You might find more reviews on homeschool buyers coop. They offer thinkwell sales frequently. I used their Alg 1 a little bit to supplement the math program I was using. The concepts did not match up well, so I did not get much out of it. https://www.homeschoolbuyersco-op.org/thinkwell-math https://www.homeschoolbuyersco-op.org/thinkwell-testimonials/ But, the teacher is fabulous! We liked him very much. His Alg 1 was not nearly as rigorous as our book, but I did use the video access to help explain some of the more difficult concepts. Good Luck! I hope you can get some more responses. :)

We allowed my oldest to have a smart phone at 15. I made her sit through me reading the apple update software agreement to understand how data is monitored and tracked. We have also researched radiation issues so she knows how to be safe as possible and still operate in the modern world. She uses her phone for music, books, talking to friends, texting, etc. Music with headphones helps her concentrate in the same homeschool room as her younger siblings. Only a few games. Phone use for texting during the school day is limited to breaks. At night, it must be kept in the kitchen. No social media yet. She is asking, so I told her to write a persuasive appeal paper for her father. She must use logical and emotional appeal without being manipulative. She has to document the research correctly. Life is full, she really does not have much time to be on a phone too much. We have discussed that she wants to learn to be wise, but still operate in the 21st century. In adult life (her near future), smartphones, social media, etc are all part of American life. As a homeschooler, I don't want her to be "ignorant" of the way most people operate in a tech savy world. At the same time, she has to learn wise stewardship of time, internet safety, balancing the digital landscape with the real world...

We have also used Memoria Press : Latina Christiana 1 and 2, First and 2nd Form, Henle with the Memoria study guides. We also used BJ Press Latin for a year. It is not organized well. They have fantastic math, but I do not recommend their Latin. Memoria products are well organized, logical, it comes with tests and quizzes.... You can even get videos to help you teach. For us, it was a very good fit. https://www.memoriapress.com/curriculum/latin/

I just got an email message of a 40% off sale for music app self paced courses: http://learn.musicinourhomeschool.com/ The discount codes are for the 40% off for only 8/5 - 8/6 LAUNCHWEEKEND for next week at a lower percentage off sale: LAUNCH25 I have looked through some free access lesson from here a few months ago. The plans were very well done. But since I had already bought music history DVD's, I did not need to purchase it. I also love the idea from Aggiemomma about studying the programmatic music from movies. That would be very educational and a lot of fun!

Is your son still interested in guitar? Sometimes having a teacher who is not a relative can make a huge difference in progress and faithfulness of lessons. I have taught piano to my own children and understand the struggles of being the teacher and the practice coach all rolled into one person. It was a good thing to transfer my daughter to a different piano teacher. For us, finances are a definite issue. So, I am still working on teaching piano to my younger children to give a foundation. In my area, one of the colleges has an educational program that offers classical guitar ensemble. They are a group of tweens and teens who play beautifully together! Your area may have something similar..... The above posts have good thoughts regarding music theory, music history, comp. etc... and going to concerts. I have a music history curriculum from Bright Ideas press called A Young Scholars Guide to the Composers. Its is meant for middle school. We never actually used it. My high school daughter does Professor Carol music courses. Last year it was A History of Early Sacred Music; right now - Discovering Music (basically the last 500 years). We like these courses. https://www.professorcarol.com/ Honestly, there is also nothing wrong with exploring other electives too. You will have to think about your son's interests and gifts, as right now - your state may not allow elective credits to count for high school credit. So, you may not be getting a credit out of the way. You will have to check your state laws. It sounds like you have done a very thorough job introducing him to music history. But if you want him to experience music, he needs do it. In my opinion, if it is possible for you to let him try lessons with an instrument of interest, it is a good thing. Playing an instrument is very different than reading music history. The discipline, coordination, time management for practicing, learning to perform for a recital, etc. ... It takes learning and appreciation to a higher level. With all the good background you have given him, he may learn faster than anyone would expect. Would voice lessons or joining a local choir be a consideration? Again, my town has a local college with a voice program. Scholarship programs are available too. Even pennywhistle is inexpensive and not too difficult to learn at home. (Pennywhistles are like cars and violins -- student grade is much cheaper than the instruments that the masters use....) Since you already play piano, the note reading you taught back then could be reviewed and applied. My girls picked up pennywhistle on their own. It is fun for Christmas music and Irish music. It is just an idea..... This is where I ordered my daughter's step up penny whistle and my younger one's beginner whistle. We started with D whistles. http://harpanddragon.com/ May you have wisdom as you guide your son in these busy years. :)

