My kids and their friends spent days making and battling Lego mechanized battlebots! I know we ordered special motors for technics for some of the designs.

For Oceans, World Without Fish. https://www.amazon.com/World-Without-Fish-Mark-Kurlansky/dp/0761185003

I loved this book in middle school and proceeded to read everything Bradbury wrote that I could get my hands on. Then I read it as an adult and realized that it really didn't appreciate it as a kid. If your kid picks it up on her own, definitely encourage her to read it, if not, I'd recommend waiting. There's so much good stuff in there but better late than early.

Lots of great books in there! Little Book of Talent is awesome. I recommend it to anyone who wants to be good at something. I was so sad when i missed A Little History of Philosophy and now I get another chance! I have way too many books in my shopping cart though. How Star Wars Conquered the Universe A Man Called Ove Thirteen: The Apollo Flight that Failed Elements of Eloquence Demon under the Microscope Screwtape Letters....

My math/science guy as a rule reads only nonfiction, but has fallen in love with Tolkein.

Also, the Martian, but preview for language.

The Greatest Show on Earth looks terrific! It should go great with Big History this year. We loved Magic of Reality. I think my son has listened to it 3 times. We've also enjoyed The Dissolving Spoon and a number of science Great Courses on physics and geology.

Have you found a nice illustrated copy of the Silmarillion. I'd love to get this for DS for his birthday in August also. He already has and treasures the illustrated Hobbit and LOTR. We're doing LLLotR this year too.

I totally agree with this. LOTR is just about the only fiction that DS12 likes. I've tried so many other things. He'd rather just read science or engineering books. If I'm going to get anywhere with literature, I figure I better start here :)

Thank you for the replies! It looks like there are a lot of options. Joshin, I was wondering how the courser course measured up, maybe i should try a couple lectures myself. DS12 is comfortable with the Coursera format, so that would work well for him. Skateleft, how important is the visual component of the Great Courses course? I was planning to get that with my next Audible credit. I've found we're much better at completing audio Great Courses than video ones. We spend a lot of time in the car :) Rose, that is good information about the writing. DS12 generally avoids writing at all costs, unless its technical writing. I thought the assignments looked like they would be interesting to him and was hoping to spark more interest in writing. I wonder if I can do this in 7th, and then again in high school. This is a kid who would study chemistry and physics all the time given the choice. Did anyone incorporate field trips? We did a terrible job with field trips last year, but I was thinking I could find something to do monthly, Carnegie Planetarium, Ithaca paleontological research center, Meadowcroft Rock Shelter... I'm a geologist who was almost an astronomy major. This is so exciting for me!

And those links are terrific! I think we'll do this, and incorporate a bunch of the stuff from the other threads. As an excellent reader, but much more a science/math kid than a language arts kid, I think this could be just what he needs (fingers crossed).

Lori D, thank you for your detailed reply. We haven't done much in the way of formal lit. We've listened to the whole audiobook series (loved the reader) as a family and now DS12 is rereading on his own and loves it! DS10 doesn't love it as much, but we could start out trying it all together. I like that idea. I didn't want to admit it, but DS12 loathes comprehension/vocab questions, but is very good at it, so I intend to skip that. Although the game idea is great, we've often handled history vocabulary and memorization that way. I really liked the sample discussion and unit studies and would want to focus on that, so its good to hear that you found it valuable without the more workbooky sections.

For those who have used it, had your child read the books before doing the curriculum and then reread them, or were they reading the first time as scheduled by the curriculum? My son loves LOTR, and parts of the LL look like he'd enjoy them, I'm not sure if he wants to start back at the beginning of the books. I'd love to hear how this curriculum worked at your house.

I'd love to hear more about how you used it. Did you pretty much follow the web page? Did you add any books?

Arduino is awesome. I highly recommend it. Just get one and a good intro book. DS 12 has been making stuff with arduino for several years.

Is anyone planning to do Big History this year? Has anyone done it. I know that DS12 will love it. There is a great teacher training program on their web page and lots of great ideas here https://homeschoolsciencegeek.wordpress.com/category/big-history-project/ I really like the way it approaches writing and inquiry.

I recall reading about a middle school lit program based entirely on short stories, but I can't find it. Does anyone know anything about it? I'm sure there was some Ray Bradbury in there.

Thank you so much!! It worked!

We just loved the Mexican Street Food class! I was excited to see the free pizza class. We're definitely going to try that next!

My boys are 12 and 10. They both enjoy History of the. ancient world 30 greatest orchestral works My older son loves the science courses. He's listened to The origin and evolution of earth The Higgs boson and beyond (i don't think many kids would like this. It was dry and complicated) Einsteins relativity How to listen to and understand great music (I don think he finished it)

We just started listening to Bill Nye, Unstoppable. Its optimistic that engineering and ingenuity can overcome climate change. Its very helpful for the engineering minded worried DS. I also think that its excellent and very well read.

We're listening to Bryson's Short History of Nearly Everything after having read A Really Short History. Its a good followup. I also have Dr Art's Guide (we're using his Planet Earth book right now) and Science matters for later this year. Magic of Reality is awesome, and the app is very worthwhile as well.

Actually I just surveyed 2 and 3 and although we haven't completed 2, 11 yo ds has most of those concepts pretty solid , so we'd be up for giving a Skype coop for 3 a shot. We can preview anything that he doesn't know. My email is tritschs@gmail.com

What a great idea! We did level one a couple years ago and loved it but never got going with level 2. I just started again for 9 yo ds and it would be much better if we had other folks to keep us accountable :). It would also be better if I ditched the ebook and bought the hard copy! Anyone up for doing something similar for 2. I'd give it a shot!

The instruction books are fun, but a lot of the problem solving "meat" is in the workbooks (including stuff that's not in the instruction books). The workbooks are also full of great puzzles. I wouldn't skip them.