Jump to content

Menu

Greta Lea

Members
  • Posts

    712
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by Greta Lea

  1. We've are still just doing Unit II. I've not introduced any dress-ups yet. Things are going smoothly so far. I'm thinking of introducing Unit III before the end of the year. Next year, the plan is to use IEW's American History I based writing lessons.
  2. 9th grader: -Math U See Epsilon, then Zeta when finished with Epsilon -Megawords book 5 & 6 -History of US books 1-5 with old Sonlight core 7 guide -IEW American History Based Writing I -Literature: Using Reading Roadmaps and TTC as a guide and IEW's Poetry -Fix-It Grammar -RS4K level 1 set -Logic: The Fallacy Detective 12th grader: -MUS Algebra I -Notgrass Econ & Gov -Writing: Notgrass assignments and lit. analysis essays -Personal Finance: Hoping to get Financial Peace for Teens -Visual Latin -Lit: Probably The Jungle, The Grapes of Wrath and not sure what else. Poetry will be to finish The Poet's Corner. -Logic: Not sure yet. -Worldviews: How Then Shall We Live and The Deadliest Monster (and the two lit books that this book is studying)
  3. He's 18yo now. My son does have a narrow interest, *but* his narrow interests have changed over the years. He has 3 different narrow interests over his 18 years. Our pshy. suggested that when our son did the pretend play and INSISTED he WAS the character and not pretending, to *NOT* push him to say that he's pretending. The dr. said that our son was flexible enough that he would eventually see for himself that he was indeed actually pretending. This was a slow process, but eventually my son DID begin to say that his play IS *very* real IN HIS OWN HEAD, so that's why he'd say he was not pretending. This thought process of his began when his friends and younger brother would just INSIST that he was pretending and wasn't really Spiderman. My son's creative side has helped him be able to study people in a controlled way. When he was younger, he had this running story in his head (never, ever wrote it down). ALL of his friends had a certain character and part in this storyline (it was a fantasy type storyline...everyone had superpowers and were *all* working TOGETHER to fight the one evil bad guy in the story. My ds was, of course, the leader of the entire group fighting the bad guys). Over the years (yes, this went on for YEARS), if a new friend came into his life, they got put in the story. If he didn't play with an old friend for a long time, I wouldn't hear about that friend in the story line UNTIL they got together to play again. The interesting thing is that my son would create his friend's character in his story in a way that FIT that person. He would describe their personality and create super powers that fit that friend. It's really odd and impressive. His psych. said this was his way of sorting everyone and analyzing them in a safe, yet controllable way. He's currently being evaluated again (first dx was when he was 7yo) so he can have that updated dx for any special services he might can get in college (like a note taker!) We go next week to finish the evals. So far, his dr. says he's *barely* meeting the criteria for AS. He's made LOTS of progress since he was 7yo!!
  4. 11th grader (Aspie & Math LD): He loves reading books about philosophy and worldview. I try to have one day a week for him to work on the book he's writing during writing class. 8th grader (struggles with reading *and* math): I keep his lessons short and to the point so his school day is short enough for him to have time for music.
  5. The dictation from All About Spelling will be enough for 2nd grade writing. Then LOTS of oral narration, making sure she's narrating in complete sentences. Once a week, you write down the narration as she's narrating, then read her "writing' back to her. I also recommend IEW's Teaching Writing with Structure and Style in a few years.
  6. My 8th grade son is a struggling reader and speller. He's been using Megawords for 2 years now after completing All About Spelling's first 3 levels. It's really helped his spelling and reading.
  7. He'll be using A History of US by Hakim for 9th and 10th grade history. I've got an old SL Core 7 IG that I will use for the discussion questions and some of the SL notes. He's read some of book 1 and *really* likes it. It's nice to have him excited about history for the next two years. He'll do books 1-5 next year and 6-10 in 10th grade. For science, we are gonna try a series that is recommended for struggling readers. It's Science Workshop series. I have a couple of local friends who use this series. Their kids do well it. http://www.wiesereducational.com/products/i_science/33-i_chemistry/science-workshop-series.htm
  8. My ds has loved the 3 Uncle Eric books he's read so far (no guide, just reading). Ya know, I might just purchase the rest of the books and have him read them in his free time over the summer, do an end up book essay for each book (like he's do so far on the other 3) and give him a 1/2 elective credit for it. I think I'll snatch your title for the course:)
  9. I've thought about using Dave Ramsey's course, but was worried it be time consuming. Looks like from your description that it's not. It might help my ds to take that course for another reason also. He needs some practice in taking notes while listening to lecture or presentation.
  10. This will be for my son's 12th grade year. He *is* very much college bound, but will probably go to CC first. He has Asperger Syndrome. REading and writing are his strong areas. He just absorbs what he reads and naturally thinks very critically when reading and writing. BUT, he is a slow, methodical reader *and* doesn't transition between subjects quickly. Anyway, the BIG focus next year is math and research paper writing. I don't want to overwhelm him, but I DO want to push him towards college level work and workload some. SO, this plays into my decision about whether to go with Notgrass Econ and Gov *or* the Uncle Eric series. Also, wondering if Notgrass is a little more "in the middle-yet conservative" in his approach. We've read 3 of the Uncle Eric books and I wonder if my son needs a wee-bit more "balanced" viewpoint. He's VERY into the libertarian viewpoint...VERY! He struggles *greatly* in math, so next year he will finally be tackling Algebra II and hopefully a bit of Geometry. HUGE chunk of his day will be devoted to math. He's my natural writer, but we have not covered research paper writing at all. I'm planning to use IEW's Research Paper Writing course next year. Science will either be biology or integrated chem and physics by PAC. He's VERY into world view and philosophy, so I will continue the living books approach to this elective. Reading and discussion is pretty much all I require from him in this subject. He will finish the Bluedorn's 2 book series for Logic (almost finished with the first book now). Our cover school requires Personal Finance. I already have Money Matters for Teens, so he'll work through that. Thanks!