BJ Press has a very nice set of flash cards that have true sight words (words that really don't follow the phonics rules... not just a bunch of CVC words to memorize.) -it's not nearly as huge as the Dolch and Fry lists. Their first grade card set includes loads of words arranged by word families. If you need fun characters to introduce the basic phonics rules they have a Mr and Mrs. Short, a Miss Long, and Bossy R for teaching r-controlled vowels. My children's favorites were the bad cats for suffixes. I have not ever used their teacher book, just the cards with the workbooks. Obviously, different teachers will have different opinions about which word to teach as sight words. The point is to teach with understanding - not rote memorizing. Parts of sight words can be read phonetically, but many really do have to be recognized. You will have to decide what makes sense for your child. If you need a solid phonics program, BJ Press has one for K4 and up. It is Christian perspective. THe CBD website called the flashcards a flip chart set: https://www.christianbook.com/phonics-grade-1-homeschool-visual-flipchart/9781591662921/pd/211847?event=Homeschool|1004221 for K5 card sets - https://www.christianbook.com/bju-beginnings-phonics-charts-homeschool-packet/9781591662969/pd/208090?event=EBRN#CBD-PD-Description A BJ Press phonics workbook for grade 1 would be too much writing to a 4 year old. But the grade one flash card/flip chart set is a better mix of sounds and words. Critical thinking company has great preschool products too. I used their math for preschool. Since then, they have developed a phonics program. It might be worth checking out. http://www.criticalthinking.com/preschool-academics http://www.criticalthinking.com/catalogsearch/advanced/result/?grade%5B%5D=117&subject%5B%5D=122&product_type%5B%5D=all

Another idea: Whatever sound you are working on, have your girl listen for it in your read aloud books. For example, when I was teaching suffixes, I used the book My Lucky Day. I had my girl listen for particular suffixes, and we kept tally marks or she would oik like the pig in the story when she heard the sound. Anything to find the sound and make reading fun. Technically, this technique of token analysis is useful for lots of subjects. Honestly, I had one child reading individual words at 3. My other two started at 4 and we built fluency throughout 2nd grade. I am doing some review of phonics in 3rd grade for my youngest too. There are plenty of ways to make learning to read feel like a really fun game time. Just because you are teaching her to read, does not mean you are forcing it down her throat. Some children do read early. But do know that reading individual words and short sentences will grow as maturity and focus ability allow. You can't rush it. I learned a lot by checking out library books for teachers about teaching reading. It is a fun time to enjoy with your child.

It sounds like you have a maturity issue going on here. Blending comes both with the teaching of systematic phonics - which you are doing, but also with maturity. It sounds like your girl is ready to start learning phonogram families. For example: and, hand, land, sand, etc. She might understand the idea of blending if she "sings" the sounds to say the word. Teach her the trick of learning to look for what comes after the vowel to know how to read it. So, read the first sound, then look at the vowel chunk and what comes after. So, it would be /s/ = /an-d/. This way you teach for comprehension. Also learning the two letter sounds such as the /nd/ that end words. School supply stores have posters of this kind of thing. I think, if it were my child, I would keep on working on the words that are familiar and add in just a few word families. You can make books very easily with easy words, basic sight words, and just a few of your word family patterns. Some kids have to learn word family cards right brain style. What I mean is - even though they can sound out the individual sounds, to put it together comes faster and more permanently by memorizing it. I made index cards for my youngest a few years ago when she was stuck sort of like your daughter is right now. For /ail/, I drew the letters on with permanent black sharpie, then my student helped me draw little nails on the card over top of the phonogram sound. WE made about 2 or 3 new cards per week. So, we reviewed these cards each time we read and this helped so much. For a very smart girl in other areas, she could not remember phonics "rules" for the life of her. But she could memorize the patterns. Since she could sound them out, she would try to read the words and part way through -- would recognize the patterns. She was memorizing, but doing it with understanding. Teaching reading by learning to either read or recognize phonogram "families" will produce a reader who reads by syllable chunks, rather than a reader who is sounding out every little sound. I also used vertical cards with word families such as : _um, _ump, hump, pump, dump.... Reading the words in lists, rather than in sentences worked well for practicing these words. An example from one of the little home-made books: The text was about our cat named Aslan. Title: Cat Nip. Each page has one sentence: Aslan is here. He has a tick. She will pick it off. He can take a nap. [child's name] will pick him a bit of cat nip. Aslan will lick it. He loves it! You can see, that we are introducing the /ick/ sound. Sight words we already learned help make a story flow. My children loved to draw the pictures in these construction paper books. Sometimes I drew them also. Doing this made it easy to tailor books to the sounds we were learning. Reviewing was fun because the books were about our family and pets. I just chopped construction paper in half vertically, and stapled paper books. The expensive reader sets with the full color pictures hardly got used at my house. Simple stories like this helped us use the three letter CVC words my children knew, but allowed practice of specific phonogram word families in a fun way. And then before I knew it, a quantum leap in learning would happen and we would be over that particular hurdle. For my children, progress in learning to read was not always by increments. Sometimes, something would "click" and learning would happen in chunks. If you are not already teaching sight words, I do recommend it. You can find Dolch and Fry lists on line. Many reading curriculae have them too. http://www.mrsperkins.com/dolch.htm http://www.k12reader.com/subject/vocabulary/fry-words/ Sound Hounds is a fun card game resource to work on these types of things. I bought my set at a craft store with a 40% off coupon https://www.amazon.com/Trend-Enterprises-Inc-T76302-Learning/dp/B001JTMJ50/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1501532674&sr=8-1&keywords=sound+hounds+game Pinterest is super loaded with lots of ideas also: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/376543218814932467/ Since your student is very young, it is not a rush or anything to be worried about if she seems at a standstill for now. What seems hard right now, might be very easy in a month. You want to make it fun so that she looks forward to reading with you. You can play lots of games with what she knows and scaffold her up to the next step. My children loved playing on the Starfall app for ipads. The resources available are really endless. Best wishes as you explore options! :)

