I'm wondering a couple things about this curriculum. 1) Is it a Christian curriculum? 2) Do you have to use the study guide to make it credit worthy? Or can I just add more time period books, have him write some papers, etc. I'm considering this and another curriculum for my son for next year. Thanks!

My nephew used TT Algebra last year. He actually isn't quite finished (like 10 lessons to go but he hasn't got back to them). He is doing geometry at the local high school this year. He's getting A's and completely feels like he knows and understands Algebra better than the public school kids he's taking the class with. I'm confident that TT will be better than fine for my kids. I do enjoy using some different math however, just because I like to. So mine will have dabbled in Fred, as well as the Key to Series for extra practice if they need it.

Ok, it's an old post, but I have to respond, too. :hurray: We LOVED both of these books. I wouldn't skip either if at all possible.

It's kind of interesting. Everyone in real life I have posed this question to has said they think this age is too young for that and would rather not have their child in the play. Everyone online says go for it. :confused1: I'm not sure what we'll do yet. I'll have to think on it a bit more. There are kids from 8 to 15 in this play. While my 13 year old may not have an issue with it, I certainly don't understand an 8-10 year old range having to do this when there are so many other choices. I am not sure that I want to take my littles to see their big brother in this particular play. Ah well. We'll get it figured out one way or the other. Thanks for your opinions!

My 13 year old son is taking a theatre class once a week with our local theatre guild. They are performing scenes from a couple different plays, one of which is The Crucible. I feel like this is too mature and a little creepy. Demon possession. Marital infidelity. Attempting to get a man's wife hung so she can have him for herself. I am not really happy at the moment. Can you tell me what you think? Am I over reacting? Should I just let him do the scene (he's the governor)? Blah. Thanks.

I just ordered these for my son who struggles with math. I do have other upcoming children. Do I have him write in them or is it easy enough to have him copy in a notebook? I guess I'll know better when I have them in my hands but I want to hear your opinions now. Thanks!

Key to series may be a good idea.

Thanks so much for your replies. I will read more from the pinned threads. I had not taken time to notice them. Thanks again for the info. Helps a lot!

When I say do AP classes, I mean do them at home. I know zero on this topic. I see AP classes mentioned everywhere and really don't know if they're important or not for my children's future. I'm a homeschool mom with very little education of her own to stand on. I want so much more for my children. Thanks.

Just wondering. My 13 year old already seems busy. When I look at our plans for high school I wonder how on earth he could ever have a part time job as well. And he doesn't even do very much outside the home right now. He does guitar a couple times a week and right now is participating in theatre once a week. But with school and guitar practice, family service (chores), etc, and a some free time for himself...I don't know.

Just looking over My Father's World high school plan as a base for our high school next year and wondered how many credits your high school student will end up with.

Thanks for the feedback. Much appreciated. After conversing with him more on this subject, he says he really wants to do both. So... English Latin Spanish Algebra Biology or Physical Science (does this matter which?) History Phy Ed. Does that look like an ok freshman year? Am I forgetting anything? He's actually doing Teaching Textbooks Algebra right now for 8th grade, but I want him to do Jacob's for freshman year since he is a very average math kid and I want to make sure he's really strong at Algebra before we move on to geometry. He's over half way done with Apologia General science and gets A's on his tests. Do I do physical science for freshman year or biology? Thanks again!

Can you give me an example of programs I should look at for high school Latin?

My son is in 8th grade. He will be my first in high school next year, so you'll probably see me asking questions now and then in the upcoming year. So... Latin or Spanish. We've not done much for languages at all. We have dabbled in both Latin and Spanish, but we never stuck with it. He pulled out Getting Started With Latin and is doing that on his own just because he wants to. We've also been working on Getting Started With Spanish together over the past couple months. I would like him to continue studying a more formal course in high school, but I don't know which or if it matters which. He really likes Latin (he did do some Latin for Children at one point a number of years back and really liked it) and he loves learning Latin and Greek roots. He is interested in Spanish as well. If you had to pick one, which would it be? And do colleges look at Latin as a foreign language or an elective? Or does it depend on the college? Thanks. :confused1:

Thanks for this. I know that I have time to decide, but as far as I'm concerned right now I plan on doing MFW for my ds's freshman year. I want this year to go slowly, as my baby (actually he's my oldest) will be in high school next year! But now at least I have something to look forward to when the time comes. Oh my word. He's going to be in high school next year. He's not supposed to be in 8th grade already. ::sigh::

