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DarcyM

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Posts posted by DarcyM

  1. So far our trajectory has been:

     
    Lial's Beg. Algebra for Algebra I

    Jacob's Geometry

    Lial's Intermediate Algebra for Algebra II

    Lial's Pre-Calculus 

    What is recommended to do next? Does Pre-Calc cover the trig concepts needed or should Trig be taken with Analytic Geometry prior to Calculus? 

    Larson's Calculus?  if this, I see several editions and versions.

    Lial's Calculus with Applications?  (is this rigorous enough for College / ACT prep? ) 

    I am finding so many varying options and I have to account for 1 student who has goals of pre-vet med undergrad, and 1 student who would be happy if he never saw a science book again. 

     

    I'd love any advice or thoughts from those of you who have already paved this road. Thank you.

     

     

     

  2. Is this really legit? 

     

    This is their first paragraph, and outside of being awkward I don't really know what that last sentence even means:

    Harari College Worldwide is an online, tuition-free, college-level program for high school students from all over the world. By offering a rigorous, research-oriented, global, collegiate, obstacles-free environment that specializes in the humanities and the social sciences, we allow each student to pursue his interests and ambitions until this very end.

     

     

    But I cannot see available classes, or anything else about the programs, staff, or really any information at all. No contact info. No click to learn more. No "sign up here." Just 1 kind of odd initial page. 

     

    Too good to be true?

    • Like 1
  3. Everything looks ok to me, but I just wanted to mention that the Hakim book is upper elementary/lower middle school level.  If you're looking for a high school/adult level history of science text, SWB's new book is good.

     

    Good to know. Thanks for the feedback! He doesn't really need it for his Science credit since he's doing Bio, I thought he'd just like it. I'm using it as my 4th grader's science this year, and making my 15 yo read it to/with him, so I'm counting it as a supp in hopes he gets something out of it, along the way. :)

  4. Math: Lial's Intermediate Algebra + additional practice book

    Lit & Comp:  Excellence in Literature guided books and writing 

    Teaching Literature through Art supp

     

    History: K12's The American Odyssey: A History of the United States

    Great Courses: The History of the United States on DVD ( 84 lectures by 3 college prof)

     

    Biology, Holt, Rinehard, Winston (2008 version bc it's so much less expensive!)

    + study guide/ lab worksheets 

     

    The Story of Science, Hakim  (first book linked, there are 3 texts in complete series)

     

    Foreign Lang: Italian

     

    Animation & Drawing - online course 

    Art courses through local museum in Painting, Drawing, possibly Mixed Media

    working on portfolio pieces 

     

    PE:  .5 credit in gym time

     

    Is this a full schedule for a 10th grader? Math and Bio are heavy lifters this year, it looks like a lot of work to me, but am I missing something or shorting him in anyway?  If you were to add something what would you add? 

     

    He wants to go into Animation as a career (he's a talented artist) so he has BFA goals.

     

    Thank you.

     

     

     

  5. We're pairing the DVDs with this text:  The American Odyssey: A History of the United States

     

    I can't speak from experience yet, since I'm in the planning stages like you. Neither is here yet - ordered, and I'll be matching lectures with Chapters once I have my hands on the TOC and Guidebook.  Paired with some research and 3 short papers, as well as some experience with the democratic process (We live in Iowa, it's prepping for an election year, so there are a lot of opportunities to participate in American voting system here) we should have plenty of hours for 1 credit in American History this year.

    • Like 2
  6. Darcy,

     

    I am going to share my experience with Great Courses to see if it can help you decide what is best for your situation.  Last year, my daughter was in 9th grade and I created a “syllabus†for her World History course.  I had the opportunity to purchase a few sets of used courses and was able to match several videos (from different courses offered by Great Courses) to a 32 chapter college textbook (it was a college textbook, but it was easy to read).  The syllabus consisted of the following: listen to the videos assigned to the chapter (99 videos for 32 chapters), review for a short quiz, and then take the quiz for that particular chapter (all in 127 days).  I initially estimated that she was going to take anywhere between 158-191 hours to complete, but she completed all 99 videos, read all 32 chapters, reviews and quizzes in 155 hours.

