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Amy in CO

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Everything posted by Amy in CO

  1. thanks, that is good to know about the calculator. That is one of my pet peeves. Jann, with the Lial program being set up for independent learning, can it still be taught? We found the best way for my dd to understand math was for me to give her a math lecture. The reason Chalkdust didn't work for that was lack of interaction. She might already get something and he is giving 10 examples on it. Or she might not get it, and he shows a very brief example and moves on. With me giving the lecture, I could give the examples based on what she needed. Even with me doing that, Chalk dust moved too quickly. Does Lials move slower or break the lessons into smaller chunks? If they don't, is it possible to break the lesson into smaller chunks on your own?
  2. This year I tried the Chalkdust Algebra book and dvds, and found that it moved too fast for my dd. I ended up having to drop down and have my dd repeat pre-algebra, again the Chalk dust course. We made it through, but it was more difficult by the time she got to the last 2 sections. I understand that the Chalkdust books are college texts. I have been reading some about Lial's texts and they seem like they might be a better fit for my dd. So my question is, are they also college texts or are high school texts. Do they move a little slower, or explain more thoroughly?
  3. I got my kids a netbook to share for Christmas. This year we had 3 kids doing Rosetta, 2 in typing, and 1 in an online class. There was so much it was hard to use it for research or typing papers. So getting the netbook really helped spread out the work. Also, getting it for them as a combined gift prevents them for getting possessive of it. I have considered getting another one for this coming year since the kids are using them more and more.
  4. I haven't used this set, but we did the biology and anatomy (8 booklets together) ones this year. Each lesson only took my dd 20-30 mins. We started a bit late and still were able to finish it in a year. I had written up a schedule to do the integrated course for this coming year, and it did all fit. We have school 4 days a week, and I believe that I scheduled it 2 lessons or 1 lesson and a quiz each day. And tests were on a day by themselves. And I think I had a study day before test day.
  5. I second Excellence in Literature. We have 2 of the levels, the first and American, and are enjoying them. We will be getting British for the coming year.
  6. I had thought that too. Also, the number of points that are available, you have to miss alot to not get an A or B.
  7. I thought in SWB cds, or maybe in WTM, she said a one page paper was about 250 words, dbl spaced.
  8. way too much info on some problems and not nearly enough on others. We are still using the books, but not the dvds. She struggled with algebra and have to drop back down to pre-algebra and did much better. I think we will just take each objective as a lesson next year and not try to do all objectives at once. My dd is doing better with "lectures" from me. Since I can sense when she gets it and move on, she doesn't get bored with endless explanation on something she already gets. Or if she needs more help, I can try to explain it another way.
  9. This is a skill I am starting to integrate with my middle child (very science oriented). We are keeping it very basic now. My dd didn't do many labs this year, so we didn't do it. I have been researching for next year so that we can do it properly then.
  10. If I remember right, SWB said on the cd that the two 1-page persuasive essays per week and 1-2 research papers per year were the minimum for any high school student. Also, that while working on the research papers, you could cut out the persuasive papers. So if that was all we were doing, we would do 12 weeks of persuasive papers, 6 weeks to work on research paper, and then repeat. We are using Excellence in Literature which includes three written papers of varying types and lengths per month. So keeping that in mind, I will alternate history and science, and just do 1 persuasive essay in either history or science per week, whatever is assigned for literature for the week, and then cut history and science when doing the research paper, but continue literature. My dd is still working on outlining and rewriting, which is why we are continuing it. Hopefully by the fall we will have that skill down and can drop it. Yes, I agree. We need to take the ideas and fit it to our child. Which is one of the reasons we are incorporating Excellence in Literature. My dd enjoys the variety of writing assignments they have. I think she would quickly become tired of doing two persuasive essays a week.