We've used AO for a long while now, but I'm wondering if for high school it would be so much easier for me to do a plan like MFW has. Easier planning, easier grading, etc. I just want to hear your experiences. Like it? Love it? Despise it? Luke warm for it? Let me hear! Thanks. =)

I first used AO when my ds13 was 8. I started him in Year 2. Keep in mind, that I have never been an AO purist, and I honestly don't think many people are (though I could be wrong on this!) Most make it work for their family and individual children's needs, I suspect. I had started off our homeschool journey with a couple of other curriculums (WP, SL) but was having trouble combining with SL because of the learning differences of my second son. I wanted him to have his own curriculum specifically tailored to him, and let my older ds go at his pace. I found this with AO. I could not have let them each have their own SL core and stay sane. At the moment my dd8 is doing Year 1 (I did very minimal k-2). I could have started her with Year 2, I suppose, but I didn't want her to miss so many great books. She loves the stories. She loves to tell the stories back to me and she's getting better and better at narrating them orally (which helps with her written narrations later on, I've seen this with both of my older boys). She already does read some orally to me, like Aesop's Fables and 50 Famous Stories Retold. This particular child is weaker reading aloud than my boys were, so I like to have her share the reading whenever she can. Here is her schedule for this week: Day 1: Family Bible (Apologia World View study with lap book from Knowledge Box Central Reader - 30 minutes minimum during school day, with expected reading at bedtime as well Cursive Copy Work - Expected to have no mistakes, but I don't make her re-do the entire thing if she does an almost perfect job or she will get really frustrated. She likes copy work as she usually picks something out of her reader that she really likes or thinks is funny or interesting. If she makes a mistake or two I make her find them and fix them. Math- Math Mammoth (1-2 pages) Teaching Textbooks (1 lesson) & drill with XtraMath (free website). Science - Apologia Astronomy Aesop's Fable (she practiced reading this herself, then read it to me since we're working on her fluency) Bible - Genesis 37 (particular parts, not all of it today) Day 2: Personal devotion or I may choose to read a fun animal devo with she and ds6 Math - MM, TT, and two chapters of Fred Elementary Reader Phonics Writing (this changes...sometimes it's a story starter because she loves writing stories. There's a site I found where you "pull" levers and it gives you a story starter in pieces depending on your grade level and what type of genre you choose. You can choose adventure, sci-fi, or mix. She loves seeing what pops up and then just has fun writing it and then reading it to us. 50 Famous Stories Retold - Cornelia's Jewels...I love this story! Day 3: Family Bible, lap book Math - MM, TT, drill reader phonics copy work Jack's Insects - Not AO, but AO style. She just wanted to hear it. It's a living science book. She and ds6 listen together. Day 4: Personal Devo Math - MM, TT, Fred Science - Astronomy reader phonics writing Aesop Paddle to the Sea ch5 Thinking Skills (Critical Thinking Company) Day 5: Family Bible, Lap book maps - written and geography games online math - MM, TT, drill reader phonics copy work Blue Fairy Book - Sea Salt Now, this is fairly light reading for her, but she loves the stories and really, with my 3 year old and 6 year old, it's perfect for time right now. AO gets difficult enough with their book choices as time goes by that I don't mind waiting a little anyway. I enjoy the history so much more in AO than in WP or SL because I don't like chopped up information. My kids remember so much better with the history written out like very interesting stories. I do add in SL books for free reading or sometimes a read-aloud, however, because it's so easy to put the time period of the SL books into AO. I do not do all the extras of AO. I do it to fit me. Sometimes we read poetry daily, sometimes we do it once a week as a family where all the kids grab their favorite poetry book(s) and we read to each other. We have been known to read a biography about a composer, but not always. We have been known to act out a Shakespeare play with pegs from our peg board and label them and move them around like a play so they can keep track of the many characters. But not every week or even every month. They love it though, when we do! We watch Drive Thru History DVD's because my kids saw one once and have every since have loved Dave Stotts and the Fiat 500 he drives around the Holy Land. My ds13 has a much fuller schedule than my dd8, of course, but also includes the family Bible, he wanted to do the lap book, he has Thinking Skills, Teaching Textbooks and Life of Fred. He LOVES his Ambleside history and I almost have to cut him off at times because he will talk to me about it until I really just can't listen anymore. Seriously, go play your guitar. =) He is challenged by the literature he's reading, which is right now Oliver Twist and Little Women. He actually really likes them both! He enjoys the natural history books and hearing first hand about the natural world. He does do some written narrations but he also does One Year Adventure Novel because he dreams of becoming an author and LOVES to write. I didn't do any formal writing with him at all growing up. He has always been homeschooled. He just did written narrations, and when younger, oral narrations and he is a great writer for a kid his age. I have no doubt that AO's process works. Even with my ds11 who has struggled with physically writing and spelling, his content is really, really good! I attribute that to all those oral narrations of fantastic writing over numerous years. Ok, my dh is home. I don't know if this is what you wanted to hear or not, but if you want anything more specific don't be afraid to ask. And, as far as scheduling goes, it's really not difficult once you get into it. And it's MUCH more flexible when you do it yourself! I know AO is not for everyone, but for us it has been a great journey. P.S. My oldest has done Years 2 all the way up to currently working on 6.

