Lots of reading. Evals are helpful but for me they are a lot of doublespeak -"Woodcock Johnson blah blah blah" is what I hear when they start talking. My gut told me something was wrong when DS came home from K crying because it was too hard, didn't like Sesame Street because it was too hard. I knew something was wrong but what? Reading gave me some understanding of what was going on. The testing and evaluations helped with getting services and confirming what my gut said. I knew DS had Dyslexia because of what I read, the test to confirm this didn't happen until way down the road because most of the school evaluations don't test for that. We knew he had a processing disorder but the test didn't say what that meant. I like the website LD.org. It has a lot of information about LDs and how to find testing, what to do as a parent, etc. Might be a good place to start.

Lots of reading. Evals are helpful but for me they are a lot of doublespeak -"Woodcock Johnson blah blah blah" is what I hear when they start talking. My gut told me something was wrong when DS came home from K crying because it was too hard, didn't like Sesame Street because it was too hard. I knew something was wrong but what? Reading gave me some understanding of what was going on. The testing and evaluations helped with getting services and confirming what my gut said. I knew DS had Dyslexia because of what I read, the test to confirm this didn't happen until way down the road because most of the school evaluations don't test for that. We knew he had a processing disorder but the test didn't say what that meant. I like the website LD.org. It has a lot of information about LDs and how to find testing, what to do as a parent, etc. Might be a good place to start.

I have been looking at this Geography Lesson Plan by Harmony Art Mom-http://www.squidoo.com/harmonyartmomeleventhgrade#module64427311 It looks pretty good.

We started with one text and ended up switching to World View History which is an on-line text to use as our spine. DS has LDs so for him the on-line format helps and they offer quite a lot of activities for alternative assessments that you can use for each level of student LD, REG, and T&G. The course was cheap so that was good. There is no teachers manual and no tests to go with it so you are on your own for grading and testing.

This is our plan for DS. I read about this idea in an article at LD.org and I believe it is a good choice for our DS. I am afraid if he went the traditional route, he would flame out and be discouraged. I think many LD kids can function just fine in a 4 year institution, but they are super motivated and leaps and bounds ahead of my kiddo in the executive function skills.

DS enjoyed it a lot but it is definitely not a curriculum. Professor Linwood is kind of goofy but my son ate it up. If your student is more serious his presentations might seem lame. I agree with Cat that you can use the lectures as an intro to whatever topic you are covering and the discussion guide is helpful in going over what was covered in the lecture.

We are currently using the curriculum. You will see comments about God as our Creator throughout the book but so far there is only one Chapter on Evolution that strongly presents the Creationist viewpoint. I am might be wrong since I pretty much have just turned the material over to my son-but I have tried to follow the outline and match up the material with videos from Khan Academy and Crash Course Biology. You could easily skip that chapter and use another source for that unit. The material also is in the no global warming camp which came up in the ecology unit so that could be bothersome to someone who is very concerned about the environment.

For me Peace of Mind is all in my attitude. There are days when I walk into the kitchen and every cupboard door is open and no one put the milk back in the fridge and I just take care of it without thinking. There are also days when I nicely remind my kids to take care of their mess, but on some days I am screeching at them like a banshee:( When I step back and look on it, while the mess bothers me, it is really not the mess. It is about how unappreciated I feel, or how tired I am, etc. It all goes back on me. Now how to keep a good attitude requires taking care of myself physically and spiritually. It also requires me to let everything go about once a month and just go shopping or out with girlfriends or whatever. When I do this-I have to tell myself if I come home and the house is a disaster and no one seems to care, it is ok. I will deal with it tomorrow. My tendency is to never take a day off of what needs to be done and that just isn't healthy for me.

Here is a link to an article on National Review Online addressing some of the concerns of Common Core. http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/344519/truth-about-common-core-kathleen-porter-magee I haven't really followed the issue but have heard some of the claims by different people about what is going on. This is a fair sounding rebuttal to some of the concerns from a pretty conservative website. I don't think it addresses your original question but I thought it was interesting none-the-less.

Did you use the Conceptual Physics Alive DVDs? They seem really pricey but maybe you can find them 2nd hand? Or is there an online access somewhere?

This! I really don't like the labs. We have supplemented where possible, but I have to say I had no idea where to start with science and the whole out of the box approach of Apologia was a bit of a relief for a homeschool newby.

