I ***love*** this kind of learning (TWTM-style of studying great books). I would ***love*** for my kids to learn this way. I have this fear that when asked what they thought they will say, after reading a 500-page Great Book, they will say "I didn't get it" or "I thought it was dumb." Then what?? I've been doing study guides, but those can be very frustrating. They still sometimes say "I don't get it." Or sometimes, the questions really are vague or misleading. But I can't read these books aloud with them or even silently to myself with them. So we switched to reading shorter chunks, and narrating in writing what they read. They understand a lot better. But I still have a fear of assigning an essay topic after it's done, or having them write any sort of summary or analytical-type essay/paper at the end. I want someone to upload all the Great Books and study guides into my brain like in the Matrix. I think what I need though, is assurance that after reading a Great Book, it's OK if your child got the plot, and a glimpse into a couple themes, but can't pull it all together. And maybe over time, he'll be able to do that?? Maybe?? BTW my 2 Great Books students are 8th and 9th grades. And in the course of this school year, I can see that they've made a lot of progress. Maybe an analogy would be, *requiring* them to jump through hoops (the hoops being, "understand themes X,Y and Z in this book and discuss them intelligently") or letting them discover 1 or 2 hoops on their own. Any suggestions or encouragement?

Thanks for passing on the link! Looks like lots of great stuff.

... and it's working out wonderfully. We're not using Omnibus but my kids just write a progym ex that is appropriate for the book they're reading.

Not sure if you mean teaching all the exercises in 2 years (fast) or spending 2 years on each exercise (slow). I just got Composition in the Classical Tradition. I am very pleased with how easy it is to understand. I'm using the structure of each exercise with my kids, but they're not reading the book itself (has some really icky examples). We will not have any problem completing all the exercises in 2 years (our plan), esp. at an older age (8th and 9th grades). They earlier exercises, such as narrative and fable, are really quite simple at this age. As for the price, I was slowly collecting the volumes of Classical Composition used... at $25 each new, that's about $300 for all the exercises-- which makes CCT a bargain even at full price. I got it used for about $45. In summary, CCT is an excellent resource for the parent. It's short, written in a very direct style. I was able to outline over half of it in less than 2 hours, which gave me enough to write up assignments for those chapters.

What about English department testing? I would think if the counselor says he can test out, means there is a test offered by the school, somewhere in some department.

We really liked Sophocles' Oedipus Rex, the first play of the trilogy... my 13yo actually said "I don't want to stop reading it, I have to find out what happens!" It's short which makes it more approachable. If your dd likes it she could go on to read the other 2. But lots of folks read only the first. We're currently reading the first 8 lives of Plutarch per Omnibus I and getting a lot out of them. The lives are short (20-ish pages each), and written in pairs (a Gk and a Roman) with a comparison for most. Another thing that makes them interesting is that they were Shakespeare's sources for the main facts of Julius Caesar, Antony & Cleopatra and other plays. Again, she could try a couple pairs, and stop if she doesn't like them.

I'm requiring accountability for clean rooms. if I say clean it, then the kids are not free to play or do anything else until I've inspected it. If I'm not available to inspect it for a couple hours, too bad! (although I lift this restriction for my consistently faithful kids) Inspection is the only way to hold them accountable to clean. If the "reward" is having friends over, then they don't get that reward until it's been inspected, period.

This may or may not be applicable to your situation, but my slow-reader son is much more motivated if I tell him to read a certain number of pages, rather than for a certain number of minutes. He also has to write about most of his reading, which tells me whether he understood it or not. We used Rocket Reader, a speed-reading program, for a couple years when my boys were younger. It helped a lot while they were using it, but when they stopped, they pretty much went back to their old ways.

UC Merced just opened a few years ago. Merced is about 50 mi from Yosemite.

Oops, wanted to clarify a couple things. First, the lectures are audio files. And as to what to buy, you should buy the textbook and the workbook. BTW this book is designed to be completed by seminary students in one year. It covers pretty much all grammar and several hundred of the most common NT vocab. I think it's very doable for a motivated high schooler to complete it in a year (although we're doing a little slower).

