Brigid in NC
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Posts posted by Brigid in NC
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We used our homeschool name, which ended with "High School." It did not include the word "homeschool" in it. ;)
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Wow! Congrats to your dd and to YOU!
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Regentrude, I don't think anyone looking at your dd's transcript will be concerned about 7.5 vs. 8.5 credits. Even the lesser number of CC courses isn't a problem as long as she is taking something. The concern is more for the kids who only take the bare minimum number of credits for enrollment and the classes they take are easy.
:iagree:
I would be careful not to load too much into the first semester of the senior year. College applications take a lot of time and "mental space." I think there is a clear difference in slacking off and taking a reasonable course load. I would not worry a bit about the scenario you describe. :001_smile:
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Before you have your student sit for an SAT2, have him/her take a practice test from the official College Board book. The results from that will let you know whether to bother having him/her take the real test. If you decide that SAT2 tests don't meet with your goals, then don't sweat it and find a better form of validation for your kiddo.
:iagree:
Keep in mind that the percentile "curves" for SAT2s are brutal, compared with the SAT itself. So a practice test and a look at what score and percentile that translates into is a good idea. What would seem like a pretty decent score will have a much lower percentile associated with it on the subject tests. Take a look at the attachment. ;) Good luck with the testing journey!
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If your 8th grader is ready for high school work, then you have lots and lots of flexibility as you plan the 9th-12th years. It opens up possibilities to take additional, more advanced, classes in subjects of interest. It offers the opportunity for tailored electives, as your student checks off the "core" courses early and then explores areas of passion or curiosity. It also gives you the chance to spread a "core" subject over two years if you need to (if your student hits a wall/needs to slow down to succeed), without sacrificing a class that was in the original plans.
This yr-8th grade-her English, foreign language, math (algebra I), and science would all be high school credits. All are at co-op with the high schoolers. (She was definitely ready and asking for more challenge.)
Even if your 8th grader is taking an English class with high schoolers--or at a high school level--if it were me, I would still include some sort of English in all four years of high school. I would not list English in 8th on the high school transcript. For STEM-oriented students, beginning "high school" science and math in 8th is a great way to fit in advanced science and math classes in 11th and 12th. Good luck! ;)
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A novel to consider: Upton Sinclair's The Jungle.
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I guess we're the odd ones here. We do get useful info from RMP, but not due to overall scores, we look at the actual comments and filter according to our "tastes." We tend to look for key words or phrases and give them our own positive or negative spin. So far, everything has been accurate for what we expected.
:iagree:
My guys found Rate My Professor to be helpful for their CC classes--and they now (instead) look at the grade distributions that their college publishes to compare profs (there are some tremendous variations in parallel classes).
We would always talk about the comments and filter out the responses where it was clear that the students weren't ready/able to do the work. But there were often helpful nuggets that gave a relatively accurate idea of the instructors' personalities/expectations and the rigor of the courses. Just our experience. :001_rolleyes:
you will get a more acurate picture asking previous students.
:iagree:
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We've known quite a few homeschooling families that did not graduate their high schoolers in four years. In our homeschooling community, that extra year of high school is referred to as a "super senior" year. Two of the super seniors we know are athletes--a swimmer and a baseball player--and an additional year of high school improved their recruiting prospects. Another needed to save more money for college, so rather than taking a gap year, she extended high school and got in more dual enrollment classes that would transfer. There are lots of different reasons for taking a super senior year, and in our area there is no stigma or view that they have been held back--just that there are lots of different reasons for the decision.
Good luck! ;)
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The audio is just as effective. I usually buy the audio downloads, which are their cheapest option.
:iagree:
I really enjoyed just listening to Dr. Vandiver (but I don't know what she looks like on DVD, so I may not know what I was missing). I have some other Teaching Company DVDs and they are all just the instructor at a lecturn. The audio would have been just as good (or better--since I like to listen in the car). There are probably visuals in some classes, but for the literature-oriented classes I think the CDs or downloads would be just as good as the DVDs.
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Good luck! I admire you! It's a BIG step! :)
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Coming in late, but I'd like to add that I love your list. There are so many possibilities, but I can definitely see the order and thinking in your choices. I wondered about your two Shakespeare comedy choices, but after you explained the family connection, they make sense too.
My 2 cents: If I were shortening the list I would include either Much Ado or Midsummer Night's Dream. (Btw, the Much Ado movie that just came out is wonderful.) If Hamlet and Macbeth have already been tackled or are planned for future years, I think Lear is a wonderful choice. If not, I would want to find a way to get them into the high school years. Lastly, I'd read some of the Canterbury Tales. I'm not a fan of abridged books or simply reading excerpts, but IMO reading several of the Tales is plenty for most high school students.