I feel like the curriculum has been in line with the other resources I look at. I would definitely place it as a general 1st year HS biology. All of the concepts in the book seem to match up with what I see on Khan or some of the other websites we use. We are creationists but I had my son watch several videos about evolution so he could see both sides of the story since Apologia is definitely a Christian, Creationistic Curriculum. Since Biology seems to be the future course of study, I would assume she would take an AP or Honors Biology class later in HS. Will the co-op be teaching or just a place to do the labs etc.? It might be good to talk to the instructor there to get a feel for how much they will be beefing up the curriculum. The teacher has a lot to do with making what I consider a pretty good book into a great class.

Pulled DS out of PS after 1st semester of HS. Probably should have pulled him from Middle School but because of some personal experience with some very annoying Homeschoolers, I was not going to be one of them. DS has an LD and was on IEP but was not surviving the increasing speed and pressures of HS. He failed some core classes 1st semester and was very depressed. We felt like the school was not responsive to the situation as a whole so we figured we couldn't do any worse. Transition was a relief for him-we spent the 1st few months just relaxing and learning without any pressure. He was very happy to come home and does not miss school at all. I wish we had a good homeschool group for him to participate in but we don't. I do absolutely think we made the correct choice, but I wish we had made it sooner. To pull out during HS is a lot of pressure to get stuff done when you are just learning how to teach your kids. At least if we had pulled him out during Middle School, we would have had more time for a learning curve. As it is, I feel like I have this giant countdown clock moving so quickly and every day off or every time an assignment doesn't get done, I get a little panicky.

I hate it when someone who is trained in one field feels that they are competent in all fields. DH had a NP refuse to refer him to a Rheumatologist because what could they do that she couldn't? Rich huh-well she was wrong and clearly the school nurse is an RN and not an Ophthalmologist or even an Optometrist. It is a concern that the school may not want to proceed with testing, but I never had that experience. Both my boys were tested and one has such severe deficits that he was immediately put on an IEP which only changed the direction of our journey it didn't make the journey any easier. The second son was tested and the deficits were not significant enough to merit further testing at that time or any accommodations. I know some people end up going with a private evaluation and diagnosis so that the school can't deny services. Once all that is in place, you still have to fight tooth and nail for your kiddo. Most teachers have no idea how LD's work and how best to help the student. Case in point-the teacher who thought DS was playing the system because he was too smart. LD's have nothing to do with intelligence and I was shocked she didn't know that.

Doesn't matter -I would call and file a complaint. The teacher is a professional and should be held to that standard. As to surviving the year, I would schedule a meeting with the Principal (if you feel like you have exhausted all other avenues with the teacher) and discuss your issues. If he/she can't help you forge a workable relationship with the teacher for the balance of the year, I would go up the chain. In my experience, the more experienced the teacher was, the more they felt they knew better than me what my son needed. They also tended to be skeptical of any LD's and often felt that since my son was smart, he was playing the system. New and younger teachers were much more interested in finding creative ways to help DS learn the material.

I am so sorry you are frustrated. I have DS 16 with Dyslexia that we pulled out of school his Freshman year last year. If we don't get work done in class, he doesn't get it done on his own. Fortunately, he doesn't have a bad attitude, but we do get lots of I'm sorry, I forgot, I need more time, I didn't know what you wanted. Even in his favorite subjects, he only turns in the bare minimum and he is so smart it makes me crazy! Because of his school experience, I was pretty soft on him at first, but I have been gradually ratcheting up the requirements for him. I feel like he is lazy (and maybe he is)but I know with a LD the executive function is a large part of the problem. Lots of patience is required with these kiddos and there are days when I have it and days when I don't. I would definitely start taking away privileges until you see an attitude adjustment. That is the number 1 problem! Everything else is workable if the attitude is what it should, not easy, but workable. Best wishes as you make your decision.

Wish I knew. Working on that here with DS who is severely dyslexic. Have you checked out the websites for LD's? http://dyslexia.yale.edu/index.html ,http://www.ncld.org , and http://dyslexiahelp.umich.edu/ are three websites that often have some good resources.

Don't know but we are in the exact same boat. Went back to pre-algebra this year to shore up on weaknesses and hope to get some Algebra under our belt over the summer before Chemistry or Physics.