We're using Mounce's Basics of Biblical Greek. Great for self-study which is what my boys are doing. You can buy a workbook and from Mounce's website, you can download the answers to the workbook. He even has quizzes at the website (no answers for those) and some short lectures that can supplement the book, I believe. And, a computer flashcard quizzing program to download. All this extra stuff is free. This text is very doable, esp. if you've already had Latin. Oh, and about self-study, I'm even having them grade their own work, in order for them to see the correct translations for themselves. The answers are very thorough; every single word is translated so you can tell exactly where your mistake was.

I really like this! So simple. I think the hard thing for me would be to remember to update it. But I could make that a "to-do" on my Palm...

I love my Excel workbook. I've got the whole year's assignments in it (a rough framework at the beginning, filled-in more as we go), along with attendance, holidays, # of school days completed to date, etc. I have a worksheet for each child. The next worksheet is each child's grades. I only keep percentage-type grades on a daily basis for Math, Latin and Greek. But it calculates grades for each quarter, semester and the year. I also have a worksheet for stuff we're supposed to all learn each year such as poetry and music selections, but haven't been consistent with it. The boys keep their assignments on the computer (they print me a copy and I throw it away after I'm done with it), each subject in its own folder. I started with Donna Young's gradebook and customized from there. As for organizing recitals, etc. I use a Palm and that is my brain! I also have my Excel gradebook on the Palm for reference, but don't edit from the Palm, only from the desktop.

That's true at dh's school as well... bigger schools have more FT, and currently dh is one of 6 FT physics teacahers, but at his last school (Bay Area) he was the only FT physics teacher. PT do have lower priority than FT. In OC, you most likely have lots of schools to choose from and they are probably all pretty big. You should be able to figure out which are the best ones, the ones with the highest transfer rate. Another downside of PT is that you get last choice of classes and for English, the classes they offer most of are... remedial. And, the pay is per class, which may not translate into much per hour. But, PT is your best way to get your foot in the door for FT. But don't let me discourage you. There are downsides to every job. Go for it! Jennifer ... dreaming of starting classes for homeschoolers after I'm done with my kids BTW I'm in Sacramento.

DH teaches physics at the community college... what's not to love? Great time off, more mature students (than high school, anyway), returning students who really want to "do it right" this time. Part-time is definitely not as great as full-time; part-timers often get stuck with night and weekend classes (unless that's what you want, of course).

Seconding Warriner's for a good, basic foundation. We have found a few at book sales (no answer keys, but I haven't needed them) and just use whichever book is handy. I think we used the 10th grade one this year (for 8th & 9th graders). The thing that's been so helpful is their sentence to paragraph to essay approach like kathleen mentioned. No fluff, lots of good meaty (but not overwhelming) stuff. We used this same 10th grade volume for solid, systematic formal grammar coverage in 6th grade as well. I like the older, 1960's language and typesetting myself too. :-)

I haven't decided yet.... now that you mentioned the online class I may have to save it for my next child and try the online option!

We're using it this year for my 2 oldest, 8th & 9th grades. The study & essay questions are not difficult. They are very appropriate for these grades; my kids would have required more help from me to use this in 7th grade. The discussion questions are great for a mom who wants to have an out-loud discussion with 1 or more kids, once or twice a week. The reason it isn't working so well for us, is I just can't do out-loud discussions. I tried and tried, and it's too time-consuming, too hard to keep them focused. that's just us. I wanted instead, something where they could answer some fact-recall questions, and some paragraph-answer questions. Write them out on paper, and I could read it later. And Leithart fit the bill perfectly. (No answer key, but I haven't had trouble finding the answers if necessary.) This didn't work well for Omnibus. There are so many questions to choose from that it was a lot of work for me picking out which to answer. As I said earlier, the assignments are long. Difficulty-wise, they're not hard, but there are a lot of questions. (I suppose that's better than not enough, though.) And, I found by experience this year, that my kids weren't ready to write 5-paragraph essays each week. We're working instead, on writing a couple coherent & well-organized paragraphs each week. So that means I can't really use the essay questions (although I hope to use a couple this coming spring, and work on each paragraph as a separate assignment). I really wanted Omnibus to work. I'm impressed by those who make it work. But I also have 2 other kids who need my attention, and my oldest don't honestly have the time to put into doing all of Omnibus, or even just the primary books. They study Latin *and* Greek, plus the math, music practice, etc etc. Shorter and fewer readings, and written assignments (vs. discussions) work better at this house. (I really like the book *The Latin-Centered Curriculum* and that's more what we follow.) I'm sure I sound lame but I'm actually very happy with the way it's all worked out.