     

    My daughter did well last year with this format that she dual-enrolled for two world history courses over the summer (between 9th and 10th grade); she obtained a solid A for the first part of world history and it seems that she is going to get another solid A for the second part of world history.  According to my daughter, even though world history is accelerated in college (especially over the summer), both courses were easy because of the format presented at home in the previous academic year.

     

    For the upcoming year, I am planning to do the same (use History of the United States from Great Courses).  However, I am still searching for a college textbook that would be “an easy read,†then write the detailed course syllabus before her start date at the end of August.  The plan is to have her dual-enroll for both US history courses next summer to validate what I did at home.

     

    I apologize for the long post, but I hope it helps with your decision.  Good luck to you and your son.

     

     

    We're using the same one you will this year (http://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/history-of-the-united-states-2nd-edition.html?pfm=UpsellSlider&pos=2&recloc=pdp)  and I'm going to attempt to line up  The American Odyssey: A History of the United States with it. That doesn't qualify as a college text, so I'm not sure your daughter can get AP credit for it, but as of right now - we're in a state where you have to DE to do the AP tests, so we're not. DE requires a bit more meddling here, so we're opting out. A choice I hope we won't regret! 

     

    :)

    • Like 1
  7. Thank you so much, those of you who took the time to respond. I know planning is time consuming and high school has a whole different learning curve - so please know I am very grateful for the time you each gave me to respond so thoughtfully.

     

    We've decided to use k12's The American Odyssey: A History of the United States as our spine and the Great Courses as a supplement and line up chapters as much as possible. He enjoys historical fiction so I'm hoping to multi-course some of his literature & comp work to be parallel. He's also doing an art / art history course and I'm going to also try and parallel a few art pieces if I can pull all of this together to at least get started by Sept 1. (He want to be a FineArt major and studio animation & movie making)  

     

    I think between the spine, the DVDs, some research/writing topics - as well as some caucus / political experiences (We live in Iowa - so we get a lot of experience with democracy and campaigning around here! ;) ), we will have the necessary hours for 1 credit. 

     

    Thank you for mentioning FundaFunda - I'd never heard of it.  

    Again, I appreciate the time you each took to respond. Very grateful.

  8. we will be using this--thanks!!! we will be subbing audible great courses for some of the Pages in History--getting them all is too expensive and our library doesn't carry them. Thank u!

     

    I am going to attempt to coordinate the K12 book with The Great Courses' History of the United States 2nd edition. WIll post if I actually do it more than a week in advance ;)

     

     

    If you do match K12's American Odyssey and The Great Courses' History of the US, I would love love love to see how you line them up. I'm strongly considering pairing these for 1 Amer. history credit.

    • Like 2
  9. Great question!  I love the Great Courses, my kids not so much--although they're starting to learn the value.  We are currently working through the new Understanding Japan series which I plan to supplement with text and field trips.  The other thing I've started doing is using the lectures that go along with texts.  DS and I read Dante this summer and used the corresponding lectures. It really helped provide so much more background and explanation.  My hang-up now is how to credit them.

     

    Yes - I'm not sure how to credit these either, although I think I'd like to pair it with a history text. (Ugh it's mid-August and I'm scrambling. Why have I procrastinated??)  :)

  10. If any of you have used Great Courses as a high school credit course or even as a supplement, I'd love to hear how you did it. 

     

    The course I'm considering is The history of the US:

    http://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/history-of-the-united-states-2nd-edition.html?pfm=UpsellSlider&pos=2&recloc=pdp

     

    It has 84 (30min) lectures for a total of 42 hrs. So not enough alone to count as a full credit, but seems meaty enough for a 9th or 10th greater to use as a launch point.

     

    How have you used Great Courses to work for you, how do you document it for HS?

     

    Thank you for any insight and experiences.

