A question for homeschool parents.....

**SewCrafty** · 01-18-2003, 03:51 PM

Most of you know, I don't have children. But I am curious.....I grew up next to a girl, who is now a mom to 8 children. She homeschool's all of them. I haven't seen her in a very long time or I would ask her.

My question is this.... She was an average student (B or about 75-80%) in high school, she was a grade above me, but I helped her alot with school work and home economics projects (cooking and sewing). How does she keep up with all the changes in curriculum and just general advances?

BTW I graduated HS almost 25 years ago!

Thanks in advance, I'm truly curious how you ladies keep up to date.

**homesteadmamma** · 01-18-2003, 04:17 PM

That is a great question and one I can answer really quickly. I keep up with my kids education by learning with them. I could never do algebra in high school, now I do it with our son. I hated history but now I've come to love it and it is one of our favorite subjects.

I keep up with it by reading anything I can get my hands on in regards to teaching at home.

I keep up with it by reading, reading, reading.

And our kids use Alpha Omega curriculum which is advanced and very up to date, in fact they are updating about every year or so.

There is a great book out called I forget everything I learnt in School and its so true. Can you remember what you learnt in History/Science, most math, etc. I know I can't. But because I'm homeschooling, I'm relearning a lot of it and its sticking with me and were having fun doing it. I graduated High School in 1968. And the very neatest thing is if I don't have the answers, we look them up together or find someone who does.

Homeschooling is a learning process, one in which were all learning. Thats the fun part of it!!

**cinnamon** · 01-18-2003, 05:37 PM

Yeah, what homestead mamma said!

Truthfully, I am not exactly sure what you mean by keeping "up to date". Phonics instruction or math drill hasn't changed in the past decades. Some homeschoolers actually prefer to use older books that have not been dumbed down or diluted by political correctness.

True - I don't remember much about Alebra II. But I will re-learn it as I teach my children. If they want to learn Trig, their dad can teach them, or we will co-op with another family, or find a tutor, or audit a community college class.

Good question!

**SewCrafty** · 01-19-2003, 06:37 AM

Thanks for answering ladies.

cinnamon, what I meant was, when I was in 10th grade my Dad wanted his GED (he only went through the 8th grade, him and his brother's had to quit school to help support the family in 1940). Now he is not stupid, he did great in all subjects except math he could do the equations and get the right answers, he just couldn't show how he got there. I sat at the kitchen table night after night with him doing math. He was so disapointed when he took the GED exam and missed by 3 points! All because of math.

Like I said, I haven't been in school in many years so I don't know if any/or what changes have taken place. I guess most subjects don't change over the years, except maybe math, science and of course now computers.

**cinnamon** · 01-20-2003, 08:32 PM

You might be pleasantly surprised if you visited a homeschool curriculum fair - the choices we have available to us are enormous! There is a tremendous variety of materials available. I can think of atleast half a dozen homeschooling magazines, and dozens of excellent books that we can turn to for inspiration, instruction, ideas, etc. Support groups are also very popular. I visit several homeschooling message boards daily to chat with other busy moms, talk about what books are or are not working, what type of schedules or recordkeeping we use, etc. If a mom isn't careful, she could spend more time researching and talking about homeschooling that actually doing it!

**homesteadmamma** · 01-20-2003, 09:03 PM

Cinnamon, your so right. Dh always tells me when I go to the homeschooling conference to not take my purse or debit card. There is so much to choose from, you could purchase thousands of dollars worth.

There is also so many homeschooling websites that help homeschoolers its incredible.

In reading Dorothy and Raymond Moore's books, (they are pioneers in the homeschooling field) its interesting to see exactly where homeschooling was and how far its come.