Sorry to hear of your predicament. I found the Dementia Australia website helpful when navigating our family experience while Dad was living with dementia. The Help Sheets, particularly those about Caring for Someone with Dementia were useful.

Some of Australia's leading astrophysicists have teamed up with public health experts to detect possible outbreaks of COVID-19, even before testing takes place.

We did a trip to Europe with the kids when they were 12 and 14 and had them help with the planning. It was pretty informal though. Essentially we went to the library and borrowed a few of the most up to date travel guides and let them loose with post-it notes to mark items of interest and then share them at round table meetings while we were in the planning stage. They were specifically looking for what they might be interested to do, but were also encouraged to read the culture and history sections of the guides to place the chosen sites to visit or activities in the context of the country and its heritage. We found the DK and the Lonely Planet guides most useful. You might also try: 100% Pure NZ (Official Tourism Website) NZ History (gov. website) NZ Dept of Conservation

We are in NSW with my last child in Year 10, registered NESA and happy to share our experience – although I do not know anything about the HSC History syllabus and have only loosely followed the WTM! The NSW NESA history curriculum essentially follows the four year history cycle over Years 7 - 10, so when DD started Year 7 we started started in ancients with 'middle school' style resources and have just adjusted the level of difficulty each year as appropriate. In our case because DD has a June to June registration period we have a little bit of extra time next year when she would technically be in Year 11, but we have chosen to register as doing extension Year 10 work instead which means we are able to spread the history cycle over 5 years allowing more time for rabbit trails. (I have found that in 7 - 10 there has been some flexibility in the timing of our content delivery.) There are other options for further study that suit DD better than self-studying for the HSC, so I have not looked into HSC History at all, but my understanding is that there is little leeway when registering for Year 11 and the the expectation is that you follow their syllabus closely (although I have no personal experience of this so could easily be mistaken).

There is this Australian distributor listed here on the IEW website (but I have not used them). Australia My Schoolhouse Chris & Jenny Sandford P.O Box 94, Frankston Victoria 3199 Australia myschool.house info@myschool.house AU: 1300 886 700 NZ: +64 3 669 3399 Edited to add: I have since been in contact with them via email and received a prompt reply.

DS did the Research Paper class when it was available at WTMA which used Schaum's Quick Guide to Writing Great Research Papers—that might help.

You might like to look at: Arrival City by Doug Saunders

Take out the passion for math, and this sounds like my kiddo whose goal is to study City Planning. Some free resources we have found in this area include: Brent Toderian selects the 100 best books on city-making that he's collected and read over the years FutureLearn: Smart Cities FutureLearn: Re-enchanting the City FutureLearn: Ethical Cities FutureLearn: Water for Liveable and Resilient Cities Your kiddo may also like: FutureLearn: Data Tells a Story FutureLearn: Systems Thinking and Complexity FutureLearn: Global Systems Science and Policy

Another vote for Write Now! DS used this when he was 14 because we had never got around to cursive for one reason or another. He still prefers to print or type, but he does sign his name in cursive now (and he actually enjoyed the historical information in the book). His sister also used this book to learn cursive when she was about 12 and now has lovely cursive handwriting which she uses all the time.

You might like to look at this thread

Thank you for taking the time to share this offer :001_wub:

BOSTES have a questionnaire available as a part of their current review which contains specific homeschooling/registration questions if you select 'Parent'. http://www.hea.edu.au/news/2016/04/survey-to-help-inform-bostes-review-panel/ This is an opportunity to take a quick survey and give the NSW BOSTES your thoughts, but it closes on Thursday, May 5, 2016.

Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination

DS16 has just completed the one semester Writing the Research Paper class with Ms Meyers with which both he and I were extremely pleased. Ms Meyers is very organised teacher and an excellent communicator. DS found her instruction engaging and easy to follow, her expectations clear, and her feedback helpful. He also found the textbook to be both useful and user-friendly. FYI: We are in Australia so he did the class via the delayed format. DS 16 is also currently enrolled in Rhetoric 1 with Ms Richardson which he also studies via the delayed method. However, this class he is not so enamored with. Whenever I ask him how he feels about it, he always says the jury is still out... when pressed further he says he thinks the textbook is awful, but he likes the teacher and doesn't mind the lectures (and in fact actually enjoys the art and poetry appreciation sections that begin each lecture). He is looking forward to the last part of the course (week 20+) when they move on from the textbook, and I will be interested to see how he feels when he has completed the class. Last year DS also completed the Intro to Rhetoric class taught by Ms Brian with which, again, both he and I were extremely pleased. You can read about the experience here.