I used Memoria with my oldest girl. Memoria teaches lots of style that will come in useful when your student gets to writing essays in the high school years. While I really loved Memoria, I did switch to Analytical Grammar's Beyond the Book Report, Teaching the Essay, Teaching the Research Paper -- both of which are now included in levels 2 and 3 or BBR. Now we are using Sharon Watson's The Power In Your Hands. Memoria was good for the girl who had a terrible time putting her own thoughts on paper. Not because she couldn't -- but because she was more introverted. It was too personal. So, the writing by imitation and paraphrasing was good for her. But eventually, I had to get her to use the "writing process" in working on essays. Not just impersonal research papers, but learning to logically write content. The background years of memoria have helped her tremendously. I remember that she had a dramatic difference in her writing across the content areas after just a semester of Memoria. We did Memoria back in her 5th or 6th grade years. Now she is in High school. The Writing with Ease and Writing with Skill books teach the writing process in a very clear way. If you student is able to work with it. Sharon Watson also has her Jump In, which is an elementary writing program that teaches various types of writing. What I like is that it is written "to the student" so I can read it out loud to my children or teach it as a one on one discussion. The concepts are clear and really easy to use. If you are concerned about teaching the writing process, I would recommend look at Sharon Watson's website and compare her Jump In to the Writing with Ease and Writing with Skill. I have all three of these books and have used different books with my children at different grade levels, as well as not at all with one of them. https://writingwithsharonwatson.com/jump-in/ Best wishes as you check out your options.

Kareni and Harriet, Thanks for sharing. The widespread use of the common app makes writing and determining where to upload the descriptions confusing for those of us who are beginners at this. I have been using Lee Binz' templates, but I think what I have might be too long. It seems like all of the course descriptions need to be minimized and consolidated into another file. Then I would have both available. My daughter's top choice school used the common app.

I really love using Sharon Watson's The Power in Your Hands for teaching all aspects of expository writing. This is a solid resource that is very easy to use and adapt. It does give proofreading tips too.... https://writingwithsharonwatson.com/the-power-in-your-hands/ This is not a grammar course. If you student needs grammar review. Analytical Grammar is my top choice. The author has a few schedules for doing the book in one year, two years, or three years. You might want to check your state requirements to see if your student needs to take grammar. If the understanding is solid, you might be able to skip a formal grammar and use a good writing text so to apply the grammar. But if your student is even a little shaky, AG will clarify everything. It is thorough and easy to use. It is not pretty or colorful, but very functional.

I am doing my daughter's course descriptions year by year. Is there an appropriate length or maximum length for these descriptions for the common app.? Some classes really do have much information to include.

Thanks for the recommendation. I will look into it for my 11th grader. It will relate to our social studies content.

Wow! The simulations look amazing. I just bookmarked the page. Thanks for sharing!

