I’m now going to be in JAPANESE!  Yay!

Some guy’s video game collection.

A lot of homeschoolers wonder, “What about high school?” For many homeschoolers of gifted children, add to this, “What about college?”

This isn’t a problem wholly restricted to gifted children, either. This can be a frequent problem among average or bright homeschooled children, who fall below the gifted cutoff, simply because with the one-on-one tutoring of homeschool, it is easy for most students to proceed faster than normal.

Say you have a child who advances at 1.5 times normal speed in English and Social Studies but 2.5 times normal speed in Math and Science. At ten, the child will be ready for trig and precalc while only doing late-seventh-grade level reading and writing.

Even if the gap is much smaller, there are issues of physical maturity to worry about in the most intelligent students. An eight-year-old, however brilliant, will not have the motor skills or the sheer endurance of the average 18-year-old. A nine-year-old won’t have the maturity of a college student and should not have the same responsibilities. A sixteen-year-old might be academically ready for college but might not be ready to leave home.
So if your child moves at a faster rate than normal, what do you do when she “runs out” of high-school level work but isn’t yet ready to leave home for college?

Answer 1: Let college take care of itself! Guide the child into advanced studies of whater he wants until it is the best time for him to go to college, and everything will be fine, even if he does have to “repeat” some things. There is the idea that any child WILL be challenged by university-level work no matter what age if the university is excellent enough.

This is nonsense. No matter how excellent the university, a child used to being interested and challenged by his work will be frustrated if he discovers that he has to repeat much of the last 2, 4, or 6 years of learning. And only some–admitedly most–students will be challenged be even the most excellent universities.

For an average, bright, or moderately gifted child (IQ 115-130), coming from from an enriched environment, whether homeschool or a good honors program, at 18 and then going to an excellent unviersity WILL be a fabulous and very challenging experience. A highly gifted child (IQ of 130-145) will find himself no longer “the smartest kid in the room” (if he went to most high schools) and will be humbled and will probably have to frantically learn study habits but will do very well. Coming from a more challenging environment, like an adaptive homeschool or a very selective magnet school, he will probably be truly in his element if he attends 1-2 years early or takes as many honors classes as possible.

An exceptionally gifted student (IQ of 160-180), however, will still be near the top of the pack without undue effort and will find some classes–particularly many freshman and some sophomore-level courses–tedious if he enters at 18 even without repeating material. This student would benefit from entering even an excellent college 1-3 years early and passing out of as many intro-level courses as possible. For the progidiously gifted student (IQ of 180+), the problem will be compounded. Few classes at any level will be challenging for long for this student if he enters at 18, and he will soon become frustrated and disillusioned at an education that is not meaningful or individualized. He shoud enter the university 2-4 years early after an excellent preparation and should take no introductory courses at all but should pass through to graduate level classes and original research as quickly as possible.

Unlike high schools, colleges are usually very receptive to individual treatment for exceptional students. Professors will spontaneously change course requirements for a talented individual, and department heads are often eager to excuse such a student from lower-level classes or even create individual degree plans so that the student can get a master’s in just four years of college, for instance, or unusual opportunities for research. All of these things I have witnessed at an excellent state university, and the happiness with which MOST professors and department heads met the exceptional student was incredibly refreshing. The most important thing, once excellence has been demonstrated, is to ASK. Students scarred by their K-12 education might never even think of such a step, but it’s there–so often–just for the asking. I have also seen greatness squandered because no one reached out to rescue it, and that student probably never thought that there was an alternative to the education he was receiving. But one message I want to make loud and clear is that at a GOOD college, almost anything is possible with a dean’s signature.

Continuing on…

Answer 2: I’ll send my child to (expensive, elite prep/boarding school) for two or so years afer homeschooling! It’s like college itself, it’s so rigorous, and then when she’s 18, she’ll go to (Ivy League university), where EVERYONE is challenged!

Actually, this creates the exact same problems in the university setting as Answer 1, merely adding a twist. The truth is that the average kid at really expensive private boarding schools isn’t really smart. Her parents are usually just really rich. They average child at a boarding school is probably bright, and there is certainly a decent population of moderately gifted students, but the selectivity is oriented much more heavily toward pocketbook size than mental capacity. A much better option for a bright, moderately gifted, or even highly gifted student would be an excellent publicly run school for the gifted. It would also cost $30k less a year. For an EG/PG child, it just isn’t a good option.
Answer 3: I’ll send my child to community college for a couple of years when he’s ready for college but not ready to leave the house, and then he’ll graduate from high school and go to a university.

This can work, but not as well as you might think.

First, its strengths:

-A child will get guaranteed credit for whatever courses he takes.

-The courses will look excellent on a high school transcript.

-The student will get a taste of college to prepare him before leaving home.

