Honestly, outside of this season of Covid, we have to turn down social opportunties otherwise we would never get any schooling done. It's pretty much a non-issue for us.

I have the Breville Smart Oven Air, and it has become the workhorse in my kitchen. I even prefer using it over my regular oven because it doesn't make my kitchen hot...important when you live in SoCal. It has amazing capacity even fits a 14 pound turkey! For me, that was the most important aspect. I already had a NuWave XL airfryer (bucket style) similar to the Phillips one that started the whole Air Fryer craze. I really love having the Breville which was only purchased when my toaster oven died. I did consider the less expensive Cuisinart one, but my husband encouraged me to "treat" myself since he has some bonus money that he just got.

This might help you understand how umbrella coverage works. https://www.fidelity.com/viewpoints/wealth-management/do-you-need-umbrella-insurance In fact, I carry a business umbrella policy and a personal umbrella policy.

You buy it separately from your homeowner's policy. The current insurer can sell you this policy. I carry enough to protect our total net worth.

Replays are free for 24 hours after it is broadcast.

You might want to look at WTMA's syllabus for Algebra II. I thought it was really useful for laying out what chapters from the Into and Inter Algebra texts for Algebra II. It does start off with a review of quadratics that would have been covered in Algebra I. https://docs.google.com/document/d/12WwhrH7Z8BPh24kZelazK2tpaE5Vand0Sf8Kj3zHYas/edit

My (at the time 3 year old) will use the Happy Mask for hours with very little fiddling with it. The only time she needs help was because it fell off her ear. We are in the optometrist's office for several hours because of some needed tests and evaluations. It's honestly the only mask I can stand wearing because it doesn't touch the nose or mouth and sits so lightly on my face. The ear loops are adjustable to achieve a better fit as well. That being said, I really try to avoid putting my little in the position of having to wear a mask unless I really need to. Honestly practice helps and I'm not above bribery at this point either.

I use a rack underneath and bought an ovenliner that I cut in half. I use one to line the crumb tray at the bottom and the other half to line the rack. If I am doing something that will drip, I use a rimmed cookie sheet with some parchment paper underneath the "basket" rack to catch any drips. I bought the largest size cookie sheets that I could fit on those racks. I don't have to use the paper, but it make it quicker to cleanup. The oven liners make clean up a snap. It cleans up easily with a plastic bristle brush. Plastic mesh scrubbers and dishwashing sponges will get ripped up quickly if you use it on the basket. I am pretty sure you are Asian like me. I have made the best Chinese style roast pork with the crackling crispy skin in there and even recently air fried salt and pepper tofu which had that crunch on the outside and velvet smooth texture on the inside without deep frying.

If you have even an average sized family, go for capacity. I actually started with a NuWave XL one and ended up with a Breville Smart Oven Air. I was going to settle for the Cuisinart one at half the price, but my husband got a bonus and wanted me to have the Breville. It has replaced me using our ovens which has saved a lot in energy and keeps our house from getting too hot. I have Viking professional grade ovens which take an hour to preheat. I dislike using them if I don't have to. I can do a 14 pound turkey in the Breville. I was solving for capacity. It has a ton of different options, so I really do use this multple times a day. In fact today, I did roasted a turkey breast and baked stuffing in a 9"x13" baking dish at the same time on two different racks. FWIW, I kept my NuWave and yes, there are times when I have both going at once. Both are listed in this roundup of top rated machines. https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/appliances/g34484837/best-air-fryer-toaster-ovens/

@Not_a_Number I think when you already think this way automatically (math adept and math gifted students), then it is harder to see how this is a pitfall for students who aren't oriented this year. Sign issues are very common problem for students. I am painfully anal about this because I've seen students easily lose track of signs because they don't habitually associate the sign with the number in their thinking. They associate signs with the operation in their minds and the numbers somehow exist separately from that. I think another way this is problematic is that when they start thinking about factorization, they will look at something like -12 and not know what to do with the negative. They don't easily grasp that it could be +1, -1, +2, -2, +3, -3, +4. -4, +6, -6, +12, -12 if they are still thinking about the negative as a operation. The reason why I think this is really important when it gets you start to have to work quickly with quadratic equations.

This is exactly the point I was trying to get at...your illustration with the pitfalls of not understanding this when you have to work with the distributive property. Yes, one rule that works for everything. I don't like teaching someting and having to unteach or modify it when it not longer works as easily.

