My 13yo's psychologist recommended that we apply for SSI benefits. Do I really need to do this? Do I want this? The idea of additional income to pay for his medications is appealing...and maybe to start a new therapy or see a psychologist long term as our insurance doesn't cover much at all. But what are the down sides...if we would even qualify? Any btdt advice would be much appreciated. Jennefer

Two more: "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall." - Ronald Reagan speaking at the Brandenburg Gate at the Berlin Wall. "I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." MLK at the Washington Rally in 1963.

I am trying to come up with 22 quotes from history from the year 1900 to modern day. I am in a co-op and we have 22 students in 1st-8th grade. We are going to have enough quotes so that at the end of the year celebration each child will have one quote to say. Can you help me brainstorm? I want these to be the kind of quotes that tend to be part of the American experience...that a well-read person will come across again and again. And/or ones that shape a life as well....If they can be connected to a specific event in history even better! Here is what I have so far: "All we have to fear is fear itself." FDR, 1st Inaugural Address "This is a day that will live in infamy." FDR on the bombing of Pearl Harbor "This is one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." Neil Armstrong on being the first man on the moon "And so my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you: ask what you can do for your country." JFK's Inaugural Address "Houston, we have a problem." James Lovell - Apollo 13 I would love a quote from Gandhi, Patton, MacArthur, Churchill, Eleanor Roosevelt.... and I would like it to be the something that person is most known/remembered for saying. I realize that for some of these people it's impossible to pick ONE that defines them... or a quote that kind of sums an event or an era. Thanks for your help!!!

We are in a co-op that is very academic with one enrichment period in there as well. There was not one in my area that fit what I was looking for so I helped start one. We started small with just 8 families. We are in our second year with 12 families. We cover non-core subjects - but are all the subjects that makes a well-rounded education and are best learned in a group (in my opinion): History (TOG), Science (currently using ES but switching next year possibly to Noeo), Music, and Art. I knew CC was not for us because of the price and other personal reasons. Yet I wanted to be part and wanted my kids to be part of a true learning community. I wanted to teach the core subjects myself - math, reading, grammar, spelling, phonics... - but just I just couldn't seem to be as consistent as I wanted to be with teaching History and Science. I was exhausted by the afternoon. Now we meet two afternoons a week from 12-4 and I know my boys are finally getting the education I want for them.

How much math is required? And since there is no teacher manual would it just work to buy the lecture DVD for the teacher and let her watch that to prep for teaching? I just went to his site and his About section and FAQ are not up yet. Is his material taught from a Christian perspective and if so is he dogmatic about YE? Thank you!

Oh and what about NOEO Physics III? Is this program quality? I bought NOEO once several years ago when DS was in elementary, but sold it to a friend because I realized it wasn't what I needed at the time.

Okay I like the look of Physical Science in Action...where do you buy these? I found Pearson's companion site where they sell books. Will they even sell to individual homeschoolers? I see that Amazon has the student book, but it is almost $100 to buy new. Where do purchase a Teacher Manual. Also, are there weekly experiments included? What level of math is required? And do you need the Reading and Study Notebook they offer? What about Prentice Hall Science Explorer? Does that require math? Would the three books: Sound and Light, Electricity and Magnetism and Motion, Forces and Energy make a complete program? We have 2 students in this class with some significant Learning Disabilities. The class is small. Currently 5 students and next year we expect to have around 7-8. I am hoping to stay away from a math based program for one more year. I know it is necessary in high school.

I have read that conceptual physics is physics without math but I have read that Hewitt's does have some math. Can you elaborate? In our co-op class most of the kids will not have taken algebra. My son will be possibly taking it next year but I need to be certain his pre-algebra really takes. ;)

I posted this on the logic board but realized I would possibly get additional help here. So far we have followed a traditional four year cycle (ala WTM) all the way through. Next year we are up to Year 4 - Modern History and Physics. BUT I am not having luck finding physics programs for jr. high students. I am not sure Noeo is meaty enough to really get students prepared for high school science. Thoughts? I have also looked at Hewitt's Conceptual Physics but it seems like that is for high school although I have read very conflicting things.

We used ESA last year and Chemistry this year in our co-op. It has been a great success. I am sad Physics for the Logic Stage won't be out for next year. We have elementary students complete a fill in the blank outline each week that the classroom teacher prepares. About 60-70% of the outline is completed and the students fill in the rest as they read. Middle school students alternate between outlining their reading selections each week and making notecards. They also have quizes over their reading each week to hold them accountable to really knowing the material. Before the co-op started I used Biology for the grammar stage and it was perfect for where DS was at that time.

