<p>We launched D1 at college yesterday so D2 is now the oldest in the house - she was a wreck though leaving her sister but came home to find her schedule and catch up with friends which I think helped. Of course her schedule had an error which confirms we aren’t crazy about her GC - it was missing a class completely! We are assuming it is just a printing error and that she does in fact have chemistry 2nd period (the period missing) and D2 already emailed her GC to check. She planned out which blocks fell when (her HS does an odd all classes some days/blocked others schedule) and on the days she has blocks one is more academic and one is all arts and gym - I think I know which one she’ll prefer! I think we’ll definitely find more about where her passions lie once this year is through which will put us in a good place for next summer in narrowing down colleges, etc.</p>
<p>We still have 2 weeks until school starts but now I can focus on her with D1 happilly enjoying her first days. Of course DH and I jokingly told D2 that now with D1 gone we would have all this time to speak with all of her teachers and be present more at her school and activities and she paled quickly until she realized we were joking!</p>
<p>^ Hey ShillyShally.~~~ waving~~~. We launched DS yesterday as well and DD starts school tomorrow as a HS Sophomore. Like YDS DS2, our DD idolizes her brother, but has her own interests. She attends a different HS, so there is no comparison to be done by Teachers. As we all know, no two kids are alike and we just have to parent accordingly.</p>
<p>To continue the sibling stories…launched DS last week. DD and DS are close but poor DD will now be the sole focus of parental beady eyes. I was sad about leaving DS because I think it will be so hard on his sister and, thus, on me. Who will take her to ortho appointments? Pick her up from practice? Be there in the afternoons if she wanted a friend over. No kids allowed over unless parent or big brother in the house. Haven’t figured out what will happen next year…one stay at home mom has offered to have D over the days she doesn’t have practices (not many). We find that with HS they may need more supervision than in MS. ALmost all the kids at school have working parents so there are no adults around in the afternoons…10th grade is infamous amongs our friends for being the year of really bad decisionmaking…old enough to think they know it all and young enough to sadly find out that they don’t…</p>
<p>DS’s presence at school was a great deterrant to her for getting in with the wrong crowd. He never snitched on her but i know he spoke to her about certain kids, certain parties, etc. so he was a silent partner, and far more effective when it came to peer issues, in parenting his more challenging sister. He also was the one who would intervene on her behalf with strict DH.</p>
<p>She went away with friends for a beach vacation right after DS started college but will be back for almost two weeks on her own before school starts. I feel I will have to work from home just to keep her focused on wrapping up masses of summer assignments (what is with that?) and not too lonely. </p>
<p>This question is more for my '12 son rather than my '13 daughter. I’ve already posted it on the HS grad 2012 board, but since there are many experienced parents here that don’t read the '12 board, I thought I’d repost here. Hope that is ok. </p>
<p>I am trying to figure out how much SAT prep my son really needs and is a private tutor worth the cost. Tutors are running around $85 - $100 an hour. That seems outragious to me! We live in an area that the majority of students go to college, but most go to one of the good, but not great, state schools. Most kids are not being privately tutored. My son took a SAT prep course offered at the high school for 8 weeks last Jan. He didn’t put that much into it, so he didn’t get that much out of it. His practice scores were ok, but not great. He is a better student and “smarter” than his scores would indicate. I think he is now recognizing that he will need to work a bit harder than he has in the past and he is asking for a private tutor to help him raise his scores. Is one on one tutoring worth the cost (if he will put the time in)? How many sessions do kids normally have? We are planning on him taking the SAT for the first time in the spring. He can retake it in June and the fall of senior year. What do you well seasoned CC parents think?</p>
<p>Hey, geogirl. We did no tutoring for ds1. In the summer before his junior year, he did a practice SAT test out of the big blue book each summer month, looking at what he missed and then working on that skill. In the fall, we incorporated aspects of the Xiggi method so popular here on cc, some weekends working on CR, some weekends working on math, some working on writing. This sounds kind of intense, but it really wasn’t; we were just trying to get more bang for the buck by studying before the PSAT so that he’d doubly benefit.</p>
