Every kid is different, of course. I'll say this much: I have a 15 year old who is anti-social except with her cousins who she sees most weekends. She's very resistant to the idea of any outside activities, although she has agreed to do a once a week co-op (classes there are easier than I would give her!) I don't think she's connecting a lot with anyone there however. I've thought about making her do activities to get her around people, but when I have, she tends to look/act fairly sullen (doesn't look, talk, or smile at the other kids.) She expects them to reject her and of course, they tend to because of her demeanor. It's a self defeating activity, and her counselor agrees we shouldn't make her do activities. As I said, every kid is different, but in our case, making her do activities would probably be counter-productive. Side note: I really appreciate homeschooled kids. The kids in the co-op don't reject her, so it has been one of the few non-negative social experiences she's had. Many schooled kids, whether public or private, are generally just nasty.

Here, too. I could have written that one myself! Not only do I not cry, there are times I count the years 'til they can be on their own.

Well, I'm sure I'm going to get thoroughly slammed for this but... I guess it depends upon your perspective. For the record, I'm not sure I'm an 'extreme providentialist,' but I certainly believe in hell. From that perspective, you're weighing a lifetime of suffering against an eternity of worse ... so I can see how one might come up with that. However, from the perspective of the slave-owner... wow! What they had to answer to God for is truly terrifying.

I think doing it in one year would be a pretty major undertaking. Your plan sounds like a good one. It does not sound too light, but I do have one concern. I've been trying to remember if there are things in the later modules of Algebra that you would need to cover before before doing Geometry... I don't think there are, but for us VT was very independent and self teaching, so I'm not certain. Since you're just doing the Geometry portion, you should be okay.

That's encouraging, as my kids aren't the highly motivated, top-tier school kind. I'm glad to know it's not required to get into a 'good enough' school!

It is generally agreed that the lit analysis is a weakness in Notgrass, and many of us have supplemented. Personally, I used a variety of sources, Progeny, Smarr, and others to add analysis to the more 'literary' of the selections. Blessings

It stands for Life of Fred. It's strengths are that it is self-teaching and more enjoyable than most math curricula. It's biggest weakness is that most of the answers are not worked-out solutions, which we need. It also doesn't use a graphing calculator, so we will try to fill in that gap before SATs in May. Here's the website for more info. HTH Debbie

That's been my problem! But I can't teach it when the videos don't work, and we didn't really like the accompanying text, so after months of frustration we changed to LOF Trig. I have NO idea what we'll do next year, so I'm watching this thread with interest. Debbie

It's hard to know which is worse: expecting young people to take on massive amounts of debt (even 10K is a lot for someone just starting out!) or the implication that it is morally acceptable to incur debt and not pay it. :confused: Feeling old these days, I guess...

The case in this article is admittedly extreme, but I think the cautionary note is work paying attention to... If my attempt at a fancy link didn't work, here's the URL: http://finance.yahoo.com/college-education/article/108846/the-555000-student-loan-burden?mod=edu-continuing_education Blessings, Debbie

Not all of it had been released when we used it a couple of years ago, but I was quite pleased with Modules A-C.

I've not used the Geometry, but we are currently using the Trig... My husband often has to help my son because only the answers are given, not the worked-out solutions. That's the big drawback to an otherwise very neat curriculum.

My son has had a similar difficulty. When he comes across an unfamiliar word in his reading, he doesn't seem able to intuit the meaning out from the context, and generally just reads past it... His first experience with standardized tests was after 4th grade, and his scores in vocabulary were quite low. I immediately started him in specialized vocab workbooks... Wordly Wise for a few years, followed by Vocabulary for Achievement. He showed an immediate improvement, and since then his vocabulary scores have been in line with the rest of his scores. HTH

I'm so glad to hear that my 16 year old son isn't the only kid in the world who does this!! As a devoted fiction lover, this has always seemed very odd to me.

for your daughters' health, for grace to infuse your day/week/month/year... for your husband's employment to work out in a way that will bring great joy and benefit to your family, and for you to find comfort in his love as you succeed in being the loving mom and wife you want to be to your family and to God's glory.