I used WP when they were very new. I really did enjoy Animals and Their Worlds when my oldest boys were 6 and 4. We made the crafts, they played with them until they fell apart, and I have a ton of pictures to prove it! But I haven't looked at it to see how it is recently, or if there has been great changes, but we did have fun. Now, with my youngers I won't do that because I don't have the time. I did try American Story after Animals, but ended up giving it to my sister. I didn't like it as well as SL for American history, but my sister and niece had a really good year with it. Now, for expense sake, book quality, and my sanity I love Ambleside Online. :thumbup:

I'm a huge A&P fan here. I tried everything with my son: AAS, R&S, Sequential Spelling, etc. I've never had him tested but I know he has learning differences compared to my other children. He took longer to learn to read (but now reads everything) and he has never been able to spell past a very young child's level. It was terrible. Actually, when I first started panicking was when his little sister who is three years younger had MUCH better spelling than he did. So I kept trying different things, but never saw improvement. I actually told my dh that I was making one last ditch effort when I ordered A&P and then I was going to get outside help. A&P is the first thing that ever helped him. Is he a great speller now? Not really. But he has improved SO much! I can read his work now and see some misspellings (of course, we are not all the way through the A&P program yet) but it no longer looks like a first grader wrote it (he is 11). He is more confident in his writing now that his spelling has improved, and I'm sure it's going to only continue to improve with this program. He is at the beginning of level C. Maybe your daughter needs more time, maybe others will say it's normal. I don't know. But I will tell you that I love Apples & Pears!

Thanks everyone! We're going ahead with it.

My ds13 just took the TT placement test for Algebra 1. He passed by the skin of his teeth. He hasn't been doing pre-algebra all that long. The thing is that my copy of TT Pre-Algebra is being used by my niece right now, and my sister's copy of Algebra 1 is free for the using right now. So, if your kid just passed the placement test by a close mark, would you for sure go ahead and put him in Algebra? I know technically he passed (12 out of 15 on the first half, needed 10, and 8 out of 15 on the second half, needed 8 to pass) but I'm not sure since it was so close. I know TT does have quite a bit of review at the beginning normally, although I haven't seen algebra itself. He will also continue to do LOF pre-algebra a few days a week, whatever we decide. Thanks for your opinions!

He will be learning music theory by then, yes. And he will be performing at least intermittently by then I hope. I like the idea of it being used as an extra curricular and giving him .5 credit for music theory eventually when he gets to that point. Thanks everyone!

My son plays the guitar. He takes 1-3 hours of instruction per week from an amazing teacher, as well as practices 30 minutes to 60+ minutes per day. Can he get credit if he keeps this up in high school?

Wow, thanks for all of the ideas! I'm going to have to look them over closely. Thanks goodness I have time, because I'm going to need it! Homeschooling. The great adventure.

Hi, I'm sure this will be the first of many questions I have about homeschooling high school. We've homeschooled from the beginning, yet the thought of next year is still a bit daunting to me. My first question is...(drum roll, please) Is Ambleside year 7 fine for freshman year? Is writing summaries and discussion enough for high school when you're reading high quality books? Or do you have to do work like Biblioplan, etc, where there is map work, worksheets, etc.? I do want him completely ready for college if he chooses to go that route, so I don't want to mess this up. Or would I be better off doing something like SWB's new high school level history? He has done AO 2, 3, 4, half of five and then we ended up doing some SL in there for this time period, then we did our own Egypt and Greek studies using Simply Charlotte Mason as a base, and finally we are back to AO year 6 for his 8th grade year. There is Greek overlap in that, but I felt year 7 looked like a little much for him still so we went with it, as there is so much more to AO than just the history portion. What do you think?