  11. HI everyone. This is my first 9th grader. And suddenly I'm super nervous about how to document, make transcripts, and assign credit to his work. He is college-bound and interested in engineering. I would love feedback or tips or to please point out any obvious gaps.  Thank you.

     

    Math: Jacob's Geometry + Life of Fred Geometry

    Science:  Hewitt's Conceptual Physics (with Labs and wkbk),  +  Life of Fred Elem Physics

    Soc Stud:  Runkle's World Geography

    For Lang:  Italian + Rosetta Stone

    English:  finish Growing with Grammar 8, then English I - Intro to Lit, Excellence in Literature
    PE: he works out 5 days a week at our awesome gym (how does one document this?? ) and takes cycling, Zumba, Pilates, etc. Does open gym weekly.


    Does this seem like a good start for a college-bound 9th grader?  TIA.


     

     

     

  12. Your junior high / high school kids could probably do Prego. I think it's geared at older students, but it moves slowly and has a teacher's edition, and there is a lab portion that you may not need if you stick with Rosetta Stone but it reinforces the chapter work. We used Prego to teach 1st year of Italian at the college I taught at, but it's not complex. Da Capo is the 2nd year level of that series.

     

    I also think Barron's Painless Italian is pretty decent for junior high level, but it may be because I'm teaching with it and I already know the language. I don't know how effective it would be at teaching yourself. Perhaps decent once you've mastered pronunciation via Rosetta Stone. It's one of the better ones I've found.  Get a good verb workbook and practice at conjugating, it's a drill and kill skill, IMO.

     

    Stick with Rosetta Stone. It's great for pronunciation and vocab.

     

    I don't check here often, but I do speak Italian, have taught Italian at the university level, and I'm currently teaching 6th and 8th graders, so if you have questions you're welcome to email me where I am more likely to find your comment:     darcy    at     my3boybarians.com

    In bocca a lupo!

  13. We did Horizons for math because it's cyclical enough that it will repeat the material again (and again and again and again and... ) which is great for when he had an off day. He is the kid who will fly through material like it's nothing, ace it like a whiz, then the next day stare at the same problems like he has never seen such a thing in his life.

     

    We are switching to Singapore this year. Basically, the sheer number of problems in Horizons became an issue. Math was taking either 15 min on a good day or 4 hours on a bad day. It has been very effective as far as progress. He is great at math when he is on. I don't know how Singapore will go for him. I used it successfully with my older boys; I just believe that focusing hard on 15-20 problems rather than 40-50 may be what he needs at this time.

     

    I like Horizons for a kid who needs to revisit material over and over. If you have that kind of learner, it's fantastic. But if your child has attention in 5 minute doses, you will need to either break up the amount of work or find something else. I can always report back on how Singapore goes. I've got my fingers crossed.

  14. I recommend Life of Fred for math-hesitant enrichment prior to algebra / pre-algebra. Most boys find it engaging and it's a quick study, really quirky and kind of funny. We used it as a refresher with Singapore prior to pre-algebra. There are about a dozen books or so, but we found them just funny enough that the boys like them, but content-rich enough to be useful.

     

    We used Lial's PreAlgebra in 7th and we're using Jacob's Elem Alg in 8th.  But I think doing preAlg in 8th and waiting until 9th for Alg may work for your child's age/stage. Back in the day, that's what pubHS did anyway.

     

    Regardless of what you do, slowing him down to do all the steps properly is a must. With math, there is no such thing as partial credit. And a pubHS teacher won't examine closely to see if he 'mostly understands the concept.' With so many kids in a class, he would just get it marked wrong, even if the math is mostly right. This can impact his scores and not truly indicate his understanding and abilities simply because there are too many kids in PubHS.  Teachers will simply look at the final and mark it wrong. He needs to understand while you may have time to look deeper to gage his comprehension, a teacher with 100s of students will not. He'll want his scores to reflect his actual ability and for that to happen he must do each step sequentially and carefully. This is hard for teen boys, isn't it? There're like a million things they rather be doing, but I believe it's a maturity thing. I see the rushing here at home, too.

     

    :)  good luck

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