This week: 1. My 11th grade son got an A on a really hard midterm at the Computer Networking Academy class he takes at the career center. Most of the other kids (all public schooled) got a C or worse. 2. My 10th grade daughter and I get along pretty well most of the time. Two years ago we lived in what felt like a state of constant and open warfare. I'm so glad we kept homeschooling in spite of it. Persevering has paid off in increasingly positive relationships between her and the rest of the family. 3. At 15 and almost 17, my kids are becoming people I like being around.

Shari, I'm sure you know this, but you have to take some of what you read on these boards with a grain of salt... First, remember that not every kid is the same, and the best education is the one that works for him, not the one that everyone else is bragging about. Second, ask yourself... wouldn't you be quicker to post about your students' successes and the areas in which they excel than about the areas where they are just so... average? I have two kids (10th and 11th) both homeschooled all the way through (except for a disastrous few months in a private school for one of them and some outsourced classes in high school.) They are both bright, but frankly, lazy. My high flying expectations from homeschooling them have been gradually brought lower and lower. At this point, I think they'll both get an above average education, but that speaks more to how poor average is than anything else. The fact that they can both read well, have a pretty good grasp of grammar and punctuation and can write comprehensibly, and do math at a high school (not college, not AP) level, puts them ahead of the majority of the other 10th/11th graders in this country. I didn't homeschool only for academics, though. (Please forgive me if what follows sounds like bragging... if it is, I'm bragging on the benefits of homeschooling, or at least on God's grace, not on my kids or especially my own inadequate attempts at parenting.) My kids have never even considered any kind of substance abuse; they have no interest in 'pop culture'; their closest relationships are still within the family; both will stand up for what they think is right in the face of what is popular; and I could go on. We have some serious struggles because both have major issues with OCD, but I don't think homeschooling has hurt that at all. The boxed curricula you mentioned provide a very good college prep education. (Ivy league -- maybe not, but so what?) HTH Debbie

What do you mean by work based colleges? Thanks, Debbie

Here's the Amazon link to a good book: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0817435522/ref=ox_ya_oh_product Blessings, Debbie

... but no program is good for all students. If possible, give your students a chance to view the sampler and see what they think. My 11th grader, now in Trig, did very well with VT for Algebra 1 and 2, and as he was working through a physics problem with my (literally) rocket scientist husband, I overheard my husband compliment my son on his grasp of Algebra. I was pleased since he took Geometry last year, which means the Algebra has stayed with him since finishing it in 9th grade.

I know it's a long way from Texas, but there are a couple of options in Maine. University of Maine has several smaller campuses on the coast, and at least one of them has one. Also, there's a school right on the island where Bar Harbor is, that is all about Marine Biology. It's called the college of the Atlantic. I also think Ohio State has an extension program on the South Bass Island off the coast of Lake Erie. If you want to stay closer to home, you should look along the gulf coast; at any rate, such places are probably found close to the ocean. FYI, none of those are Christian, and especially in the field of Biology, that will make life challenging. That's something we've been concerned about here. Your daughter's academics and career will probably be spent in an radical environmentalist/evolutionist milieu.

Just a warning... I did the same thing with CD Precalculus, and ended up with discs that skipped a lot and had problems. Make sure you check the discs carefully and watch as much of the program as you can stand to when it first arrives...

Have you checked with Bob Jones University testing to see if you can order the Iowa from them?

... if the level of concern I have with whether or not my children have friends is not perhaps merely a result of the fact that my socialization came from being public-schooled.

I'm in the middle of homeschooling my teens... some days I can see it's worth it; other days I question myself. My purpose in replying is to suggest you ask this on the high school board, however. You may get more responses.