<p>I wonder about this part of your post: “He didn’t put that much into it, so he didn’t get that much out of it.” I sure wouldn’t pay alot of money for a tutor if ds wasn’t going to put forth effort.</p>
<p>D’13 was off to school this morning. I was dreading having to drive him to school again, now that older sis is in college. But, no fear, DS charmed one of the senior girls down the street for a ride every morning and she picked him up this morning like clockwork. WAY too charming for his own good. A born salesman!</p>
<p>^LOL, megpmom! My S will be taking the dreaded bus this year with big brother off the college. This is a big slice of humble pie & means waking about 30 minutes earlier. I’m not looking forward to the new morning routine as S1 always woke up first, got in shower & woke S2 when he was done. (Another reason to miss S1 :()</p>
<p>D’13 is also back on the bus Although we may carpool with a few new freshman families as we live less than 2 miles from the HS yet the bus comes 50 minutes before school starts. D’13 is my morning girl so it’s not a terrible burden. </p>
<p>So far the year is going well. AP Euro as expected has the most homework, but it’s not “hard” just a little time consuming. We had the parents open house last week & all the teachers seem good; I had given up hope on ever having a decent math teacher.</p>
<p>Re: SAT prep. We never went that route with D’10. She generally tests well, so we just bought her the blue SAT prep book & had her do the math sections. She reads a lot & didn’t feel she needed to brush up on the verbal area. She probably should have worked a little harder on the writing section. Our school offers the sophomores & juniors the opportunity to take the PSAT; Geogirl: if your son can take the PSAT this year then you’ll at least have a starting point to see where he needs to work to bring up scores for the SAT. I agree that $80-100 sounds outrageous. There are also SAT prep CD-Roms that give more immediate feedback than a paper test.</p>
<p>Thanks RobD and Youdon’tsay for your SAT prep comments. Like many kids, S1 is juggling alot this year and he has said he needs to feel like he HAS to do the work. He completely understands that if he doesn’t do the work, the tutor will disappear. I’m going to contact the GC and see if they have a list that is a bit more reasonably priced. I’m thinking 2 hrs a week for 3 months maybe, 4. I’m going to have to think about this one.</p>
<p>When D1 needed a tutor due to some LD issues, we asked around and found a teacher who did some tutoring after school. She was $50/hr. Not sure where you are located, but that might be a more reasonable route to take.</p>
<p>I think if your son is actually asking for a tutor that he is serious about wanting to improve his scores, but he may think that having a tutor is a silver bullet–magically higher scores requiring little effort from him. Like your son, mine did a prep class and did not put in a whole lot of effort doing the homework. I thought he hadn’t gained much from it but when he did take the SAT his first score was a big improvement over PSAT and practice SAT. Just being forced to attend a session, listen and go through the tests was helpful and cost effective; after he took that first SAT he was a bit disappointed in the math score and used the books and notes from his class to review and blew the second one away. His SAT II Math II was also much improved just from the practice in test taking.</p>
<p>Your son may have gotten more out of the course than he realizes. The first SAT after a course may not actually be the best. Have your son sit down and do a full test this weekend and check this score. Explain to him the costs involved, both his time/effort and your money. Tutoring is not a silver bullet. He will probablly have to put in a lot of time doing prep for the tutoring sessions. So, ask him to try studying on his own one particular area that was not good for the practice test and ask him to evaluate whether he feels he is improving. He may discover that he can do a good job on his own. Also, some tutoring programs offer group lessons that may be a nice middle ground for costs and may be a better fit for your son. </p>
<p>I am a new poster as well. My oldest D1 will be a sophomore and we are taking her to college this weekend. D2 my youngest is going to be a Senior. Yikes!! Hard to believe. I know Senior Year will fly quickly. D2 is sad but also happy D1 is headed back to college. She will miss her sister but excited about Senior year!! Here is hoping to a great Senior year for all!!</p>
<p>I guess we are starting…
Fall meeting re: DS’s sport last night.
College class starts today.
