Interesting, AK_Mom4. Now you've got me wondering if we should just keep working straight through. I know she'd like statistics. That would be right up her alley.

Thanks, everyone! My dd likes math, but she's not passionate about it. That's where I struggle with what to do for her. If math was her passion, I'd put a lot of focus on it and get her into as many math classes as possible. But, she seems to like all subjects and doesn't seem to have any idea about what she wants to do. The problem we run into is time. She's taking a very heavy load of classes, including two languages she doesn't want to give up, and doesn't really want to devote more than an hour a day to math. I like the idea of taking a separate year for geometry and may check into the AOPS books or Jacob's if those don't seem like a good fit. What I'd really like to find is a great class with a teacher who will inspire her.

I'm curious about this class, too. I was just reading about it on the PAHS site a few weeks ago and was surprised by how time-intensive it sounded.

If you have a student who is accelerated in math, then what do you do after you complete calculus? Also, how do you keep their algebra and geometry skills fresh for the PSAT? Do they continue to use those skills in precalculus and calculus? It's been a long time since I took those classes and, unfortunately, I don't remember much about them. Is there even any benefit to going beyond calculus in high school? TIA! ETA: This is for my dd who is doing Saxon algebra 2 now in 8th grade because she just gets math. I had her do Foerster's algebra 1 after Saxon's alg 1 because she is young and I wanted to make sure she had a solid foundation, but Foerster's didn't take her more than a few months to go through. I will probably have her go through Foerster's or Lial's algebra 2 after she finished Saxon alg 2, but I'm not sure what else I should be considering.

It's good to hear your son did so well on the AP exam after using Teen Coder. That's another option I just started looking into, but it seems to get a lot of mixed reviews. It is appealing because dd could start it in January once her Python class is over and then just take her time with it.

My son is taking LTOW I this year with Renee Mathis and I am very pleased with the class. I have been watching all the lectures with him, so that I can help him apply what he learns in the class to his other writing. This is the first time ever that I have felt like I could actually be a help to my kids with writing. My daughter isn't even taking the class, and some of the basic ideas that I've picked up in this class have also helped me to guide her. Ds has had years of IEW classes and while he was strong in grammar, punctuation, sentence structure and variation, writing complete paragraphs, etc. he was still struggling to write papers for his lit class. What I started to realize is that he had no idea how to come up with strong arguments and support them. He didn't know what he wanted to say. LTOW is very simple, but it puts a huge emphasis on the brainstorming process. My son is being forced to put a lot of thought into why he is making his argument and he has to come up with plenty of reasons for and against it. That is turning out to be The Answer for him. He's recently been working on his first lit paper this year and we've been implementing the brainstorming process using the questions from LTOW and it has gone so much more smoothly than it ever has before. The focus on the structure of the essay has also been helpful to us, but the focus on the brainstorming process is what really makes LTOW different IMO. While it isn't a method that I found easy to automatically apply to other types of writing, I was able to ask for help on the LTOW message board and I'm really starting to get how it's done now. I will say that when we first began the class, I was a bit disappointed because it didn't seem like there was much to it and it was moving so slowly, but as we continued, it all started to click and I began to see the beauty of it.

Wow, this looks great! I will definitely keep an eye out for this for the next school year. Thank you!

Thanks for the input.

My daughter is taking a one semester self-paced python course through FundaFunda this year and is really enjoying it. What should she consider next? I see AOPS has an intermediate python programming course and PA homeschoolers has AP CS using Java. Are there any other courses we should be looking at?

Thanks, Mark and Julie. I will have go ahead and have him do it now since it sounds like he's going to need it eventually anyway.

My son is using Lial's for algebra 2 and there is a section on solving systems of equations with the matrix method. He is already solid on using the substitution and elimination methods. Can we skip the section on the matrix method or is this something he really needs?