-The student will get access to courses he may not be able to self-learn or that his parents aren’t comfortable in teaching him.

Its weaknesses:

-Very few credits will transfer out-of-state or to private universities.

-A child can ceiling out on community college offerings easily.

-A child will probably need frequent transportation.

-The student will be limited to the shallowness of community-college offerings on any given subject.

-The sudent will be restricted to the pace and scope-and-sequence of the CC class, which will not parallel that of an excellent university.

Overall, this option is the best for 1) Average/bright/MG students who know that they will go to the local university, 2) A/B students who want an excellent high school transcript but aren’t concerned about getting credit for their classes, or 3) students of all levels who will only take a limited number of courses that they can’t get credit for elsewhere or who want to take group classes (like orchestra or drama) or arts classes (like ceramics) and get a taste of college life.
Answer 4: Begin doing college-level courses at home, through a combination of programs but concentrating on programs with the widest acceptance.

This is my favorite. I am especially a fan of AP (advanced placement) courses for the following reasons:

-They can be learned at any speed, at any time, and at any depth beyond the requirements. This is especially crucial for the needs of EG/PG kids, who can study something at their depth and get college credit at the same time.

-AP tests (and classes meant to meet the requirements) are generally more challenging than community college classes, even unembellished. In addition to frugal students, community colleges often have a healthy percentage of students who couldn’t get into the state four-year college or adults who originally had no intention of attending and weren’t very academic-minded in high school, and the colleges generally have no entrance requirements, while AP courses are tailored for the academic high achievers destined to be accepted to the best universities. (Don’t get me wrong–there are plenty of smart students at community colleges, including those who didn’t initially plan to go to college, but most have not have high academic preparation and/or success for one reason or another, and this affects the overall rigor of the courses.)
-AP credits are accepted more widely and abundantly than community college credits. Community college credits are accepted least among private universities and a bit more freely among out-of-state public universities, but most won’t transfer out of your own public state system, or else transfer credits are extremely limited. Even when credit isn’t directly given for AP classes, students are often allowed to substitute more challenging classes for the classes that they have succeeded in through AP.

-AP credits look at least as good as community college credits on a transcript.

AP is not a good option for poor test takers, however.

Let’s look at the college-level offerings through AP with the typical number of college semesters’ of credit given:

ENGLISH - 1-3 semesters - Comp & Lang, Lit

FOREIGN LANGUAGES - 3-5 semesters per language - 1-2 tests, depending on language

SOCIAL STUDIES - 6-10 semesters - Human Geog, US Govt, Comp Govt, Macroecon, Microecon, Am Hist, World Hist

MATH - 2-3 semesters - Calc BC, Stat

SCIENCE - 7-11 semesters - Chem, Bio, Environ Sci, Physics B, Physics C, Comp Sci

ART - 1-3 - Studio Art, Music Theory, Art Appreciation
SOCIAL SCI - 1 - Psych

For students who exhaust these before reaching graduation age, there are distance learning options, such as EPGY, through which you can take regular Stanford courses in math and science, including:

Comp Sci
C11A Introduction to C Programming,
C11B Programming in C - Algorithms and Techniques,
C11C Compound Data Types and Advanced Topics in C

Physics
P055 Light and Heat
P070 Modern Physics
P110 Intermediate Mechanics I
P111 Intermediate Mechanics II
P120 Intermediate Electricity and Magnetism I
P121 Intermediate Electricity and Magnetism II
P130 Introduction to Quantum Mechanics

Math
M51A Linear Algebra
M52A Multivariable Differential Calculus
M52B Multivariable Integral Calculus
M53A Differential Equations
M106 Complex Analysis
M109 Modern Algebra
M115 Real Analysis
M131 Partial Differential Equations
M146 Point-Set Topology
M152 Number Theory
M157 Introduction to Logic

These courses would, of course, be subject to the transfer credit policy of the enrolling institution. I’m not too wild about the math courses because Stanford has chosen, inexplicably, to make their less-rigorous courses available to the excellent young math students, which might leave them unprepared for an honors course of study in mathematics. For math, I prefer eIMACs, which grants no direct credit but is very, very well respected by excellent universities and usually leads to a student being placed out of math classes through the junior honors level. It replaces the grade 6-12 course of honors study with a college-level sequences.

For history, English, and the like beyond what AP offers, the local community college is often the best choice, or a distance-education program like that offered by Texas Tech.

Answer 5: 3 or 4 above, combined with being a commuting student to the local university when those options have been exploited as well as they can be.

This can be an excellent option particularly for EG/PG students, who may outgrow even the most college-level-enriched homeschooling environment at 12, 14, or 15 while her parents are still not comfortable with her leaving home. To work, though, the parents have to be near an excellent university to keep from limiting the student in her choices of university for her advanced studies, should she choose to engage in them.