  11. He's currently reading Post Modern Times. Next year (12th grade) he'll read The Deadliest Monster and I'm not sure what else yet. AO has a nice list compiled... http://www.amblesideonline.org/WorldviewBookOptions.html My ds is also enjoying Never Before In History, which focuses on the founding fathers' worldviews.
  12. And started Abe Lincoln's world last week. We have followed Ambleside ONline's reading plan for these books. AO breaks the reading down into a weekly chunk, but my son, who's dyslexic, reads a section 4x a week instead of all in one day. Many of the AO families read each week's schedule reading at one time in one day. You might want to check out how they have it scheduled.
  13. There are some books that my older son has read that I just don't think my younger son will be able to handle. Most of these books are books my older son has read in 10th and 11th (this year), like History of American People, Count of Monte Cristo and Mere Christianity. Next year for history, he'll finish Abraham Lincoln's World & This Country Of Ours then move into SOTW IV to finish out the school year. My tentative plan for 10th & 11th grade is to use SL Core 100 over those two years for history along with some of the Uncle Eric books (older son has LOVED those). We'll continue using classic literature that is a bit hard for him to read independently, but that he does GREAT with if he has audio to read along with. I mostly use Librivox audio for him, but also utilize the library some for audio books. Next year he'll probably read (with audio), the Hobbit, Treasure Island, To Kill A Mockingbird and The Giver (probably no audio for this one...it's an easy yet enjoyable read). His older brother struggles in math, so their math seems to be looking more and more similar. He'll continue using a combo of the Key To books (fractions book right now) and Systematic Math (level 6 right now). His brother has always enjoyed using high level reading living books for science with NO hands on stuff. My dyslexic son has been talking for the past few months about how he'd like to be an engineer. He wants a more hands on science next year, but also do be as independent as possible with it. I'm thinking of using Neoe Science Phyics III for him in 9th. It's really a middleschool program but will be perfect for *him*. For writing this year, we've continued LOTS of copywork & dictation along with LOADS of oral narration (one written with guidance each week). I'd like to begin using Jensen's Writing (just the paragraph instruction) some next year at a slow and steady pace suited for him. We'll see. One thing that is very different than his brother's highschool time is the fact that he will continue with phonics and spelling via Megawords. I also plan to add vocabulary (probably Wordly Wise). Also, his brother had finished what little grammar instruction I require by the time he was in highschool. My dyslexic son has only had some extremely basic grammar, so he will continue on into highschool with this moving very slowly through Easy Grammar Plus.
  14. Not only will my son be graduating at age 19, but I know a couple of other kids in our area who have done the same. Not tramatizing at all. THe other two I know about ended up doing a couple of classes at home and the rest at the CC. One didn't need a lot of credits that year, so she just took a couple of CC classes each semester and worked a part-time job. I've noticed that with my boy's group of friends (some homeschooled and some regular schooled) that ages and grades don't seem to matter once they are in highschool. Maturity matters to them, but not the actual age. Of course, this is even more true at the college level. Editing to add...I just thought of another family (in fact, the mom used to be a regular on these boards). She had her son take a "project year" (her lable for that year) between 8th and 9th grade. He's a very strong student, but not extremely mature in some ways. Anyway, they ended up doing some subjects very differently that year. I think they studied state history (which is not required here) and then an interest based science study. I can't remember it all, but when I would ask him about what he was studying (I always ask my kid's friends this no matter where they go to school...good conversation starter and I usually learn something:) it was always fun and fascinating sounding to me. Not tramatizing at all.
  15. My son has Asperger Syndrome (VERY high functioning...almost no lable). Although he's an extremely high functioning Aspie, I'm still glad we held him back one year (he was about the age of your son when we held him back "on paper" with our umbrella school). He's a strong reader and writer, but has always struggled with math. He is barely gonna get Alg. 1 & 2 under his belt by graduation. College is a definite plan for him, so holding him back to have time to get more math skills in before graduating has been helpful. My son is very independent with his schoolwork and has been for years. I have always used a dvd or video program for math (and dad helps him if he has any problems in math, 'cuz I'm not strong in math). I read many of the books he reads for school (we don't use any textbooks, not even for science). We enjoy *discussions* about the books we read. I guess I'm more of a mentor than a "teacher".
  16. SO, I worked *hard* to stop. I had a few years of yelling when I would loose my temper. Then I got control of that, but moved on to an extremely frustrated sigh and facial expression. Well, that was just as bad. My boys shut down when they are treated like that. They can't think, so they can't learn if I'm getting frustrated like that OR if they are always anticipating it. I *really* started working on getting it under control (old, bad habits are HARD to break) when I overheard my younger son, probably about 9yo at that time, tell somone that I made him nervous during school time:( No wonder he had trouble focusing.
  17. Here's the link... http://www.answersincreation.org/homeschool.htm A book I *highly* recommend is Beyond the Firmament. HIGHLY recommend.
  18. My son is using this. He's an 11th grader who is college bound but struggles greatly with math. He's been using this program for a couple of months now and REALLY understands Algebra now.
  19. SHe will certainly be challenged in history and literature if you go with AO year 7.
×
×
  • Create New...