  11. This is just my understanding, I am right in the middle of transitioning my dd from logic to rhetoric. I looked over my notes from both the new WTM and the 2 cds on middle/high school writing. From what I can see, from WTM, it shows the summaries increasing from 1/2 page in 5th to 1-2 pages in 8th in literature. For history it increases from 3-6 sentences to 1 page. And for science, 2-3 paragraphs to 1-2 pages. So there is definitely longer assignments as you progress. Also in 7-8th grade, you transition from just writing summaries to re-writing from your outlines, which would also be longer. For high school, the rhetoric 2-3 hours, isn't necessarily 2-3 written assignments. You spend that amount of time reading, outlining, and either writing or finding an example of what you read about. I have in my notes that the research paper is 4-8 pgs in length for a 9th grader. I don't know about you, but my children always focus on the minimum, not the maximum number. It isn't that hard to write a paper that length if you allow them to choose any topic they are interested in. For the two 1 page persuasive papers, it isn't that much more difficult than the outlining, re-writing, and summaries that they have already been doing. And on the cd, SWB lists question that can be used to find a thesis. I was surprised how easy it was to get my dd to come up with a thesis using this method. Of course sometimes she has more to say than others, so currently her length is 3/4- 1 1/2 pages. My dd is in 9th, but a bit behind SWB's suggestions as we started late. She has been doing maybe 1 persuasive paper per two weeks, while she continues with outlining and those skills.
  12. Thanks for this idea. I often will ask my children if there is anything that they like or don't like, but I never get anywhere. My middle son doesn't like to complain about anything at all, ever. So it is like pulling teeth to get him to admit that something isn't working. While my daughter complains about everything all the time. I decided to give the kids these surveys (with some adjustments), the youngest demaded one too. I got back some very interesting comments. Things I hadn't thought about. I looked them over and then had the kids, one at a time, come and discuss answers with me, help me understand if a comment wasn't clear, talk about other options, etc. It worked great. They are all so much more excited for this coming year, knowing that I have listened to what they think, and that I am willing to change my plans and ideas, to what they want. And it wasn't like I hadn't listened and talked to them before. Maybe it just seemed like I was more serious about it since I took the effort to type it up instead of just asking random (in their minds) questions.
  13. Thanks. I have wondered about Teaching Textbooks, but it costs so much that I hate to pay that much and have it not work. It is something to consider. Are there any other spiral programs out there?
  14. I had never thought about this before, but after the comments I have seen on the board, I discussed it with my dd. A little background- we used Saxon for K-3, and Abeka 4-pre-algebra. This year we switched to Chalkdust Algebra, it was too much, we dropped back to Chalkdust Pre-Algebra. It is a struggle, but we are working our way through it. Now, from what I have seen, Saxon and Abeka are spiral, whereas Chalkdust is mastery. Is that right? If so, after talking to my dd, she much prefers the Abeka style. However, we didn't like Abeka Algebra, which is why we changed. So, is there a program out there similar in style to the mid-grades of Abeka, but for the high school maths? My dh and I both understand math, so we can help her with that, so it doesn't matter if it has dvd instruction with it or not. Thanks
  15. My dd will be flying Southwest airlines this summer. Once they are over 11, they can fly unaccompanied.
  16. Excellence in Literature is secular. I have levels 1 and 3.
  17. Excellence in Literature American Literature is for 10th grade. Their are 5 levels, but you can shift them around to suit your schedule.
  18. I have the Excellence in Literature books #1 and 3. We started with book 3, but dd is a little behind in English and it just didn't work. So we dropped back to book 1 and that has been working well. Each book has 9 units. Each unit include the main text and an optional honors text. There is a brief introduction to the author and "something to think about". Then there are several pages of context info to look up on the web. Context readings that help you to understand the basics of the book. For example, for Last of the Mohicans (#3), there is a site to read about the author, the Mohicans, and what Mark Twain said about Cooper. Sites to see the poetry, music, and art that were popular at the time of the book. Suggested videos, either movies based on the book, or documentaries of the time period. There are sites for info about the author's life and the historical context of the book. Suggestions for field trips. For the assignments, it is broken into weeks. In book 3 for example- Week 1- you read context resources and start the novel. Write an author profile, about 1 page (instructions in the back of the book) Week 2- finish the novel, write historical approach paper, about 1-2 pages- gives suggestions and the formats are in the back of the book. Week 3- begin 750 word essay on suggested topic. Week 4- edit your essay In book 1, the first unit is short stories. There are 6 short stories to read. Week 1- read the intro to Excellence in Literature to see how the program works, read 1st short story, write an approach paper- about 1 page Week 2-3 read other 5 stories and write a literary analysis summary of each, about 1/2 to 1 page each. Week 4- pick 2 stories to compare and contrast, write 300 word essay. The work load seems to gradually increase over the course of the program. I had written the author, and she said that you can rearrange the order of the books, which is why I jumped in with #3. From my experience though, I would highly suggest starting with book 1 first. It really does lay the groundwork for the program. Once you have that understanding, I think that you could do the books out of order, or even choose a couple of books from #4 and a couple from #2 if you wanted.