From what I can see in my book, the chapters have a few studio project suggestions at the end of each chapter. You could pick and choose. For example, chapter 6 has 3 projects: one making a drawing of a building with Greek architecture elements, the second - making a coil pottery vase using clay, the third - clay slab pitcher with scraffito design. If I were you, I would just choose one or two. You could even try out scraffito technique using the watercolors onto wc paper. My book is old. It is a 1989 edition, so your book will probably be a little different. Another option: you could actually have your student do some of the projects, and then look up web examples of the other two. Maybe even go to an art gallery or museum to look instead/or in addition to the studio work. The text book is very full, fitting the description above.

I have Art in Focus on my shelf too. It is like a high school version of an Intro to Art CC course. Great Suggestion.

Another resource to consider might be the Teaching Company. They are also called the Great Courses. They have sales and a huge number of video classes that might work as a supplement to whatever you choose for a spine. http://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/physics-of-history.html https://www.thegreatcoursesplus.com/quantum-mechanics this looks interesting : http://study.com/academy/course/intro-to-physics-course.html a mix of physics/christianity: Josh Peck's Quantum Creation (I have not read this, the reviews look interesting) https://www.amazon.com/Quantum-Creation-Supernatural-Fourth-Dimension/dp/1499760841/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1500332269&sr=8-1&keywords=quantum+creation Masters books website might also have something. If it is advanced enough. I wish you well as you create a workable plan for your family!

Have you seen the Physics 101 DVD? I have looked into this for our family, and from what I gather from reviews and testimonials -- these 101 courses are easier, but the publisher does say they are high school level. It might be worth looking at as part of program or even as your spine. Since the 101 is easier academically, you could always beef it up by adding in labs and reports. Even a science project would be very appropriate. http://www.the101series.com/ Also, Aurora Lipper has high school science on her website. We have lots of her videos from the Supercharged Science series, my youngest daughter loves them. Honestly, some of the DVD series might correspond to physics concepts in your course of study. Not all experiments have to be fancy to teach for understanding. Aurora does have high school level courses too. http://www.superchargedscience.com/opt/grades-9-12-topic-summary-08-2014-2/ http://cathyduffyreviews.com/homeschool-reviews-core-curricula/science/experiment-books-and-labs/supercharged-science

I will check out the Late Night labs. Thanks for sharing the resource. I have to order the $70 lab kit today to go with my daughter's chemistry course, but it might be more realistic to do some of these virtual. I would like to give her experience doing both - since that might be required of her in a future college course. I just looked at a sign in page and description. I don't see a fee or list of labs. Can you tell us more about Late Nite Labs. Is this the right link? http://www.macmillanlearning.com/Catalog/Author/latenitelabs/booksandmedia https://labs.latenitelabs.com/register

JulieG - If your student is the 7th grader in the pink typing, you might want to double check your state requirements for which years electives can "count" for high school credit. Core classes and foreign language can count in my state. It is different for electives. Here, electives had to wait until the high school years. (So, during her 7th grade year, I could not count my daughter's time in dance class as time towards her PE requirement). One way around this is to start the credit now and continue it into the 8th or 9th grade year - whenever your state allows you to start counting electives toward graduation requirements. If you finish the course in a particular year, then you can count the credit for that year. Your state may allow more flexibility.

I have used the Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. it is a great book. I think your question might be is to decide if this needs to be a studio course or an introduction to art in general? It might be worth using The Story of Art as your core, then practicing drawing techniques from the book as you want to relate it to the history. You might consider assigning reading from both, and other times giving studio assignments. In terms of a course description, you could list it either way: 1/2 credit Right Brain Drawing, 1/2 credit introduction to art history or one full credit as a combined course. It would be also appropriate to just do the history and add composition into so to earn a full credit that way. With a fine arts credit, you do have some flexibility in how you organize it.

I used these last year for reinforcement. I did buy them since I have younger children who will use them. The last time I checked the Apologia website, the video option (at least for Chemistry) was only available through a renting type of situation for the DVD's. Also available was an online access to the video clips for a fee. Since I wanted to buy due to limited bandwidth, this was not an option to me. You might want to re-check though. Maybe the biology videos are still available to buy. About the content: The teacher is great. She reviews and teaches through each section in the book. She is on video sometimes talking, other times, her voice is heard as the viewer sees diagrams and other animations. This type of teaching made the concepts very clear! All experiments are on video. This was a help to us especially for viewing a dissection before actually doing it. I think the 150ish price I paid is worth the videos since now I own them and can use them for you younger children. The reinforcement to my teaching was so helpful! At the cost of online classes and coop classes, the price of the videos - whether to own or "rent" is a good investment. I used these videos throughout most of the book, except the really easy sections. For my non-science daughter, it was helpful to have this teaching option.