Yes, the student wouldn’t have the typical undergraduate experience, but there’s always grad school, and it might not be the perfect choice but it is a very good choice when the perfect choice isn’t available. It also means that the student could take a year or two after graduation from college to travel the world or volunteer in Africa without setting back her career, family, or anything else–she will have gained time from her unconventional education rather than have lost it.

There is one more answer now, thanks to the Davidsons, for HG/EG/PG students and that is Answer 6: Move to Reno!

The University of Navada at Reno has a program so that public school students can attend a high school on the college campus as well as taking college courses pretty much regardless of age. Many kids are as young as 10 or 11, and I’ve heard fabulous things about the program. Those who have moved were very glad they did.

He now has a job with a larger company than before. And for more money. And a signing bonus.

Hooray!

I am so bone-deep tired–run ragged, beat down, sleep doesn’t help TIRED.  Too much driving and too much stress.  I don’t know how truckers do it!  So my absence has been a result of this since I got back.

I read A Cartoon History of the Universe (through the second book) while I was in MD.  It’s amusing and fun, but the history is often pretty dreadful.  Pre-farming cultures were matriarchical, and farming led to the suppression of women!  Egyptians were black!  Plus very silly, arbitrary claims about which parts of the Bible are “really real” and which aren’t (the ones he likes?), and so. many. more. errors…  Anyhow, Horrible Histories are many, many times better.

Also, I listened to three more Teaching Co lectures in the car.  The Concerto (Greenberg) is delightful and informative like all Greenberg lectures, and as usual, he largely keeps from repeating himself even when talking about composers he’s covered in other courses.

I also listened to History of Science to 1700, given by Principe.  I was rather hesitant to buy the course because so many “history of science” courses are either taught by someone who has NO grasp of science or is complete and utter propagandistic bosh–or both.  I’m pleased to say that this is neither.  It is, in fact, excellent.  He has to spend quite a bit of time correcting wrong-headed assumptions about the past, but even for someone who already has some grasp of scientific history, this is very interesting and informative and isn’t too dumbed down.  (The only negative comment I have on his ENTIRE course in terms of content is that he has a better grasp of biology that physics, but his grasp of physics still ain’t too shabby.)  I highly, highly, highly recommend it.

My one real complaint is actually mainly centered around his pronuciation.  This sounds petty, but it drove me a bit batty.  He has a heavy California valley-girl leaning accent, complete with over-emphasized glides and too much up-talk.  He also has an oddly robotic way os speaking sometimes and puts bizarre separation between syllables.  Ro-ger Ba-con was Eng-lish.  For foreign words, he has a faux-authentic pronunciation that combines some elements of the language with a painfully broad American accent plus not even attempting other aspects, and he has a tendence to lengthen vowels almost arbitrarily in foreign words.

I also listened to Byzantium by Harl.  This is more than 1000 years of extremely eventful history in 24 lectures, so unfortunately, it is VERY, VERY superficial.  His treatment of late antiquity and the rise of Christianity is far better than that of Fagan–despite how delightful Fagan’s lectures are, his claims about why Christianity was appealing and what its philosophy was and the movements within early Christianity is often ludicrous–the equivalent of presenting the language-developed-to-butcher-elephants theory as mainstream history.  Harl is less silly.  He is also very good at giving an overview of the political and social developments of the empire.  Overall, this is a very good course, but it is SO SHORT.  I strongly recommend reading the books on the Byzantine Empire by John Julius Norwich after finishing this lecture.

I also read the Horrible Science books about plants, and thank goodness, it’s better than the one about Blood and Bones and the one about Diseases or the simply ghastly one about Time.  I didn’t notice any outright errors or gross misrepresentations, and though this is total fluff, it’s fun fluff.  It’s trivia and really doesn’t speak a bit to any CONCEPTS of any sort, but it doesn’t present concepts badly, either.

I made the other posts before I went to the funeral and just scheduled them to appear late. Anyhow, from there I went to MD because my husband lost his dream job on the same day that my grandmother died. So we have a huge, gorgeous, EXPENSIVE house there and no money right now except what I’m making from writing. He’s trying to get another job before the bank takes the house back, but we’ll see… I can’t talk about the details, but chalk it up to the government screwing someone’s life up again. *sighs*

Anyhow, I’m BACK in NM now. Back to my destroyed kitchen and maze of cabinets in the livingroom…. Joy. But the night sky is truly breathtaking here.

