I know that sounds silly, but I just realized this morning that his schedule is too easy for him. He woke up today at 7, got right to work, and finished all his work by 9am. Because he wants to be free to play video games all day. He's never been particularly academic, but it's past time to engage him in more. I'm thinking at the very least I will start giving time limits like "Work on math for 30 min" instead of "Do one exercise in the workbook" So here's what he's doing: (I've been pretty relaxed the last year or two, so I hesitate to share--this looks like a 4th grade schedule to me) Singapore Math 5A W&R Narrative 1 Grammar Island/Practice Island edit: Practice Town (3x/week) Spelling Wisdom (2x/week) Cursive Practice Latina Christiana (planning to move to FFL 1 in January) American History (mostly reading through books by The Maestros and Foster) Astronomy (Various living books that I chose) I think I have all the subjects covered, but he can rush through and get done pretty quick, when he's not whining that "it's too hard". I worry about how easily he gives up, so I know I need to provide more consistent challenge without overwhelming him. Today I had him read for a half hour when he was "done" and then assigned some chores, and then sent him outside to play basketball with his brother for an hour. But he still got on the computer to play by 11am. Do you see any glaring holes? How would you beef up this schedule?

Ok, that just reminded me of a funny story... When I was a Senior in high school, it was the end of the school year, and my brain was fried with AP chem and AP calculus practice tests. One day my chemistry teacher was reviewing stuff, and she mentioned the boiling point of water at 100 degrees. I had this amazing insight, and my hand shot up... "So you really can cook an egg outside on a hot day??" She just looked and looked at me, and finally said, "100 degrees Celsius." :lol: That kinda burst my bubble. I was thinking how cool it would be to just go outside and crack an egg on a sidewalk when it was 110 outside. Then I remembered what would happen to me if I went outside and it really was the boiling point of water out there.

I have a friend that likes to say they all become Stooopid when they turn 11. :lol: I'm so glad she told me about that when my oldest was 10. Now I can look at a suddenly clueless pre-teen and laugh, when I really want to bang my head against the wall and throw things. I'm sorry it hit early. Maybe she'll grow out of it early too?

I think the book you're thinking of is Knowing and Teaching Elementary Mathematics by Liping Ma You have my permission to solve things vertically, horizontally, with fingers, toes, or whatever works. ;) I think the key is that you practice different ways of looking at those numbers over and over as you work on problems together. Over time, she will naturally adopt what works for her in her mental math. The assumption for mental math, though, is that you won't be using any tools at all. Like when you're in the grocery store trying to figure out if the cans that are 3 for $5 are cheaper than the ones that are $1.75. But...if she struggles with mental math, don't make her do a whole page of those drills. Choose maybe 5 at a time to start with. My dd is using XtraMath.com as a supplement to practice memorizing math facts.

Curried chicken salad, croissants, veggies and dip, chips, lemonade. Edit: I suppose it's getting cold in some places. Then I'd have a 2-3 crockpots of different soups and bread. Im not into fancy meals. ;)

Do you have the HIG? I think it will help you introduce concepts. Singapore was always the way I understood math. And my first 3 kids were the same way. I never needed the extra teaching help, and I sold my HIGs. DD7 doesn't intuitively click with Singapore and I bought the HIG again for her, because I couldn't figure out how to explain things to her in a way she could understand. Manipulatives are the first way to introduce new concepts. So for your example I'd have 35 linking cubes. 3 groups of ten and 5 ones. "Regrouping" (what we grew up calling borrowing) means you take a group of ten and break it into ones. Then take away 7 of them. What's left is 2 tens, 3 ones, and your original 5 ones = 28. I know you already get that...but Singapore usually gives 2 or 3 different ways to understand a problem, and some of those are introduced only in the HIG. Whatever clicks with your dd is fine. I was so frustrated with dd because she is still adding on her fingers. Then DH pointed out that she does understand the concept of adding. She can do it, just not automatically. So I'm spending more time with her letting her draw pictures and stack poker chips until she starts to memorize those addition facts. While you are learning new ways of looking at numbers it may feel like you are rewiring your brain for a while. And it can be frustrating. But SM has a loose spiral. You will see all these concepts again. I've become a believer in using the HIG to slow down and help kids learn math concepts in a concrete way.

:grouphug: :grouphug: I'm going to assume you were able to get in, since there are no updates. My mom was bipolar. Just like pp said, my respect for her has only gone up over the years as I realize how self-aware she was in controlling her disease. She was always proactive about seeking help, and spent most of February in the hospital some years. Now that I'm dealing with a milder form of mental illness, I can only imagine how terrifying it was for her to lose control when she had me to take care of and worry about. But she always sought help and I was blissfully unaware of what was really going on with her. You did the right thing in reaching out.

Nm

I keep my glass-top stove covered with pots and pans so no one can store anything on it. :laugh:

:svengo: The things I never knew about menopause... Why don't they teach this stuff in school? Ladies, you have convinced me to get endometrial ablation when I'm totally certain that I won't have any more kids.