I might be able to give some ideas for a couple of your brainstorming subjects: For English literature: You might consider looking at a few of the many online reading lists teachers have put together for each grade levels. There are so many! Here are a couple of examples: http://jis.dadeschools.net/pdf/Complete_Elem_Reading_List2.pdf https://www.memoriapressacademy.com/catalog?pagename=summerreading If you want books that correlate with specific historical time periods: You could look at a catalog from Veritas Press, My Father's Word, Sonlight, Tapestry of Grace website,etc All of these will give you ideas for titles of both classic books, historical fiction, and contemporary books. Another older book I use at home is called All through the Ages. It is full of timelines and titles and is a good resource. When my children were young, I also used the lists in the old first edition of The Well Trained Mind. Planning time to read legends and fairy tales, medieval adventures, mythology from every culture I could find, historical fiction, and abridged versions of the classics were all instrumental in helping my oldest student be ready for tackling advanced high school work based on primary source reading. Have you seen the fabulous picture books of Shakespeare plays in the children's section of your library. I forget the author, but the lines are right out of the plays! Just selected lines. These books motivated my children to re-inact some of the plays with their doll house people. For vocabulary practice, I really like the Evan Moor books. They have 2 series: A Word a Day series, and Daily Academic Vocabulary. The Word a Day is less formal and a bit easier. Also, the Critical Thinking Company has books for learning word roots. This might be a good fit for your older children. Learning the roots, prefixes, and suffixes greatly helps with vocabulary, it reinforces foreign language for us ( we do Latin), and it has been good for spelling. This company makes books designed to be used by parents - whether homeschooling or supplementing the school curriculum. It might be worth taking a look: http://www.criticalthinking.com/ http://www.criticalthinking.com/word-roots.html http://www.evan-moor.com/c/98/language?specs=1379 http://www.evan-moor.com/c/98/language?specs=1438 (I usually find used copies of Evan Moor books on amazon to save money) For writing: If I were in your situation: I might try to reinforce writing in a practical way: such as thank you notes, letters, maybe writing a book for a younger sibling or as a family project, maybe send something in to Highlights, Cricket or another children's magazine, enter a contest for poetry. If it is for something "real," it might not feel like more school work. I use books from Sharon Watson's website to teach writing. (Jump In, The Power in Your Hands). Sharon's website has lots of free prompts in the newsletters. In the past, I also used something from Memoria - the composition books which had a lot of writing by imitation. You might be able to have an interested child re-write a story in another style. The point is that you want to nurture and encourage, not add to the load of a child who already has writing work from a teacher at school. But at the same time, I get it that you want to fill in the gaps, build up the weaknesses, and challenge the gifted areas. Hopefully, some other moms can help you more here :) For your child with the possible audio processing issue, I would encourage you to learn about right brain teaching. If there is disorder going on, it will become more evident once the work load picks up in middle school years. Helping your child with right brain style help in spelling and in other studying will help her remember the content as well as learn how to study. I learned much from Dianne Craft's website and materials. Your 7 year old sounds like an incredible boy with a gifted mind. Leonardo and Einstein has some quirks too. Leonardo's notebooks are full of backwards writing.... A lot of creative people have some funny traits. If you are concerned about learning issues for this boy, again I would suggest checking Dianne Crafts articles about brain training. I used this with one of my children and it made a huge difference for her. These materials can help students with minimal glitches as well as children with larger issues. http://www.diannecraft.org/ https://www.youtube.com/user/DianneCraft Good Luck as you gather suggestions. Hopefully, many people will give you some helpful ideas :)

I have not finished reading the Eats Shoots and Leaves. I was not aware of the inappropriate language and content. Evidently I did not get to it yet....So sorry for recommending. :crying:

I agree with the post above about breaks. Sometimes even reading easy books was helpful in building confidence. Then, when I was least expecting it, a quantum leap in learning would happen. Learning to read is not always linear in progress, but progress will happen with diligence. The right brain teaching information on Dianne Craft's website also helped me adapt reading for some of my children who could not remember the rules. Not all of the link below will apply to you, but it is a lot of information that might be a help to skim through. http://www.diannecraft.org/language-arts-reading-program/ Spelling programs that are organized by phonogram patterns can support what you are doing with reading. I use BJ Press Spelling because of the incremental approach. (This is Christian perspective) Even in 5th and 6th grades, the spelling continues to reinforce very useful patterns that we see in words all the time. I'm sure many programs so this. I just have experience with this particular one. Best of luck as you think through this. :)