This actually makes a lot of sense to me because in higher math, there is no division sign in algebraic expressions only fractions which are the expression of division. She needs to see that 1/8 is the reciprocal of 8 or 1/a is the reciprocal of a. This is a really important concept to grasp and why reciprocals are important for manipulating an algebraic expression. Thinking about reciprocals is very important in math. Also subtraction shouldn't be used in algebra because that is not what is happening. Students must grasp the concept of positive and negative terms and that whenever you see - it is not an operation. An expression that say 2x - 4 = 12 really means + 2x + (-4) = 12. A student who doesn't grasp that this is the addition of postive and negative terms will struggle in algebra because it will be intuitive to them to always keep the positive or negative with the term.

And the Sanford CEO is essentially forced into retirement. https://www.argusleader.com/story/news/2020/11/24/kelby-krabbenhoft-bill-gassen-sanford-health/6416027002/

Come to think of it...I liked the authorized Marilla of Green Gables by Sarah McCoy.

Goodness. My eyes tricked me for a moment. Being from CA, I read STANFORD at first and thought...no way! And then I read it again SANFORD in South Dakota. I would continue because of the possibility of reinfection and honestly, I really would prefer not to get sick during this season at all.

I lean towards the Chronicles personally because it inhabits the same universe of characters. Emily is a complete standalone series which is a very nice series as well. Also, a lot of people don't know that The Blythes Were Recorded was published in 2009. It was never published because she died after submitted the manuscript. It is the last in the Green Gables series. It might be hard to find. There are only 2 copies available to me in CA through the interlibrary lending system.

I was going to post this to the mammoth thread, but I thought it was a useful tool from GIT (corrected, thanks for the catch, it was attributed to MIT in an article I got the link from) for anyone as they make decisions in this season. This is a real time interactive map that assesses the risk of a Covid positive person attending an event. You can adjust the calculation (use 5 if testing is widely available, 10 if testing is not not) and adust based on the size of the gathering. This is all based on the data for each county. I really thought it was helpful since it is not static as data is continually being updated. https://covid19risk.biosci.gatech.edu/?fbclid=IwAR3tv1AkbpvBGldyF9dkRVbce1pSxMuqZwovpYTAVyc8ebp6q7lpIjzpQCY

Writing is the one area that I kept closer to his actual age. I had listened to a webinar hosted by Headmistress Guinevere (her online persona) at Online G3 and felt really comfortable to be more relaxed about writing. The amount of writing output that is expected in public school would have not worked with us because there was a significant gap between what was going on in his head and what his writing abilities and physical staminia could tolerate. He is also through and through a STEM kid so to say he is reluctant writer is putting a good face on things. We did use Writing with Ease in a pretty relaxed manner, 8's Treasured Conversations and only in the last two year really started with more explicit writing instruction. This is one area I outsourced this year to WTMA with Writing with Skill (aka writing for Engineers haha). I am helping him understand his assignments and work with him on his pre-writing and then editing. This is also why humanities classes through Athena's and OG3 have been so great because the writing output is minimal while the content is engaging and at a high level. https://www.onlineg3.com/writing-can-wait/

+1 on the Concise History of Us as well. It is published by K12. There are lots of used copies floating around. I think I got all 4 volumes for under $25 total a couple of years ago.

Thanks for the suggestions. I will ask him what he thinks about giving it a try. We have time since it won't be until February. Certificate of Merit is recognition given to students 6th grade and under scoring 15 or higher.

@daijobuYes, that tatoo thing was MK 2017 I believe.

For the BTDT, when would be an appropriate time to consider also sitting for the AMC 10 as a younger student? Should you be looking at a certain score or percentile rank? DS earned the Certificate of Merit last year with his score.

On the topic of MK t-shirts, our test center finally located my son's prizes...this is after asking over the last several months. I just picked it all up today and they gave me the shirt as well. It is a fuschia pink color. I have no earthly idea who thought that was a good idea. Talk about a waste of money. There is no way my son will ever wear this. I'll save it for my daughter. And if anyone know what in the world you are supposed to do withh the wooden box puzzle thing beyond trying to arrange all the pieces to fit properly in there, let me know.

I just remembered a few gifted families enjoying the asynchronous classes with Next Level Homeschool and using the higher level courses for their accelerated learners.

We've been mostly happy with the classes at Online G3 and Athena's. He is currently taking physics with Jetta through Clover Creek Physics and that has been going well. If everything works out, we plan to enroll Clover Valley Chemistry next year. Just the regular one, given his age. It was important to us that he have the EF skills in place to be able to meet the work requirements of any classes without scaffolding. (in this case, science and foreign language so far).