We have been considering A Levels as a pathway to university for DS and have found the National Extension College (NEC), who provide distance education both in the UK and to students worldwide, to be very helpful. They are used to dealing with home educators and even offer a family discount. This link will take you to their homepage or you can download their 2015-16 course guide. Did you know that the A Levels are currently being reformed? The course structure might be a little different by the time your students want to study for the exams, but again I have found NEC to be very helpful in answering such questions. The restructuring of the courses also mean that NEC will soon be offering A Level courses in Biology, Chemistry, and Physics.

A big thank-you to your husband! This is the perfect resource for us to get our head around American politics and will enable us to discuss how the US system differs from our system in Australia.

AB ‘Banjo’ Paterson also wrote classic Australian poetry

What I would really like is for copies of the new edition to come with a unique code which allows one user to download an electronic version of the book (in the same way that many textbook publishers do) so I can always have a copy to hand without having to carry around my bedraggled, dog-eared, sticky-tabbed, underlined, well-loved, and quite heavy physical copy!

I am registered with the BOS in NSW and have had fairly flexible APs over the years who have approved our application to homeschool for the maximum period even though we do history chronologically. I do, however, make an effort to help them to be able to tick the required boxes by including a smattering of Australian content throughout. You should also know that my children are in Year 7 and 10, and we were well established before the new Australian Curriculum was rolled out. I have also heard that some APs may have a different outlook to ours. You might like to visit Aussie Homeschool Forum where registration requirements in NSW are regularly discussed by families with children currently placed in a wider range of stages than mine.

My DD 12.5 enjoyed Write Now by Getty-Dubay

I agree wholeheartedly! Sydney is beautiful: the harbour, the beaches, the national parks, the blue mountains... I would only add "it's a bugger of a place to live... unless you have plenty of money." And perhaps the company courting hubby are willing to pay enough to assist you in overcoming two of the major causes of stress for Sydneysiders: commutes and housing affordability. For example, our family-of-four-western-suburb-lifestyle is completely different from the inner-city-double-income-no-kids-lifestyle of my sister and her husband. Being close to the harbour, beaches, city, museums, galleries, playhouses, parks, etc means you can ignore a lot of the traffic problems that cause so much stress. And being able to afford to enjoy all that the city has to offer obviously makes it a lot more fun. If you know where your husband's office will be located, you can get a good idea of commute time from other parts of Sydney using either google maps to calculate driving times using the get directions function (be sure to use the arrive before x time on a weekday to get an accurate reflection of travel time during peak times) or Sydney's Public Transport website. With any luck it is close to a train station and you can afford to live within walking distance to a well serviced station that is on the same line. Driving during peak times is a nightmare unless it is a short distance or against the traffic. As previously mentioned the general wisdom in Australia is that housing costs ideally should not exceed a third of the family budget and you can get an idea of housing costs suburb by suburb at real.estate.com.au. You will also need to know that property purchases are subject to stamp duty. To get an idea of what a scrum master (had to google it) earns in Sydney look at seek.com.au. I am guessing he is looking at a six figure salary and you would probably need that to be comfortable. Local homeschool sites you might like to visit to find more answers include Sydney Home Education Network, Aussie Homeschool Forum, Home Education Australia, and Rockpool Homeschool Forum. Good luck!

Commutes in Sydney can be a nightmare! We are a family of 4 who live in the western suburbs about 40km away from the CBD. Today I drove 42.3km to a park just east of the CBD for a field trip and it took me 1 hour and 40 minutes to get there. Hubby has recently started a new job on the western edge of the CBD near central station, and just yesterday we were celebrating the fact that it "only takes him an hour door to door". You might find Melbourne, Victoria a more livable city (and I believe their registration requirements are very straight forward). We have spent a fair bit of time visiting relatives in NZ and I think if I was choosing between the two countries and work opportunities weren't an issue, I would be very tempted by NZ even though I am an Aussie! And I think if I was going to choose one of the bigger cities, I might seriously consider Wellington (although all the other cities mentioned are nice too). Good luck in finding what works for your family, Angela

Do you know about the Women's Adventures in Science series of books already?

You could also try Australians, Volume 1: Origins to Eureka, Australians, Volume 2: Eureka to The Diggers, and Australians, Volume 3: Flappers to Vietnam.

Australia is currently having a new national curriculum (AC) rolled out so high school texts are in a period of transition. And, unfortunately for your purposes, the focus for high school is now world history, and Australia's place in it, rather than on Australian history itself. You could try older second hand text books published prior to the AC being taught in schools (began 2014 I think). I have heard the Jacaranda texts recommended, but I have never used them myself. Edited to Add: Here is a link to the current Jacaranda texts