We have been using Elemental Science for the past few years but Physics for the Logic Stage won't be available next year. So I'm looking into different options...both for eighth grade and for all of high school. We will be using this curriculum in a Christian co-op but most moms are not YE so we want to steer clear of Apologia for that reason. Noeo's website is beautiful but most of the reviews I've seen say it's boring. Have any of you used Physics III? And I love the idea of Hewitt's Conceptual Physics but are any of the books appropriate for jr high students? Other options to consider?? I'm at a loss here. I coordinate history and science for our co-op but I am NOT a science person. I am just doing it out of necessity until a more qualified person comes along. (That won't take much! :huh: ) Edited to add - Since this class is for jr high students we need a non-math based physics program. Searching for that is what led me to find out about Conceptual Physics but I just can't seem to find any consistent information about which grades this program is appropriate for. Thanks!

Our co-op has been using Elemental Science for almost all levels for the past 2 years. We are a classical co-op so we really enjoyed ES but she will not have Intermediate Physics out in time for us for next year (which is where we will be in the our 4 year cycle). So we are looking for a science program for 8th and beyond. We are a Christian co-op but many of our families are not YE - a Christian perspective is fine though. What programs are proven for excellence in high school given the above information?

This is so helpful. I copied all the tests the College Board requires and fortunately most of those are used by the neuropsych we'll be seeing. Thank you again!

No, I didn't know about any of the EF resources you mentioned. I've read a few books and come up with tons of modifications on my own and ways to help him grow...with limited success. Thank you!!!

Thank you, OhElizabeth. I was hoping you might weigh in. And thank you to both of you for encouraging the psych eval. I've struggled with having him test by another developmental pedi or go with the neuropsychologist. The appointment is set for mid-November. :)

This is similar to another post started but I didn't want to hijack Saraha's post. We got our initial dx of HFA (Aspergers at the time) and ADHD when my son was 7. It was done in Houston at Texas Children's Meyer Clinic for Developmental Pediatrics. A Developmental Pedi did the eval and gave the dx. Now fast fwd 5 years. We've been plugging along. And we're at an impasse. I remember a long time ago reading here that we would need a dx from a psychologist for future help from universities in high school if/when we did dual-enrollment or just started college courses. Is that still the case? I also have heard multiple times that these kiddos need to be "on the radar" long before high school in order to get any sort of services in adulthood/college if they were needed. What does that look like? What can anyone tell me about what I should be doing NOW to lay a good foundation for later success? I know I want testing done on his Executive Functioning skills. He has severe deficits in EF for sure. I just need to know how to help him with developing those. I also know I want another professional confirm his dx of HFA. Any help you can give is greatly appreciated.

Not sure about the ages of your kids but we use Elementary Spanish on Discovery Streaming for my youngers and Educación Española (their middle school program) for my oldest, which is also available on Discovery Streaming. These programs were developed at the University of Arizona (if memory serves correctly) and we have been very happy with the program. I have my boys do it at a much accelerated pace though. My oldest is just about to finish the program (the middle school program on Discovery Streaming only has lessons 1-50 and not 51-100 for some reason) so I'm about to be researching again, too. :)

We are a happy TOG family! Next year we will begin our third year with TOG. Is it necessary if you only have young kids? Nope! I did SOTW for 4 years with my oldest and we learned so much and had a ball! If you are not committed to TOG for the long haul or even to homeschooling for that matter I would hesitate to spend that kind of money. BUT if you love TOG then there's no reason to not jump in and do it even with younger kiddos. Having done both SOTW and TOG with LG students I think TOG is better but not tremendously so. Now, once you get to UG and beyond I wholeheartedly believe that TOG is an absolutely phenomenal program. Here was our schedule for UG and D students at co-op but you could easily follow a similar schedule at home (and this is what I would do if I stopped co-op at any point). Our co-op meets T/Th so those days were done in a group and M/W were done at home independently. Our T/Th class is 75 minutes. M/W time spent on assignments varied wildly depending on how fast the student read and wrote. My ds12 is very slow so sometimes he would spend a few hours on both M and W but the average student probably didn't need more than 90 minutes. Monday: Read History Core, Core In-Depth and complete Accountability Questions/Accountability Writing Assignment (I prepare these and do not use Writing Aids - just personal preference.). Tuesday: Go over answeres to Accountability Questions or read Writing Assignment aloud, do map work, and read Worldview (Church History) together. Wednesday: Read Literature selection and complete worksheet Thursday: Pop Quiz over Lit (found I needed this to get students to read at the level they needed to so that we could have an engaging discussion), discuss literature reading together and do timeline (We choose not to use TOG's timeline information b/c I prefer Homeschool in the Wood's materials but either way is fine - my way is more time consuming b/c you have to coordinate which figures align with each week) Friday: This was an off day for most kids but I had ds12 get a jump start on the following week. :) Probably more than you wanted to know but sometimes the biggest hurdle with TOG is figuring out how in the world to schedule it all!

