, and then catch up the rows.

Rabies is a 3-year vaccination. There is also the parvo/distemper vaccination that it highly recommended if your dog spends any time outside of your own house/yard. It looks like that is recommended for once every 1-3 years. Those are nasty diseases, so I would definitely have my dog vaccinated for those. If your dog spends a lot of time with other dogs or stays at a kennel, you might also want to research the annual Bordatella (kennel cough) vaccination. I've never heard of a titer (measures level of antibodies) for dog vaccines. There is a blood test for dogs to rule out heart worm, which is needed before putting a dog on a monthly heart worm prevention pill. Our dog has to have an expensive blood titer check on her Valley Fever, which is pervasive in the Southwest. We do this in the hopes that if her titer goes down enough and STAYS down, she can go off the meds, in a 3-months-off, 3-months-on, cycle to help reduce the heavy load the meds put on the liver.

We used Jacobs Algebra and 2nd ed. Geometry, and had all 3 elements for each (student text, teacher text, and solutions manual). I did find the teacher editions useful for the additional teaching info. But yes, if you are comfortable teaching higher maths with just the info that is in the student text, you could probably just go with the student text and solutions manual.

Not wanting to sidetrack this thread from original poster's focus, but I just wanted to add to @EKS's suggestion about how to learn to write/teach writing (taking a writing intensive class to challenge yourself). While that is ONE way to do it -- and may be a great way for some, and yea! so glad that worked so well for you EKS, and thanks for offering your experience and idea! 😄 -- that is totally NOT how I learned to teach writing to my own DSs while homeschooling, nor how I learned to teach writing to a class. There are many ways to learn how to teach writing, and some people really do find that a writing program helps them see how to teach writing (although, that was not what worked for me). But... getting into all of that would be great for a separate thread. 😉 And I believe the thread @Clarita is referencing is "Bringing Karen's mention of essay writing to a new thread" -- look for the 2 back-to-back posts by @8filltheheart that are about 3/4 of the way down on the first page of that thread.

Agree. No formal novel/literature studies below middle school. That's a great way of killing love of reading and literature for many reasons -- not least that it runs the risk of turning reading, which is (hopefully) enjoyable and magical for the child, into "schoolwork." Grade 4-6 is a wonderful stage for reading. So many fantastic, well-written books to enjoy at this reading level. In grades K-3, "formal reading goals" were more about getting solid in decoding, fluency, comprehension, and holding what came before alongside what is happening now to begin to predict what might happen later in the story. In grades 4-6, children now have that solid foundation, so "formal reading goals" are more about exploring a wide variety of genres (mysteries, humor, historical fiction, real-life adventure, fantasy, sci-fi, etc.), and about slowly increasing difficulty in vocabulary, sentence structure, and content/ideas. But at all of those grades, keeping the reading pleasurable is critical. Not as a formal novel (literature) study, but at that age I CAN see adding in some fun extension hands-on activities that are similar to things done or seen by characters in the book. Or make a food that is described in the book. Or possibly do a go-along short geography or history unit on that area of the world in which the book is set... etc. If you have a child who loves to do creative writing at that age, then maybe they might enjoy writing some "further adventures of" for the characters or the world of the book. BUT... my expectation, if doing something along these lines, would be to keep it as FUN supplement, and NOT kill the enjoyment of the book. Wishing you all the BEST in finding what works best for you and your students for enjoying the journey of reading those many wonderful children's books that make reading magical at this age! Warmest regards, Lori D.