It's a toughie. I think if you are hesitating asking, you probably have a good feel for how it will be received. That being said, you probably won't be happy with yourself until you bring it up. Just be bold and ask if she has ever noticed the speech issues. Be kind, bring it up, let her digest it, make a decision, and then stay out of it unless she asks for more help or information. Maybe she doesn't even notice it. My mom told the story of how she couldn't believe it when the doctor told her my brother needed speech therapy. She had his older siblings who just translated for her and she was tired and busy and just didn't notice that she couldn't understand him. The other thing is that even if the kids are in the system, they often don't get flagged. We did well child check-ups, pre-school, etc. I always knew DS was hard to understand but no one seemed to be bothered about it but me. He made progress, but in 1st grade he ended up with speech therapy and a host of other help because he had an LD. The speech was a leading indicator of the other problems and I wish someone would have told me there were places I could have him checked out when he was younger.

We had a great evaluation through PS. DS was flagged by classroom teacher for some speech issues and when she asked if the speech therapist could check him out, we had to agree to a full scale evaluation. The testing caught the deficits and the professionals who did the testing were very competent. I knew DS had some issues but I was totally unprepared for the diagnosis so it was a great catch by the PS. We eventually pulled him from PS because they just couldn't give him the individualized attention he needs but, the testing professionals and therapists we used were all excellent. This all happened in Colorado so I don't know what your experience would be somewhere else.

So sorry you are going through this. I have been looking at American History for a History lover so my goals are different but I do think the story telling in William Bennett's America the Last Best Hope would appeal to many students. There is a companion website for a full curriculum plan but the book itself is pretty neat. Also the book What so Proudly We Hail http://www.whatsoproudlywehail.org/book#praise might give some interesting supplemental US History. Here is a link to using Netflix to teach US History http://www.yarnsoftheheart.com/2008/09/using-netflix-to-teach-history.html which might be a really good way to supplement the desire to just study the wars in depth. As to the rest of the year, I agree with the posters above to let the rest of this year be as non-stressful as possible. Work on what has to be done and just give yourselves time to grieve. I hope you can find the balance you need. Last year I was working full-time with a homeschooled student and it was very difficult, but if your son is motivated you are very fortunate and it will be okay.

Praying for this maturity for DS:) He is 16 and technically a sophomore by years in school, but still a Freshman by credit. Someone on the LD boards encouraged me earlier this year about the delayed graduation. I think DS can complete all of his credits for college(at least CC) but maybe not the advanced math. Unfortunately, he is slow and needs a lot of help from a pushy mom just to keep up. We are planning on doing summer school for math so we don't lose any gains we have made over the summer. I am hoping he will find an area of interest so that when he finally graduates from HS, he knows what to do next. I think the most difficult aspect is when you don't know what the plan for your child is going forward. I think DS can make it in college, but I am not sure if that is the "right" course for him so we will just plod along day-by-day until we get to the end.

Held back both DS in K. Oldest has summer birthday and needed it for maturity reasons and some academic concerns. He is now 16 and he still tends to be a bit immature for his age in my mind. 2nd son has May b-day and he could have gone either way but we were encouraged to give him the extra year of K because he was having so much fun. He is 12 and he still brings it up sometimes but I tell him we just wanted him to have more fun. I really have no regrets but I am glad we did it when they were little. It would be harder to do it at your son's age. Since you are homeschooling I wouldn't worry about the grade level now. Those boys grow up a lot between 11 and 18:) If academics aren't the problem, just wait and see.

I took a similar course track in HS as you did. Biology, Chemistry, Physics, AP Chemistry. I am trying to decide about Chem or Physics 1st for math phobic DS. The one thing I remember about the science classes in HS was that we had college prep and basic science for chem and biology but Physics did not have an upper and lower level. This makes me feel like Physics is easier on the math end than chemistry, but I don't really remember the math being hard for either one. I guess I will find out next year:) Just pick a basic curriculum to get them through the class. I am guessing any science requirement for a non-science degree could be fulfilled with a fluff science class so it wouldn't matter as long as they get the number of credits needed to get into a college.

DS who is 12 liked the Divergent Series by Veronica Roth. I think he is currently waiting for the 3rd book to come out. Mysterious Benedict Society, The Alchemist(Michael Scott), The Homelanders series by Andrew Klaven , Edgar Rice Burroughs Princess of Mars series.