Talk me down, someone...

[JennifersLost]

First, a short whine. I sent my ds to public school for eighth grade and part of ninth. I'm still paying for it. He's finishing up 10th grade now.

 

I am letting him "specialize" in computer programming, to the extent I'm scheduling a lot of time for that and easing up on some other stuff. I'm also letting him use the work he does for his cooking around the world blog to count for part of his English and Social Studies grade.

 

Here's what's working:

 

Biology - he's going through Prentice Hall's Exploring Life book comprehensively

English grammar - we're using Rod and Staff grade 6

English writing - he's doing weekly blog posts on his world recipes blog

Social Studies - we're listening to the Teaching Company's Medieval series (all three) and he's doing short write ups of countries around the world for his blog.

Computer programming - he's doing web programming for me, and learning flash, etc. He's written games and simulations.

Music - he's practicing several instruments and in several bands and orchestras

PE - it's getting done

 

Here's what's not working:

 

Foreign language. We've done Latin for years...and he's still struggling with Oxford Latin 2. We won't finish it this year. He doesn't want to do any more. I'm thinking of letting him do an online distributed learning course in any modern foreign language he chooses. If he does this, he'll only have two years of it by the time he graduates. What else can I do?

 

Math. Basically this whole year was worthless. This was the one class I let him schedule on his own. He totally screwed up. He just took a test on the first half of the textbook and flunked. This was Canadian math 10. I'm ditching that book, and he's going to do a forced march through Life of Fred Geometry between now and summer. What do I do for the next two years?

 

I'm panicking. And I need to stop focusing so much on him, and give more attention to my younger kids. I need do-able solutions to these problems. What would you do????

[Chris in VA]

Math--TT? Algebra 2 and Trig/Precal. You wouldn't have to oversee it.

 

Two years of Latin and two years of another language is fine to meet most requirements. He'll find other languages (Romance ones, anyway) much easier, having had the Latin. Could you find a native speaker for at least a once every two weeks meeting?

 

He sounds like a really neat kid. I'm sure colleges will "look with favor" on his blog/recipe thingy. It'll stand out as a cool project, and colleges like that.

[Harrison_B]

Hi,

 

Please come off the ledge ...

 

Looking at your schedule, I think you've done a fabulous job so far. For a foreign language, ask him what he would like to learn - one program we used was Rosetta Stone for Latin. Rosetta Stone has many languages and since it is computer based, he might actually enjoy it. Since your son is computer-oriented, I'm assuming he'll want to go into that field in the future. What type of math was he doing? Algebra I? He might need a break, and geometry could be the answer for the short-term. It could be the curriculum he was using - see what learning style he has and gear the math to that style. Hang in there!

[hollyhillhomeschool]

Since he really likes computers, you might want to consider Rosetta Stone. We have been using this for several years now. It records how much he has done (so you don't have to babysit it) and it also grades him objectively. The only thing you would need to prompt is workbook time. It is very turnkey.

 

You can continue Latin, or perhaps try something a bit less classical...maybe have him pick the language...