Welcome to homeschooling 4th grade! And, good job on doing lots of research. And, esp. good job on realizing IN ADVANCE that this is way too much. 😉 So, how to cut back? First, let's figure out what is reasonable for a 4th gradestudent without learning issues, who reads, writes, and does math at grade level. Time-wise, plan on 3-4 hours per day of "formal" sit-down academics per day. That's it. Realize that trying to do too many subject areas each day is less effective for learning than streamlining and flowing your schedule with what works well for how THIS student learns. Some books and some other activities can go in a basket for free-choice supplements. Based on all of your resources, my opinion would be this: 4-5x week: Math - Singapore LA - Reading -- choose ONE LA - Writing -- choose ONE LA - Spelling - Sequential Spelling 2-3x week: LA Grammar - choose ONE 2x week, rotate: - History / Science so, 2 days do History, 2 days do Science, 5th day of week do fun supplements for either -- your Studies Weekly might be part of that, 5th day, along with any fun video and activity supplements 1x week, rotate: - Vocabulary -- Word Roots, or TG&TB vocabulary - Logic -- choose 1 of the 6 logic books and work through it at an enjoyable pace; save the rest for the future - Music - Art [I would assume 1 day a week you are getting out for field trips, nature walks, meeting with other homeschoolers, etc.] Choose ONE: TGATB LA 4 -- which says it covers writing, spelling, reading, grammar, vocabulary, geography, art appreciation --OR-- Writing (IEW OR writing guides); Readers & Read-Alouds; Fix-It; Word Roots Optional way of doing 2 histories: do units Example: do a chunk of SOTW2, like for 6-8 weeks, and then do 2 weeks of BF CA History; rinse, repeat. No -- put these away -- overkill (if you desperately want to do a few of these, then set aside what you chose as your "spine" writing (either TG&TB or IEW) and do one of these from time to time as a short break/unit study) - A huge assortment of random writing guides for different essays, topics, writings, etc. ( I feel like I have to do ALL of these) No -- put these away -- not appropriate for 4th grade; wait until the gr. 6-8 range: - Lit guides for all those readers - Literary devices supplements No -- please don't kill your child's budding interest in learning 😉 - ALL the supplements, supplemental books, graphic organizers, activity guides, worksheets, vocabulary for ALL the curriculum above… all the video link and encyclopedias referenced. Supplemental books -- put in a book basket for FREE CHOICE reading (which means if she doesn't choose to read anything in the free choice basket, it is FINE -- because it's FREE CHOICE) Graphic organizers -- use one very occasionally, but ONLY if it is really helpful; most are pointless busywork. Worksheets -- IMO, unless a kid LOVES worksheets and really learns from worksheets -- dump as many as possible Vocabulary -- just learn in context, by providing definitions as you read; no need to have busywork to fill out Good luck, and remember to ENJOY your journey! This is a lovely age for encouraging a real joy of discovery and learning in children, so be careful not to crush that with traditional school-y things. 😉 Warmest regards, Lori D. ETA -- PS: re: read alouds Star your top FIVE books you'd like to do as read-alouds for the year. If you get to more on your list, great. If not, it's still great because you achieved a reasonable goal. re: notebooking Only do notebooking if it fits your child's style -- that would have KILLED any interest in learning in both of my DSs, so YMMV. re: volume of writing Like Rosie said above, lots of learning and synthesis happens with just reading and talking, rather than writing about every.single.thing... re: analyze every book, practice writing all the types of essays Analysis of books, and essay writing, are not developmentally appropriate for 4th grade. Those are middle/high school skills, because they require abstract thinking/logic portions of the brain to have developed (which doesn't happen until along around age 13 on average). Again, let your kid be a 4th grader and have success and ENJOY 4th grade -- don't try and make her do 8th grade work, or 3x the work. I know it all looks cool, but set the bulk of it aside, and just do a little each day until you have a good routine and you can actually see what REALLY WORKS. for you and for DD for amount of school that brings forth fruit without overkill. 😉

How about planting some nice thick fast-growing climbing vines instead? 😄 That changes the exterior look, and kicks that can down the road of either upkeep on changing the exterior color in some way, or doing something fairly permanent, and risk looking dated in a few years... 😉

Eek! Well, then totally expunge that one from the list!! 😵

Super cute button toy! I think that Haba magnet maze looks nice, but that would have been used twice and completely over it in less than 2 minutes at our house. Maybe something with magnets but that is more open-ended to allow for imaginative play/story telling? Like a magnetic make a scene set? I loved the look of those Picasso tiles linked by the poster up-thread -- that looked like a lot of mileage for the price.