  19. My daughter has enjoyed the Anatomy books. She is just about done with the 2nd book (there are only two). We are incorporating it into the biology course, because I didn't feel that either was enough by itself. Since we are using it for a biology credit, she is doing the biology books, the anatomy books, and several labs (including dissection and microsope). For a health course, the anatomy books cover only the body systems. It covers the endocrine, nervous, integumentary, skeletal, muscular, circulatory, respiratory, digestive, excretory, immune, and reproductive systems. If you add it too the abeka book you mentioned, which says it deals with relationships, safety, drugs, job success, responsibilities, preparation for marriage, and such important issues as abortion and evolution (from their site), those two books together cover all that I remember covering in high school health. So I would say that it should work well for a 1/2 credit in health.
  20. I used Paradigm Accelerated Curriculum this year for Biology, Anatomy, and English 9. I added labs to the science. I also added literature to the English and I adjusted the writing assignments to better suit us. It was very independent. The lessons take 20-40 mins to read and answer question. Almost all the questions are fill in the blank, multiple choice, and true/false.
  21. Have you looked at Excellence in Literature. http://www.everyday-education.com/englishclasses/index.shtml They have an American book. I am having my dd do a couple of this year from that. We start it on Monday, so I can't tell you how it is going, but I really like the looks of it.
  22. thanks for the comments so far. That is what I have been kind of thinking. We decided to try it because for the most part SWB's advice has been right on the money for us. I am thinking that for at least this child, that we shouldn't continue.
  23. In one of SWB lectures on cds, she says that high schoolers should correct their own work. It is supposed to help the student with a feeling of ownership and responsibility, if I remember right. I am wondering if anyone does this. I have been trying for the last couple of months to have my 9th grader correct any worksheet things that she does. But I have my doubts that it is a good idea. In the past I would mark the mistakes, and she had to go back and find the correct answer. With her having the answer book, she just writes the correct answer down when checking. This particular child has struggled with school in the first place. She thinks she is stupid because she doesn't automatically know these things, that she has to learn them. She compares herself to dh and I, who have studied some of these things for 20 years. It is an unfair comparison, but to her it means that she is stupid and will never learn anything so why bother trying. I know some of this is due to the age, but I really wonder if just handing a child that doesn't care about their education will really help them to care about it, or if it is just the easy way out. And with no effort she now has the correct answers. Any ideas?
  24. I have wondered this too, but I don't have any answers. My 5th grader is almost completely independent. I watch him do his experiments for science to make sure he is following the steps, and I give him spelling tests. Other than that, I am just checking his work, with the very occasional help with some math concept or answering a diagramming question. But he is very self motivated and accomplishes every thing he sets his mind to. My 9th grader on the other hand, fights having any oversight on her work, and feels that if she needs help it is because she is stupid, but is not a self-motivated child, and won't do a very good job on her own. So I have to keep a much closer eye on her. So, I don't know that there is a right or wrong answer, I wonder how much of it is personality types and abilities of the individual children.
  25. Thanks, I usually have the answers as well to back me up since I didn't learn this as a child, but this program doesn't have the answers to the diagramming or the parsing. I am slowly learning diagramming, but I am obviously not up to this level.
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