With my daughter, I've used strickly DO because that's what she needed without supplementing harder until she was done. We've now moved on to AoPS Prealgebra, supplementing with Alcumus and Mathcounts materials. Things you might consider using to supplement Prealgebra - Alcumus (free on the AoPS website) or one of Ed Zaccarro's books.

Brave Writer has both a family class and a high school class in the spring. Center for Lit has a 1 week class discussing a play this summer.

My 2E daughter is doing prealgebra through Derek Owens this year. You can outsource it all to him or you can pay half-price and do the grading and support yourself. My daughter watches the videos and does the assigned homework. I grade it and control the speed through the course. If she's getting stuck anywhere, I can back up and teach that portion myself with other materials, otherwise she's been learning through DO and doing great. It has freed up my time to teach her elsewhere while still moving her along in math.

I think you are ok with starting with 100EZ. If the going gets rough, you can then research further what would be the best for your child. I use Barton Reading and Spelling to teach my dyslexics.

I also suggest Derek Owens. Some options you have are to go as fast of slow as needed. If you are comfortable answering questions and grading then you can use the half-price option and get to extra support - just do it all on your own. This is what I've done with my son that needed to take me out of the equation of being the primary teacher.

I teach chemistry lab to a small group out of my garage (Illustrated Guide to Home Chemistry Experiments) and I teach biology and physics on my own at home.

Ours takes about an hour. Go over rules, paperwork etc.

I used Runkle Geography for 1/2 credit. I am unaware of colleges specifically requiring a year of geography. I don't care so much about what other high schools do.

HUGS. Sometimes you just have to grin and bear it. ... and ignore the stares of others. :closedeyes: I have two with Tourettes. My oldest has always squeeked and cleared throat, grunted, coughed throughout church off and on. Most of the time, he isn't bothered by his tics and he's generally unaware of the adults staring at him trying to send him silent messages to be quiet, shaking their head or doing something else. Some of these adults I go to later and say, by the way my son has Tourettes. I just wanted to make you aware. I know sometimes people try to get him to stop ticcing, but he's unable to control these tics. They always respond that they'd "never" try to make him stop, but the reason they are being talked to in the first place it that they do. It helps them understand for the future. My daughter is much more bothered by her vocal tics in church. They frustrate her more than others and that is a hard battle. Mostly she whistles at inappropriate times in church, but deals with other simple and complex vocal tics as well. Take care. (I missed this post originally as I don't look at the SN board nearly as much as the Learning Challenges board).

I love my SL cores and still do them with my kids. I agree about the problems with changing every year and getting rid of the forums. I own complete cores preK through middle school, but tend to pick and choose my own thing for high school - adding in favorite SL books as well. I've used SL for 13 years now, but the marketing makes it hard to understand and with no forums to ask lots of questions I feel like it's harder to recommend to new people.

I cry every time I read that book. My kids just wonder what's wrong with mom.

See this thread for a lot of my answers and feel free to ask anything else about BW if you want. http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/587848-what-online-writing-for-competent-but-very-reluctant-writer-10th11th/?do=findComment&comment=6847259 and this one lists all the classes we've done http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/588947-bravewriter-for-hs-credit/

Yes, of course add in readers and read-alouds. I just assume that's a given with anything you do since it's such a part of our family lifestyle, but I know it's not that way at every home.

Can it - YES? Will it at your home - it all depends on how you use it. If you look at Jot it Down, part of it is the weekly/monthly projects, but part of it the Brave Writer "lifestyle" - this includes poetry, narration and dictation in which spelling and grammar will be taught more naturally. Julie Bogart does recommend using some formal grammar, but doesn't recommend doing it every year. The projects are not enough for all of your LA, but I don't think you have to add a different program to it if you do the other things she recommends as well. For those ages, I've done a lot of teaching grammar and spelling through copywork but without formal programs for most of my kids. My current 3rd grader is not a fluent reader yet so a lot of time is spent teaching reading to him.

My AoPS kids do Brave Writer classes for composition - completely different, no "daily" practice, no challenges, but it works well for them.

I would also consider another year of algebra. Oftentimes, kids don't do great in algebra because their foundational skills such as fractions, negative numbers, exponents are shaky.

Reading clicked with my daughter about age 11. My 9 year old is still sounding out short words and doesn't even begin to guess on harder ones. Both have diagnosed dyslexia and have spent years using Barton Reading and Spelling.

Why have an IEP - I don't know (for just homeschooling)? Once you have it, it might make certain things easier. If you need any services through the schools or live in a state where they will give scholarship money for learning disabilities, then it may be very worthwhile. You can get college accommodations with learning disability testing through a psychologist. You can get accommodations on ACT/SAT with the same learning disability testing. You can get learning ally with the same learning disability testing. You don't have to go through the process of getting an IEP or 504 just to get accommodations.

I also would recommend against calculus as a 5 week summer course. Too much too fast - you just need time to process the information as well as work lots of problems etc.

My math geek loves Discrete Mathematics and anything by Arthur Benjamin. My second son loves the physics videos and everything else by Richard Wolfson. "My" new favorite is Everyday Engineering, though we like all the other engineering videos as well. My oldest also likes all the Vandiver lectures.

With my oldest, I read and scribe math through precalc due to severe dysgraphia. He is now independently doing AP calculus with the only accommodation that he doesn't have to write out all the daily homework - just the free responses and tests. Teach to their needs. Separate out the parts that need more work - whether it be separating reading or writing from the math teaching or providing a calculator for harder division problems so that they can move along in math while you go back and work slowly through teaching long division by hand. Do what's best for your child, but do aim to work on all the pieces even if you have to separate them.

Adam and Missy Andrews are definitely Christians themselves and it just comes through in some of their conversations. I've never heard anything in their Center for LIt classes that I'd call preachy. In many of the lit discussions, you'd never know, but depending on the book the discussion might turn toward Christian values and sometimes it sounds like he's talking to an audience that all has a Christian worldview. One of my kids says it is obvious that he's a Christian from how he talks in the high school class, but another was surprised saying nothing "Christian" was ever said in the Jr. High lit course. My impression is that he doesn't guide the class that way, but if the conversation from the students (or from the book) leads to a more moral/religious discussion, then he definitely speaks from a Christian worldview as that is who he is.

Yes, I've done SM paired with Beast through elementary with a severe dyslexic. My daughter has great math logic, but had a lot of trouble learning many of the steps of long division, fraction multiplication, decimals, etc. I read her all the problems (with words) since she couldn't read them herself. She always ran behind grade level in math, but we kept poking along at her lever. She in now in middle school and progressing through math much faster and I suspect she'll pass up many of her peers soon. I have a son I'm currently reading all his math too as well (SM and Beast).

I vote for doing the Continuation Course as well. The theme books do cover the material, but it isn't "taught" as well.

Brave Writer does not have any religious content in the teaching or assignments in all the online classes that I've seen. Some students may choose to write about their own faith based experiences, but that is student driven and not assigned. Center for Lit definitely is taught from a Christian worldview in their lit courses.