Funny thing about car rides.  My brain seems to team like crazt, which is EXHAUSTING, during long ones.  I did a layout in my head for private dorms and other university-oriented businesses, generally stewed, and finally really worked out something about biology that’s be driving me nuts for fourteen years.  It’s not that I thought about it much…it’s just that it threw my bullshit alarm the first time someone tried to pass it off as Scientific Truth and has rankled ever sense, and the combination of some ideas I’ve been developing over the past three years, doctoral thesis work by someone else who proved my first impulse right, and then some recent popular-consumption reading on genetics I did last week suddenly all snapped into place.  I may expound ponderously on it later, if anyone cares.  :-)  And in fifty years to a century, we’ll see if I’m right.

There’s a reason I don’t post too often about the process of writing, and it is simply this:   I strongly, strongly believe in doing what WORKS.  I am not tied to any particular process or pattern or genre or whatever–if it works for you and for the work you’re creating and for you goals, DO IT.  I don’t care how wonderful or bestselling or prolific (or all three) another writer is–she isn’t you, and so what works for her is unlikely to be perfectly transferable to your case.

This doesn’t mean that all writers’ discriptions of their days or their work or their approach is bad for you to learn about.  This means that there is an ENORMOUS danger of writers taking what they’ve heard from someone who is well-respected and deciding that THAT particular way is the way every book or every romance book should be written.  Because, invariably, it isn’t.

There are some things that are inviolable because they are part of the DEFINITION of a genre.  A genre romance isn’t a romance unless it focuses on the romantic relationship between two people with a happy end.  That doesn’t mean that you can’t have a romantic book that doesn’t meet these requirements–it just means that it won’t be a romance, like a 5-page story is not a novel.  That doesn’t mean that there’s anything wrong with writing a 5-page story–it’s just stupid to call it a novel and pretend that you’re doing something SPECIAL and GROUNDBREAKING.

If you notice, I tend to take a descriptive approach to talking about writing, not a prescriptive approach.  That means that I describe alternatives and explore the effects that they have, positive and negative.  I do not ever tell you that a story must have a 3- or 5-act structure.  I do not ever say that a romance must do this or that.  The closest I come is declaring that selling your readers and the book short by writing crap and defending it (”it’s JUST a romance!”) and treating your audience like morons is an attitude that angers and sickens me and that I find artistically corrupt.  But I’m not going to tell you how many subplots you ought to have, how much or how little sex a book should have, or what kind of person your characters should or shouldn’t be.

If it works–for you and for your artistic attempt in this book and the artistic totality of who you want that particular author to be–DO IT.  If it doesnn’t, don’t, no matter who told you otherwise.

This ties into a big mantra of mine when it comes to writing:  TOOLS, NOT RULES.  (A friend of mine who gives a lot of workshops has adopted it, too, now!  *g*)

What I mean is that everything you hear about writing, from me or anyone else, is not a rule.  It’s a tool.  And, yes, that includes grammar, punctuation, and everything else.  Standard grammar and punctuation is a tool to seamlessly and “invisibly” convey language to the reader.  But sometimes characters or narrators don’t use the simplest or most standard or most elegant language.  They might use dialect or slang or colloquialisms or regionalisms.  Sometimes it works.  Sometimes, it’s a nightmare.  If it works, do it.  If it doesn’t…don’t!  Sometimes, for some reason or another, you might not want to use standard punctuation–say, no quote for dialogue.  If you’re goal is to write a self-aware, pretentious, pseudo-avantgarde book, go for it.  Now, my statement above pretty much sums up my attitude toward the likelihood of you achieving anything of greater worth by taking this step, but I also think that James Joyce was full of shit, so pardon me if I don’t jump on board your artistic vision.  But if it really will make your work more what it should be, do it.  Even if it’s a horrible decision, you just might impress enough people who think that self-aware convolutedness=good writing that you’ll seem to succeed even if you don’t!
The ability to tell what yours–for you, your book, and your goals–is just about the hardest part of writing well, one of those unteachable things like an ear for writing.  But knowing that you ought to have such an ability is the first step to developing it!

I get the Signals catalog…not sure why, since I’ve never supported PBS or bought anything from the catalog before, but hey.  *shrugs*

Anyhow, there were two things in particular this time that I thought would be of interest to my readers.  First, the Jane Austen action figure.  Yes, that’s right:  action figure.

Second, I know that one thing writers do for portable writing is to use a PDA with a keyboard attached.  Here’s a rollup keyboard for you!

It’s because I’m getting hit hard with spam and can’t do any software updates here.

I’m in Texas right now for my grandmother’s funeral. I’ve lost all three grandparents that were alive when I was born in the past two years. It was unexpected. She broke her hip–for the second time–but had had a successful surgery to repair it, but she was killed during recovery by a pulmonary embolism. She was four years older than my grandfather on my other side who died last winter (but hated people knowing her age, so I won’t say HOW old!). My father was her second child of three.

This in only part of my crappy news, so my presence is going to be spotty in the weeks to come.