staceyobu
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Posts posted by staceyobu
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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 don't know if she just needs more explicit writing instruction. Or what to do. Or maybe she's just not motivated as much to write for me because I'm mom and she knows she can put stuff off. I've kinda gone the "I'm going to punish you for not putting words down" route. And after that option failed in flames, I'm seeing if anyone has words of wisdom!
Any suggestions?
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19 hours ago, Zoo Keeper said:
Take it with a large dose of salt, since I am basing this solely on the samples from the website, but I think you could switch the 7th and 8th grade history books and be fine. It doesn't seem like the output expected or the reading level jumps significantly between books.
Or you could wait for an opinion from someone who has actually used the books. 😉
Here is a thread with some thoughts on CLE's middle grades history...
Hey... I just need a homeschool buddy to bounce decisions off of! I'll totally take your advice!
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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.
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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, there are 10 big projects that are all due May 31st. I feel like we keep pushing these off on busy days because there is an entire school year to get them done. However, I just wish there was one due once a month. Some of them are also fairly lengthy writing assignment. Like, the assigned pages seems longer than what I would have to say about something. But, the other aspects of the course seem like enough to push this slightly to the win category.
Misses:
DIVE streaming for Saxon Algbera 2 - So, maybe it's not quite fair to list this as a miss since they are informative, but the sound quality is terrible. And, the pen he uses constantly disappears and reappears. Doesn't seem worth how much I paid.
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Ya know, I always said I wanted 5 kids. And then we had 4 in 7 years, and I was like, oh my gosh. I am so completely exhausted. And then we decided we could always wait a few years and think about it again. I got really reliable, long term birth control. I eventually said if I didn't make the decision before I turned 40 to have another, we would be absolutely done at 40. And, now, here I am reminiscing about how cute and cuddly our kids were as infants and toddlers.
I love being pregnant, I love giving birth, I love nursing. I'm not totally sure that having another baby would forever satisfy those desires. Our youngest is now 8. Our big kids are much more expensive now with braces, swim team, violin, and we are about to start adding teenagers to our car insurance policy.
I do enjoy the perks of big kids. No one wakes me up at night anymore. I can go sit and chat with friends in a park instead of chasing a toddler everywhere. I don't have to be home to nurse a child to sleep at bedtime.
And, yet. Sometimes I feel like there is still that 5th kid out there.
Just, tell me I'm crazy...
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2 hours ago, Gobblygook said:
Loved the shout out to homeschoolers yesterday!
My 8 year old was ecstatic. I'm pretty sure he thought it was just directed at our family!
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He's been filming recent episodes from what I assume is his home. Today the bookshelf he was in front of clearly has a Sonlight binder and the CLE readers. I had questioned previously if the big blue binder was a Sonlight binder, but today was the first time I could actualy read the name!
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We are using Sonlight 20th century and really enjoying it so far. We are only doing the history and Bible, not the literature. I’ve read some of the book selections alongside my daughter and they’ve been fabulous. We are only about 6 weeks in, so I can’t give a full review of the year, but so far it’s great!
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I watched the movie in full today and then cancelled our Netflix account. I’d seen some conservative friends up in arms about it previously, but I’d blown it off bc they tend to be up in arms about lots of things that don’t ruffle my feathers.
We’ve had a Netflix account since they sent you cds in the mail, long before streaming was a thing. We are still mostly at home being in a covid hotspot, and I’m not excited about canceling a streaming service right now.
It’s a well done movie. The clips are less shocking when you see them spread out and in context. The movie hits on some worthy themes.
However, the ends don’t justify the means here. There were other ways the points could have been made. I thought the movie Thirteen did a good job showing the dangers of social media and the sexualization of young teens without the gross factor. I know it’s hard to make judgements on what is art and what is going too far. If children are involved, I think it’s better not to push those boundaries.
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I'm close to pulling the trigger on the Simply Charlotte Mason picture study. I just thought I'd see if anyone knew of anything else.
What I want:
A famous piece of artwork I can show to four kids at once (I have a book that is about 4x6, and I just find it too small to all look at altogether).
I'd love a short interesting fact or two about the artwork or the artist. I don't really care about the full life story.
I only want to commit about 5 minutes a day to this.
I don't want any actual making art. I just want to familiarize them with famous art.
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It only includes answers for the study guide (which is in the student notebook) and the test. Not the rest of the general notebook pages.
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Can I get by with the $5 student practice book with no answers? Or do I need the main book that contains transparencies and costs like $20?
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Has anyone used this? I was looking to see if we could get streaming Dive videos, but it redirects to recommend Shormann.
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We left after Challenge A. I wound up starting my own co-op, which may be more work than you are wanting to take on for the fall, lol.
I do not regret leaving. In fact, I really regret not quitting at semester. I don't have many good things to say about Challenge A. My oldest had done four years of foundations/essentials and is amazing at reading/writing/memorizing. She's currently reading Anna Karenina for fun. So, it's not just that she was a dumb kid who wasn't prepared for the workload.
The Latin exercises were taking her about two hours a day. Then, I learned that most parents just memorize the vocab and make no attempt at translation. She kept pace with the Latin, translating everything, until about 2/3 of the way through the program. She was sick a few days, and couldn't catch back up. And then was completely lost. I don't know why they don't slow down Henle so the majority of the kids could keep pace. I don't understand any potential benefit to moving at break neck speed through Latin. It's baffling to me.