Yes! I agree with happymomofboys. If you want a systematic reading of Scripture then TOG won't do that for you. But their worldview assignments are so rich that leaving them out would mean missing out on learning out some of the greatest heroes of the faith. My family does a Bible reading as well as Scripture memory at the breakfast table each morning before we officially start our school day because I do desire to have my children read from their Bibles in a systematic way daily. :)

I started TOG: Year One two years ago. I got through unit one and we fizzled. It was too much for me to plan and implement alone, yet I was more convinced than ever that TOG was the program for me. Last year I helped start a two-day-a-week afternoon co-op: history, science, music, and art (the subjects that I could just not get to - but the ones I felt really help make a well-rounded student). TOG is our history program. We jumped in and did Year Two with 8 families; it was wonderful! This next year we will do Year 3 with 15 total families in co-op and we'll have 3 levels - LG, UG, and D. Each year we are adding a level so in a few years we will serve K-12. As for supplements, I think MapAids is a must. We did the lapbooks last year with our LG and UG students but the teachers didn't think we got enough benefit from them to justify the cost and time. This year we will focus on doing more mini-projects in class rather than lapbooks. We also do timelines in co-op. We use Homeschool in the Woods timeline figures. In the LG class they will do a class timeline and UG and D students will each have their own timeline notebook. The notebook will be used all 4 years to stretch through a full cycle. It takes a bit of time but we have loved using this resource with TOG. As for writing, I do not use TOG's writing. I made up my own assignments but I did have the students write each week. Last year I taught our 6th-7th grade class using a mixture of UG and D books (UG for history core and history in-depth and mostly D for the lit). The writing assignments were always from our history reading, not from the lit. At the start of the year I simply had them answer in-depth comprehension questions (that I wrote) in complete sentences to get them used to being held accountable for their reading. Most of my students had never had to do this and it was a good place to start. As they become better readers (b/c they knew they were reading for a real purpose - answering the questions was only a part, classroom discussion was the other component) - we incorporated more varied writing. Sometimes the students had to write a journal entry as if they had just witnessed an historical event. I would give them very specific guidelines such as they had to include a minimum of 10 distinct facts about the event. Other weeks they wrote a newspaper article about an event. I also taught them how to compose summaries and the entire last unit they wrote 3-5 paragraph summaries of their reading. (We started with only 1 paragraph and worked up to the longer compositions.) This year I want to do better about giving them a grading rubric with each assignment that more clearly shows the expectations. I really enjoy TOG and continue to feel it is the program for us. A new mom joining our co-op shared a story with us in her interview. She is currently getting her masters degree at seminary. She and her husband (also getting his masters) have been so impressed with one young man in their class. His depth of knowledge and his strong Biblical worldview have astonished them. They finally had a chance to talk to him a few months ago and they asked him how he knew so much. He shared that he was homeschooled and his mom used TOG with them. He attributed his solid foundation to TOG! The family immediately began researching TOG and found our co-op. :) That being said, TOG is a tool. And like any tool it is only as effective as the one wielding it. TOG is certainly not a magic bullet. It takes time to implement. It takes time to teach. It is not open and go (in my opinion, although I know moms who certainly disagree). To get the most out of TOG the teacher/mom has to be prepared to lead intelligent discussions at any age. This is hard to do if you haven't read the material. And like a mom said before, there is a lot of reading. My biggest challenge in teaching my class was making the time to keep up with all the reading. Good luck on your journey!

Could you share what it is that you disliked?

How did you as the teacher learn how to use the program? If you get the homeschool package are the instructions clear enough to work from those. I am not very mathy so I want to be sure I get all I need to use it successfully. Thanks!

I missed that! Looks fun. Thanks!!!

How mom-intensive is this? Do I watch the video and then teach him? We watch together? I watched several of the videos on their site but was left was several questions still.

I posted awhile back about the struggles my ds12 was having with Pre-Algebra. I am now looking at going back and re-mediating. We have finished Horizons all the way through level 6. I am considering doing Singapore so he sees the same material but presented in a completely different way. I have seen that when the material he seemed to master in Horizons is presented differently, he can't do it...meaning he really didn't master it at all. Anyway, I am thinking of going back to Singapore 5 to start. Thoughts? Do I need 5A and 5B Texbooks, Workbooks and both Home Instructor Guides? And is the Extra Practice book necessary? I wish they bundled what you needed. All this separate stuff makes me a bit crazy! ;)