I think middle school is a fabulous time to investigate things your son is interested in. Don't worry about trying to check off all the boxes of subjects unless you have to report to someone. Don't worry if you aren't doing formal science, as long as your child is LEARNING. I would not postpone areas like math however. Have fun learning wherever it takes you - electronics or computer programming.

I agree that computer programming is not science. However, if you've already done a bunch of science I see no reason that you can't follow a different trail in middle school and do computer programming instead or go lighter with traditional science. My kids know lots more science that most, but at any point in time we are not always doing science. I have one child who started programming in high school with Python - self taught with edX courses and a textbook. My middle schooler started with scratch (a great free way to start learning concepts) and moved on to visual basic with KidCoder.

I think a "typical" pace for an average student would be one section per day in the textbook and then 3-5 days on the reveiw problems. To go faster, you can cover multiple sections on one day and move through the review sections faster. Alternatively, what we did was cover one section per day per book but out of multiple books so that we were going through one book at an average pace, but covering multiple books at the same time. Often we'd do the new sections in one book while working on the review problems from a different book and then flip-flop which book we are learning new sections in. Don't be afraid to change it up to make it work for you.

I would tend to recommend staying with AoPS. If it's easy, just move faster. I do think you can skip the prealgebra book and jump to the algebra book if you desire. Also note that starting with chapter 10 (I think) in the prealgebra book, it moves on to topics in geometry and counting and probability. My concern about starting both brothers together in the algebra book would be that the younger might find it much easier than the older. It might work well in your family, but I know it wouldn't work well in other families. I'd also think about starting some of the other AoPS books like number theory and counting and probability. This might provide a challenge in a different direction.

I like some of the kits put together by Home Science Tools.

It seems to be areas of the country and specific school systems where this is more prevalent. I find it awful that it will affect kids that really need the accommodations. After my son got accommodations I googled to see how common it was to actually get accommodations. I found many stories of people cheating the system to try to boost their scores just a bit. I also was infuriated by articles that say all kids that score in the upper percentiles with accommodations obviously don't need the accommodations. Well this applies directly to my child who is very smart, but has to have the extra time to read and process the questions.

My impression is that the neuropsych test scores are the most important and that the educational plan pretty much says you do use accomodations in real life. How I did my "Homeschool Educational Plan" Basic info - name, birthdate, address, etc. List of diagnoses - with ICD codes and name and date of person diagnosing Elementary accomodations - a single paragraph summarizing that I had scribed throughout elementary. I also included a paragraph summary of testing done in elementary school. Middle school - I started listing by year - most years were a duplicate of other years - I borrowed some of the language from neuropsych and educational testing reports where they listed suggested accomodations. Here's what I listed for 9th grade: School Accommodations: ... may ask for any work to be dictated and scribed. He then edits it independently. Limit amount of copy work or written work that can otherwise be done orally. Learning Ally subscription gives ... the option to listen to literature rather than read it himself. ... may read to himself, listen to texts on Learning Ally or request texts to be read aloud. Extended time for reading. Allow any type of print and do not count off for messiness or mixed upper and lower case. Extended time for all written assignments and tests. Reduce amount of copying. For instance, provide math problems rather than the student copying them. Break written assignments into step-by-step plans that break written assignments into small tasks. Edit the assignment separately from the writing of the assignment. Allow student to dictate work and have it scribed. The student will then edit the work independently.Allow student to use writing instrument of choice (e.g. pen instead of pencil) Allow graph paper for math. Allow much of math to be done in head. If written, ... is allowed to dictate all answers. ... may request any schoolwork to be read aloud. Teacher to provide copy of lecture notes. I also summarized pertinent testing by grade. We got accomodations by both College Board and ACT, but his testing scores reflected his need for accomodations.

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When I'm using Internet Explorer, I can't seem to post anything. When I hit reply and type in my post, I then submit it and I get an error that says "enter a post" and my message is gone. I do seem to be able to post using Firefox. Any idea what I need to do to fix this with IE?

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What's CLE? I can't seem to place it right now.

I never used the HIG at any level and did fine. I do have strong math background however.

My son is taking it tomorrow at the local high school.

To understand IEW better, it is recommended to also get the teacher videos. Do you have them? I think you could easily move on in IEW it is just story sequence that she doesn't get. If she isn't retaining anything, then maybe something other than IEW would work better for you. I'm not sure. My oldest was an extremely poor writer through elementary and middle school. It has now all fallen into place with Brave Writer - both their ideas (Writer's Jungle) and their high school and family courses.

While the punishment is harsh, we have no way of knowing if it fits the infraction. I hope the videos remain available through youtube. I would still like my son to watch the videos. We can do problem sets from anywhere. I took the course last fall when it was offered - homework, tests, and all.

My oldest has had a huge improvement in handwriting from VT this year. It has truly been remarkable. I scribed for the first ten years of school and now he choosing to take his own notes and writing (somewhat) legibly. His processing of language from idea to words has also dramatically improved. ... in his case VT was specifically done for his handwriting issues.

I would look hard at the Home Science tools kit. I don't know exactly what experiments they include in the chemistry kit, but having done several other kits put together by HST, they were much better quality instructions, learning and equipment compared to other kits.

I've done all of SM without the HIG. I'm a math person and had no trouble figuring out what the book wanted.

My recommendations: 1) Choose whatever curriculum will give your child the best education for his/her circumstances. In general, they need to be challenged at their level, but not necessarily super challenged in every subject. 2) You are in charge of the grades (unless you are outsourcing). There is nothing that says you have to grade a certain way or can't give opportunities to improve a grade through extra credit or retesting, etc. 3) Challenge is good - going too easy doesn't build life skills. However, you don't have to go overboard with challenge in everything in life. I don't think you have to pick the most challenging curriculum in every subject. "My" son will not be doing the most challenging biology as this will give him more time to work on very challenging math, physics, and computer science. If he expends too much energy in challenging every area, then he won't have the energy/inclination to excel in areas he's passionate about. I'm also having to deal with how to balance the work-load with learning disabilities. I'd first pick the curriculum that is best for your child and then figure out how you want to grade it.

Professor Carol (of Discovering Music) has a daily email about advent for this season. It is full of the history of advent and very interesting. Here's a link: http://www.professorcarol.com/category/blog/advent/

I tend to buy all my glassware from HST and buy all my chemicals from Elemental Scientific. If you are buying for only one person it might be just as easy from HST. Elemental Scientific can be easy or very slow to order from, but their prices are good on small quantities of chemicals.

My oldest went from SM 5b to AoPS Algebra (math kid). My second went from 5b to AoPS Prealgebra.

The kit is this (and you can download the manual for free): http://www.thehomescientist.com/kits/CK01/ck01-main.html Here's the DIY chemistry text - Illustrated Guide. http://www.amazon.com/Illustrated-Guide-Home-Chemistry-Experiments/dp/0596514921

The chemistry lab version by the same author but available with smaller scale chemicals and the downloadable manual is very different from the textbook, Illustrated Guide. It is smaller scale. If you buy the kit, many of the chemicals are premixed rather than you having to figure out how to make a 1 molar solution of various things. Many of the labs "tell" you what you are supposed to learn rather than you experiencing being able to measure everything and do all the math. It is definitely economical, but less fun and less educational in my experience.

I step through the example problems of each section with my child. I then assign the next set of problems. Any problems they have difficulty with, we do together. I skip the challenging problems if they are too challenging (one child).