The drawing the world stressed her out. She'd spend hours working on one tiny handful of countries or states. She didn't learn the names of the majority of them because she was being a perfectionist on the drawing.
We both hated Lost Tools. I can't figure out for the life of me how anyone likes it.
I could go on and on. It was a disastrous year and when I saw her blue book exams, I was like, you have learned SO little this year. I have no regrets on leaving. I pulled everyone else out because basically everything they do in foundations is "because of challenge". In our county, you can serve in teen court and be part of actual juvenile court hearings. There is also a formal speech club of some sort and a student government organization that I've heard great things about. i can't imagine that you can't find something to fill whatever aspects of challenge b are important for your family.
Oh, and of the group that continued with Challenge B, almost all of them put their kids in public school after the year was over. So, it didn't seem that the people who pressed on really enjoyed it.
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DD is 15 and finishing 9th grade. I do not think we can move on in math next year because of her struggles with Algebra 1. I've posted previously about it. She tends to make 85% on tests in Saxon Algebra 1, but she is missing sometimes 50% on lessons and is just super frustrated.
I'm wondering about putting her in the Key To series or Teaching Textbooks for the next several months and then trying to finish Saxon Algebra 1 before we move ahead in the fall. Of course, the idea of a summer of more math is crushing to her.
Any thoughts?
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I'm wondering if we could offer Lightning Literature as a class at our co-op for middle school students. The problem is, the students are in the class for two years, so some students would get lightning lit 7 for 7th grade, but others would get lightning lit 8 for 7th. They would have them in reverse order. Is this a deal breaker?
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I've wondered this as well. I pretty much always buy WIC approved items because they are usually the lowest priced.
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I have an Earth Science Grammar Stage teacher book and the student workbook. The teacher book says do quiz on page 12. It's not on page 12 in either book. I've checked the website to see if there is a separate quiz book and can't find one. Where are these?!
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DD has basically always done saxon. She did really well with math until she started struggling her 7th grade year with 8/7. I thought part of it was just a difficult mental year (hormones and teenager stuff). We did Algebra 1/2 for 8th grade to try to help her solidify some of the basics. The first half the year was definitely better, but she started to struggle again by the end of the year. It was always hard for me to pinpoint exactly what she struggled with. She made a lot of sloppy mistakes. Would get a concept correct one day and then miss it the next.
This year, Algebra 1 has been fairly disheartening. We sit together and go over the lesson and do the practice problems together. She then completes the lesson. The next day, we work together through every problem she misses. On average, she misses about 1/3 of the problems. The lessons take a long time. She is particularly lost on exponents... when you add them, when you multiply them, etc. I've explained every which way I can think of, but I think she has herself convinced she's not going to understand anyways.
Amazingly, her test average is 85% right now. We are on lesson 68 in the book. She's a really smart kid... but definitely leans toward literature and art. She corrects my spelling and grammar at this point and can tear through classic literature way faster than I ever could. I'm at a loss of what to do. I've considered stopping this and restarting her in some sort of easier Algebra 1 program with plans to move her back into Saxon Algebra 1. However, in the back of my mind, I'm also worried that she isn't going to be able to get enough math credits behind her to do well on the SAT if we don't push forward. While also realizing that pushing forward and her getting even more lost makes zero sense. Sigh.
I just feel like this is way harder for her than it should be. Like, it just seems so super frustrating. And I don't have the foggiest clue how to remedy the problem. Help.
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Title basically says it all. If I pay for digital, can I print it and have a hard copy to use after my subscription period ends? Or can it be downloaded?
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Are you looking at the most recent edition? We used the edition that just came out last spring in co-op this year. I felt like it wasn't as wordy as some of the other apologia texts.
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It was great! Over half the moms from my co-op attended as well! I'm still thinking over some of the things she said. One was allowing your high schooler to specialize. My oldest would spend all her time reading and writing and hates being forced to do math. I'm not totally sure how to allow her to specialize when most colleges want that 4x4 of math, science, history, and English. I also liked her emphasis on the classical virtues: prudence, temperance, courage, and justice. It's always so hard to sum up what classical education is! It's not memorization, it's not the stages, it's not a four year history cycle. I liked the idea of using those as summary points for what classical education is.
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I read the WTM when my oldest was 3. And joined this forum shortly thereafter. I figured out today that we have used some item written by SWB every single year since we began homeschooling, and usually multiple items. I cannot wait to see her in person.
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22 hours ago, Alice said:
We are a swimming family and I read your thread title to my two boys and they died laughing at how obvious a choice it was and then were appalled when I told them everyone so far had said summer school. There aren’t a lot of things I can say anymore that leave two teenage boys speechless, so that was fun. 😂
🙂
I asked my 7 year old what he thought I should say. He stood with his mouth hanging open for like 5 minutes in shock that any child could have to do school instead of summer swim!
Can the 7 year old not participate? Two of mine started at age 6! The others started later, but only because we moved here when they were 10 and 7!
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Help thinking through a homemade lit plan for 9th and 11th
in High School and Self-Education Board
Posted
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 literature analysis from a lit guide (like memoria press or glencoe) if that will be enough.
Is this a dumb idea? I've looked at so many packages put together by other people, and I'm just not loving anything.