I always entered every school year with doubts about the reading schedule and choices--and I always had books on the schedule that I had not yet read, but were on my own personal bucket list. One of the great things about homeschooling is you can enjoy reading alongside your kids when you want to, and you can make changes on the fly. Good luck! :001_smile:
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Averaged high A's in math through pre algebra. Review in summer shows algebra ready.
But! He scored 82% on Iowa in math and 65% overall. I have no idea what happened. He has always scored 97-99% on Cat every year previous. He said the test was super easy.
For students that are "ahead" of grade level, there is the chance that what they see on standardized tests is not what is fresh--they have not been working on some of the math concepts, and have been working on others that are not on the test. My suggestion is to look closely at the subscores to see where the percentages dipped. What we found in all standardized testing in middle school and high school, was there was a need to review and refresh the "easier" concepts. The fact that your ds found the test to be easy (and had scored well in the past) would be a clue to me that he was very familiar with the concepts, but was not necessarily noticing the "trick" questions. He knew the math, but was tripped up by the way the questions were asked.
I think you have gotten a lot of good advice from earlier posters. I would consider not backing up. The fact that your ds is ahead gives you breathing room to slow down in a future year when he might need more time to cover material that he finds difficult--so you have the option of covering pre-calc in two years rather than one, for example.
Our family has experienced the same bumps in the past. If your ds is a math/science guy, this one test does not mean that he's not. I would frame it that he is ahead of the test, and test prep next time will help him refresh the concepts that he's not been practicing or that he has not seen in a "gotcha" test framework. Good luck! :001_smile:
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We really loved Apologia at our house. My two guys liked the way that Jay Wile explained things, and they felt well prepared for the next level (CC classes). We used Apologia for General Science through Physics, and then my ds's took chem and physics CC classes in 11th and 12th. We found that weekly co-op lab classes and paid lab classes (with instructors who were science-saavy --> not me! :scared:) really improved the labs and lab report-writing experience.
My older ds took the Chem SAT 2 after Apologia Chemistry, and it was not preparation enough, as others have pointed out. (If you are considering taking an SAT 2, be sure to have your student take and score a practice test early, and then be sure to look at the SAT 2 percentiles--the curves are brutal.) He re-took it after another year of Chem, and that made a tremendous difference. That did not diminish our regard for Apologia, though. Good luck with your choices everyone! Apologia was a good homeschool-friendly fit for this non-science-mom who somehow raised two scientists. Whew!
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This was true of the PreCalculus book that my my daughter used for College Algebra and Trigonometry classes at the local community college. The cutstomized version was simply the regular textbook minus several chapters. I found the regular textbook at a local thrift store and my daughter used that for both classes. This saved us more than a hundred dollars.
:iagree:
I always shop for used editions too--and it really can save you hundreds of dollars in a single semester!
The "custom" editions infuriate me. They are a scam, IMO, as they offer no added value. My two ds's took quite a few dual enrollment classes, and I was always sad and angry to see so many high-priced custom editions. Custom editions change so frequently that there are limited **or no** options for resale. We have found virtually no opportunity to comparision shop, since the custom editions at our local CC are shrinkwrapped--and once you break open the shrinkwrap, you cannot return the material.
My two "follow the rules" guys were totally stressed out at the idea that the question sets in a used copy would not match up if we did not purchase the specific custom edition on the syllabus. :o And contacting the instructor . . . it just doesn't seem like students should have to go through this extra step. Book vendors and the bookstore know that most won't.
Everybody is on a budget these days, but so many CC students are schooling on a shoestring. Some school book strategies border on the
unethical IMO. And now, off of my soapbox--and thanks for the reminder, Creekland!
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The word "official" is important to some schools. So we were advised to use "Official High School Transcript" on ours. Also, sign and date the transcript at the bottom. I used the title "Academic Supervisor" following my name--but I don't know that a title is necessary. :)
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For those of you who did weight your grades, did you follow the weighting methodology used by your local public schools? My public school determines the gpa by taking the total grade points and dividing by the total credit hours. Is this how it is normally done?
That is exactly what we did--we followed the weighting method of our county school system: A=4.0 regular/5.0 honors/6.0=AP/CC. We did not use +/- and we assigned 1 credit per class. :)
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I would also make sure that she isn't given a limit over, say, $500. :coolgleamA:
I completely agree that a low limit makes sense for a first-time credit card holder. But let me share something I just learned.