I started out intending to use more and found it difficult to adapt for our homeschool. Spielvogel Aeneid Plutarch Julius Caesar Screwtape Letters Sophocles, Oedipus Rex (only one play, not all 3) My top priorities were to Odyssey/Iliad (I let my kids choose and they chose Iliad which isn't even in Omnibus) & Aeneid for the epic genre; Sophocles for drama; Plutarch for history/biography; Julius Caesar because we do 4 Shakespeare plays each year (we'll also cover Antony & Cleopatra which isn't in Omnibus); Screwtape Letters because I like that book. It helped me to focus on one "biggie" for each type of literature. When I needed to fill in I've added Ben Hur, another "living history" book called Lion Gate & Labyrinth, Bulfinch's Mythology and R. Sutcliff books. I found the Omnibus assignments to be too long for us. I also really preferred Leithart's book, Heroes of the City of Man, which works well as a commentary with study & essay questions. It includes many of the Omnibus books (not all). So, we ended up using so little of Omnibus that next year for medieval, we'll just use our own study guides such as Leithart's Dante commentary.

FWIW we're using Lingua Latina which is way more interesting and very thorough. And, much easier for me to keep up with it. A child who loved to "figure things out" would *love* LL as it's entirely in Latin!

My oldest almost finished Level 1 in 7th grade, but wasn't understanding it well. It's difficult for a parent to learn along w/the student, so we switched to something that was easier for me to keep up with (Lingua Latina). Even though AL doesn't require daily teaching on the parent's part, I've found that any Latin program runs *much* more smoothly if the parent has at least half a clue. AL is impossible to "skim". Probably my kids were a little too young to be expected to do it totally alone. Not because they aren't able to work independently, but AL is written at a fairly high level; the grammar explanations (the farther along you get, esp.) can seem abstract and hard to understand. The other thing that made it hard to use, was that if my child came and said "I don't understand X", even if *I* understood it, it was very hard to direct him to a clear explanation of X. It is meant to be read straight through, like a script, and there are few summaries or bullet points or outlines, if any. Hope this is helpful.

Hi Nan! In a post recently you mentioned "Natural History" as a sort of big-picture biology program... is this a curriculum, or if not could you enlighten me as to what you were referring to? I'm intrigued. You also mentioned Conceptual Physics, which we like. My 9th grader is reading through the text and readers. He really enjoys them. DH is a community college physics teacher and he picked up CP years ago as a high school student-teacher... the school was getting rid of them, and his mentor-teacher said, "Keep a set! They're great!" Jennifer

I don't believe state law guarantees open access. I think I read in HSLDA that only 15 states have such a law, and CA isn't one of them. The only "loophole" I've found is to join a charter school in my local school district, then my child could play sports at the local high school (however it's still the principal's final call). Instead, we've found club-type sports that my kids can play outside of high school and that's working great for us. My 9th grader is in crew and I found a track & field club too.

Basic goal: All of our kids will complete Latin grammar before high school. This is typically covered in high school Latin in 2 years. My students will study Latin grammar in grades 4-8. (back up: My 2 oldest are 8th & 9th grades, and each started Latin in 5th grade. After a couple false starts they're completing Lingua Latina Book 1 which will complete the grammar. So my oldest is a year behind and will complete grammar at the end of 9th.) Advanced Goal: To read Latin authors such as Cicero, Vergil, etc. in high school. This will be their choice. If they prefer they can start another language instead. You have to look at each text to see how many levels it takes to complete grammar study. We really like Lingua Latina. I believe Henle finishes most of the grammar in book 1. Hope this makes sense! Jennifer