Sophomore year starts tomorrow.</p>
<p>I already feel quite overwhelmed by what is ahead of him this year. Or maybe by all the driving I will have to do But even scheduling wise, it is all becoming much, much more difficult to coordinate and to handle.</p>
<p>They have changed bell schedule a little and DS is not liking it. We will see…</p>
<p>DS has asked me to purchase all the AP prep books early on, will have to do some investigating, maybe teachers will have some suggestions… I have already spend $260 ona college textbook (one!). Insane, isn’t it?</p>
<p>Kelowna: that $260 is just getting you ready for his college freshman year ;)</p>
<p>Our HS’s AP teachers usually mention their preferred AP prep book. D pointed out the AP Euro prep book mentioned in class and we already picked it up (it was labeled as the 2011 prep book.)</p>
<p>S’13 enjoyed first day of classes. Was shocked to have AP World History homework already (He was “shocked”, I assumed it having gone through the same class with D1 with same teacher!) Only sophomore in his AP Spanish and only one of two sophs in Algebra 2, but it doesn’t really bother him. His only request “Please don’t make me walk home when it is 110 anymore!” We agreed that I would pick him up after school on days over 100. That may be a while here in TX.</p>
<p>School starts here Thursday. Sports have been in full swing for a week - she made varsity. D got the less good (read bad) foreign language teacher for the second year in a row. She tried to switch her classes around, but her schedule is so full that she would have to drop something. She is concerned about not learning enough, that will cause her problems junior year when she will finally get the better teacher. Language is a difficult subject for me as a parent to monitor her progress. I’m going to talk to the other teacher to ask how they coordinate so that they learn equal amounts. Older D was lucky to have better teacher all 4 years.</p>
<p>Welcome to all the new parents on this thread.</p>
<p>We are in our second week right now. Things are going well. Son got a car so he is driving himself. I’m no longer the taxi driver. (15 yo can drive in our state). He seems to have gotten the pre-cal class with the non-math people so he has become the go to guy for all things pre-cal. One night last week he was receiving a text or a call about every two minutes. The next day he told the class that his phone is turned off at 9pm. These kids have all been in classes together for the past 5 years so everyone helps everyone which is nice to see.</p>
<p>Our school offers an SAT prep course that is taken on Saturdays. The cost is $25 and son has asked to take it. The course will be before PSAT and if he does well he will take the SAT this year and hopefully won’t have to take it again.</p>
<p>S does not like his Chemistry teacher and she will also teach him Physics next semester. Spanish 3 teacher is a hot mess as he calls her but he had her for Spanish 2 and learned a lot. Government teacher has about changed his whole life path. He loves every bit of the class and the discussions. She treats them like adults and allows them to each have an opinion no matter what it is. The class has kids from both political extremes and each is encouraged to express their opinions. The teacher will not give her opinion on anything. She calls herself the moderator. The math teacher is the BEST teacher ever. My husband had her many years ago. She has been teaching 40 years but is more current in teaching style than any other math teacher I know with the except of S’s Algebra 1 teacher who has been teaching for 30 years. </p>
<p>Well my D’13 may not be the same hard working, driven student her older sister is but she is a go-getter and doesn’t take much crap, LOL. After her schedule arrived missing a 2nd period class which should have been chemistry by process of elimination she emailed her GC immediately. Upon not getting a response she alerted a different GC who was able to make the correction for her (turns out it was not a schedule misprint but was completely missing) and then emailed the head of the guidance department requesting she be moved to another GC. Not sure if she’ll get her request but I admire her persistence in making things happen, especially as she is my quirky kid who will need a GC that gets her when it comes time for apps and recommendations. A week and a 1/2 to go before school starts, at least now she has all 7 periods accounted for! May her persistence extend to classes and work as well! :)</p>
Although we may carpool with a few new freshman families as we live less than 2 miles from the HS yet the bus comes 50 minutes before school starts. D’13 is my morning girl so it’s not a terrible burden. </p>
But even scheduling wise, it is all becoming much, much more difficult to coordinate and to handle.</p>