Last week we helped our ds apply for a credit card with our/his bank (so that he could easily pay his credit card bill by transferring money from his checking account), and our local banker alerted us to an interesting point. Part of the reason we wanted to help ds get a credit card was so that he could begin building his own credit history--and the banker (who we know and trust) said to be careful not to set the limit too low. If the credit card is going to be used to pay for college books and rent, you want to set the limit high enough so that the student is not coming close to the credit limit each month. She said that even if the amount is paid off in full each month, "maxing out" will negatively affect the cardholder's credit score. :w00t: I was not aware of this at all. I figured that if the balance was fully paid off each month, that all was good. So, just a tidbit for consideration.
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Jenn's blog is a great reminder. These shared gaps are hilarious. Someone on this forum recently reminded us to tell our young kids what to say if they are asked what grade they are in. It's always fun to ask kids how much a postage stamp costs or a gallon of milk. Just the other day I had to tell one of mine that next time he did not need to buy organic carrots. Regular carrots were just fine . . . for the horses. :001_rolleyes:
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I definitely think kids should be allowed to work at challenging academic and life things, but I don't feel that needs to include a push to be in college (full time) at any particular age. I enjoyed keeping my "advanced" kids home until the more normal time to do college - and they certainly haven't been harmed by it nor do they regret it. They've enjoyed their time. Homeschooling does give one a bit of freedom. ;)
:iagree:
I mourned when my first went off. We were in no hurry!
Our only pre-9th class listing (as an asterisk below the 9th-12th listings) was biology. If my ds's had taken Human Anatomy or an advanced bio class in 9th-12th, I would have left that off. My scienc-y guys packed in 4 years of 9th-12th science, but biology was not their interest--so I wanted to make sure that a college wouldn't interpret the absence of biology in the 9th-to-12th timeframe as no biology at all. :)
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OP, I just want to say again how sorry I am for you and your ds.
The stories I have read on this thread have just stunned me. Students being turned away by people who know them? What the heck is going on? Has this country lost all common sense?
:iagree:
It seems like common sense has flown out the window. And as an earlier poster noted, just because a passport has expired doesn't mean it's not "you" anymore. Sheesh! Craziness!
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All I can say is do what you think is best for your homeschool.
:iagree:
I did include the honors designation on my two ds's transcripts. I included a 10-page course description supplement that provided "back up" for the honors designations.
I have two "from the horse's mouth" plot points to share. Four or five years ago a Campbell University admissions representative (whose responsibilities included the homeschool community) spoke to a homeschooling youth group that I was involved with and counseled the kids to include both weighted and unweighted GPAs on their transcripts. She indicated that Campbell would not apply weights to unweighted GPAs--and that the submitted weighted GPAs were used for scholarship consideration. She stated to the kids that they were putting themselves at a competitive disadvantage by not including weighted GPAs.
The other example I have to share is a state scholarship program that was associated with my dh's occupation. GPA and SAT scores were the sole first-cut criteria. The wording on the application:
"The . . . will follow the procedure below to determine which applicants will be interviewed:
- Determine the grade point average for the most recent three semesters, multiply by 500 and add the applicant's highest SAT score.
- The . . . Scholarship Committee will review the top twenty-five applicants (as determined in 3 (e) (1) above) and will choose ten to twelve applicants to be interviewed."
It was not stated that the GPA was unweighted, but when I inquired, I was told that honors/AP courses should be included in the GPA calculation that was submitted. So our transcript included weighted and unweighted GPA, "just in case." All I wanted was to make sure my ds's were given the same consideration as other students who were performing at the same level. :001_smile:
- Determine the grade point average for the most recent three semesters, multiply by 500 and add the applicant's highest SAT score.
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This nifty calculator compares college costs and graduation rates: College Reality Check. You can sort a number of different ways to make comparisons. Might be a helpful "first pass" for evaluating options. :001_smile:
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Brown University is offering a free two-week online course that starts next week: Exploring Engineering. Here is an article about Brown's plans: Brown Daily Herald.
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Brown University is also planning to offer free online courses to high schoolers. I just listened to a webinar yesterday and Brown sounds quite committed to offering a glimpse into the field of engineering to high school students. They quoted a statistic that only about half of the students who begin college in an engineering track actually complete their studies with an engineering major.
Here's an article I just Googled about Brown's plans: Brown University Creates Online Course for High School Students :001_smile: (oops, had the wrong link. I just fixed that!)
Common Application
in The College Board
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I did not notice that there was a submit by mail option for letters of rec when I wrote common app LORs in the past. For the teacher who submits the LOR online, the teacher will write and upload one LOR that will go to all of the common app schools for that student. The recommender will not be able to tailor the uploaded rec by school. That may be different if they are mailed.
I went back to the common app site to look at what I did with ds1's counselor letter, and I got a "site under maintenance" message :glare: --so I am 99% sure that the same holds true for the counselor letter. One document. The common app cyber glitches can be a bit stressful. Good luck with the process. ;)