:lol: That's awesome! There's a FryDaddy in my bottom cupboard. I have no use for this thing, and I can't toss my landlord's stuff. But maybe it's time to start moving their stuff to the utility closet. Last night I realized there's a small, unused bookshelf sitting in my bedroom, and I hauled it downstairs for school supplies.

This is my first time peeking into a minimalist thread since moving 6 weeks ago. I am living in a furnished house--we only brought what I could stuff into my minivan with 4 kids. And realizing that I'm not as much of a minimalist as I thought. Or maybe I just value totally different things than my landlord. DH is frustrated because I keep wanting to buy more books and shelves and kitchen stuff. I'm frustrated because there is all this furniture I don't need (I'm looking at you China cabinet), but no shelving. And no decent mixing bowls or sharp knives. :glare:

The online pronunciation just had a link in their homework assignment. They self-reported whether or not the completed the assignment. It was basically a recording that dd played and repeated, so there was no one on the other end telling her if she had correct pronunciation. But, she did have a chance to interact with the teacher during class and turned in recordings for some assignments.

I was going to suggest this too. I've been eyeing it for myself for years.

Lol, my dd feels exactly the opposite about that book! As in, "finally... we're done with that cell-stuff, and I can learn about things I can actually see!" Do you a university nearby? The first thing that comes to my mind is to visit the chemistry department and see if there are any biochem professors that would be willing to give you a tour of their lab and talk about what they do. I don't think this is common, but the university I attended was heavily invested in undergrad research, and most of the professors would have welcomed an interested high schooler to do some work in their lab.

DD is fairly good at math--she understands it intuitively, but she has never enjoyed doing math. I thought the wordy style would appeal to her and increase her interest level, because I know she can handle math in more depth. At some point she started asking, "Ok, what's the trick to this question? The answer is probably 1, because there's always some trick that makes it easier than it seems." AOPS wasn't increasing her interest in math, just teaching her to look for the trick so she could be done sooner. I've tried a wide range of curricula with her over the years, and at that point I realized, she will never love math. So I found a more straightforward program that she can get through and move on to subjects that she actually cares about.

DD took Spanish 1 & 2 through TPS. They were both a challenge for her, but she was a young 8th grader is Spanish 1 and is not a naturally focused and organized person. She was in class once per week for 90 min, and weekly homework took at least 3-4 hours. I'm going to try to attach screenshots of a week's worth of work in the workbook. She also had 4 online pronunciation assignments a week. They took 5-10 min each. In Spanish 1, she was expected to memorize a Bible verse in Spanish every 4-6 weeks and turn in an audio recording of her recitation. It's only allowing one screenshot. This is half of a weeks' work. She generally had to complete 4 sections from these exercises a day. I'll let you judge how long the translations might take.

I used the teacher's manual, the workbook,and phonogram cards that I had from another OG program. I ignored most of the directions that had me play a game that was in the games book. Games would be nice, I think, when I use it again with my youngest. It would have been redundant to use with my 10yo who was moving through the material quickly.

We're in Florida, so I used FLVS for the driver's ed class. For driving instruction... I take Xanax before and after. :lol: :mellow: :scared: I've only been doing this a week. I would fork out the money for someone else to do driver training if that were a viable option right now. Goodness, my heart rate is going up just thinking about taking dd out to practice driving.

Thanks! After I hunted around the website some more, this was what I thought would be the case. I think we will go ahead and get one. Filtering the internet would ease my mind. DS12 has accidentally come across images he can't un-see while he was on his iPod. :sad: And the time limits would be awesome. I can't enforce limits with insomniac teens after I go to bed. Or early risers who want to watch TV before I'm up in the morning.

We used TC pre-A after dropping out of AoPS pre-A. It was great at first, but dd got bored silly watching the videos. It got worse as the year went on. She needs to be taught (not discovery method) but she catches on quickly and tunes out altogether if the instructor keeps speaking after she's gotten the point. (Which leads to missing key info. Sigh.) I haven't tried DO. Dd15 is using Aleks to finish up Algebra 1. We may stay with that for geometry or try Math without Borders.

I started using Help for High School with dd15. I'm really enjoying it. I think I should be doing the exercises too, to help me with my own writing woes.

I'm (literally) drooling over that one. Yum.

I just thought of a question... Does it work with multiple accounts on a Windows computer? We have Microsoft family monitoring on our computer, but it's stopped reporting internet usage for non-Microsoft browsers. We had to drop our filtered router, so kiddoes are currently at the mercy of whatever ad pops up in their face on the Internet. I'd love to have something that monitors screen time across multiple devices, so kids can choose how to use their time, instead of getting a set time on each device. I don't even know how exactly the limits work, so I'm not sure if that's possible.

Sounds like my ds12! :lol: If it's his money he can buy what he wants. I won't fork over any more money for knives he doesn't actually *need*