I'm hunting for writing ideas for our co-op for junior high students. Is it possible to use W&R books 7 and 9 one year followed by 8 and 10 the next? We have a class of combined 7th and 8th grade students. Each year, new 7th graders move up. I need a curriculum where students don't have to do the first year before doing the second year. If that makes sense.

We use IEW in our co-op for elementary school. We've had sort of a book discussion group for 7th and 8th but are wanting to include more writing for that age group. I don't really want kids doing IEW for years and years since each book is so similar. I've had some suggestions for Bravewriter, but when I look at it, it's not something I would purchase for myself for home use because it doesn't seem very structured. Are there enough writing activities to work on once a week in a co-op setting? We would plan on alternating writing instruction and some lit discussion. With COVID, I'm n

Ohhh... I am looking at this now. Is it hard to pick and choose which aspects to do? How old is your daughter?

Yes... the others would cycle to early modern next year. I was hoping I could just find something with a nice daily breakdown instead of creating it, but alas... curriculum providers just don't always make exactly what I'm wanting! I'm going to look at your suggestions. I was perusing build your library earlier this afternoon!

I've looked at that. She's not a science lover, necessarily, but it might be a more interesting approach to her. And, I could throw my rising 9th grader into that alongside her.

My oldest did Sonlight American and then Sonlight Modern World. She's already done government at community college. The history of the Christian church sonlight core doesn't look appealing to her. What she's loved is the relatively easy readers that reinforce the history. I've read most of them alongside her, and man, I do feel like they've given me such a different view of multiple modern events. We also like that you can just do history and have a completely separate literature. We will do a literature course with some other families, so we need an independent history. Any id

We started Apologia Health this year and dropped it. I did notice multiple places where it seemed to reference a very specific worldview that had nothing to do with health. I particularly remember a section where it was sorta said that it's ideal for a woman to remain home with her children. I found it bothersome, as did my teen daughter. I say this as a conservative Christian who gave up my career to stay home with my children, lol.

I feel like I need to pay you for these thoughtful responses!

Looking at using this theme to combine 9th and 11th graders next year for literuature. I have some ideas, but I'd love to hear yours! I'd love the books to include some from the following categories: an ancient work, a play, an American novel, a non-Western novel, a British novel, a sci fi novel.

Ohhh... I love the idea of following a theme through time/culture.

My oldest has done Windows to the World and Excellence in Literature. This is what I'm kinda wanting to do instead... Read one book from the following categories each year: Ancient - Odyssey, Illiad, etc American Brit Lit Non Western (Asian, African) Sci Fi or Dystopian Play - Shakespeare or other Poetry Unit I feel like an entire year of ancients just seems rough. Or an entire year of Shakespeare. But, I'd like them to get exposure to all the great things. I'm wondering if my 9th grader needs more explicit writing instruction, or if we do literatur

My 10th grader is really an excellent writer. Her grammar is better than mine. She writes well. She just got a 100 on a term paper for her first community college class. However, she seems to get really stuck (maybe because of some perfectionist tendencies?) between the brainstorming and writing stuff down. We are attempting to do Excellence in Literature this year. She has no problem reading and understanding the lit selections. But, if she doesn't like the prompt option, she just will sit and stare at a blank piece of paper for hours and hours and hours and hours. I'm frustrated. I

Hey... I just need a homeschool buddy to bounce decisions off of! I'll totally take your advice!

Changing Frontiers and Across the Ages? I'm considering having my 7th grader use Changing Frontiers next year because her 9th grade brother will also be doing a year of American history for 9th. Is Changing Frontiers significantly more difficult than Across the Ages? My plan would be to reverse the order of those two books.

Hits: Sonlight 20th Century World History and Bible - DD is loving all of the reading. All of the books have been super compelling. Government at the CC - Her first community college class. It's free. I'm loving having something completely off my plate. She wraps up this weekend! Still deciding: Excellence in Literature Lit & Comp - I feel like it's getting the job done, but it's not particularly fun. But, not everything has to be fun. Experience Astronomy - This is the first online class we've ever outsourced. The videos, reading, and quizzes are all good. However