Homeschooling...

**valerian** · 03-28-2010, 12:59 PM

...your kids? Want to share your thoughts on it? I homeschooled my kids for three years, but was forced to stop for a while due to health reasons. In the meantime my kids went to a private school. Well, we have decided that we can no longer afford the private school as they go up every year for everything (tuition, book fees, etc.) so I want to bring the kids home again instead of sending them to public school. My husband is a public school teacher, but I don't want my kids to attend them. There are things that I don't want my 12 and 8 year olds to be exposed to at their ages plus the teachers around here have very little control over their students. My kids are close and have never been in separate schools from each other and would not like it. I know they'll have to be apart at some point, but just not yet. My kids are very small in stature, sheltered, and the middle son has a speech/hearing problem and I don't want him to deal with the taunts. The middle school where he would be going has the kids making out in the car pool line etc. and the teachers don't control it. In the high school, there's sex and drugs and it's not safe to even use the toilet 'cause you'll get mugged! Also as disorganized as he is, there's no way he'd function well changing classes all day and trying to keep up with his stuff. Anyway, I don't want this to turn into a public school debate...just giving some of the reasons why I don't want them in public school.

There were aspects of homeschooling that we really enjoyed, some we didn't. I have been planning a different approach this time around though and just wondered if anyone else wanted to tell what they do each day, what type of homeschooling approach you like, do you do a lot of field trips, are you in a small town, any unschoolers here, anything really you'd like to share about it because I've always been interested in it and the various approaches.

I found out about a co-op that meets once a week in another town 40 miles from here that I'd like us to try. Does anyone do co-ops here? How do they work? The one I've checked into sounds like fun. Field trip options are limited in our town, but we can go out of town sometimes. We tried to get involved in a homeschool group here before, but they weren't very friendly and didn't do much. I've been looking into other groups that are out of town. Unschooling sounds interesting to me, but not sure it would work for my sons and not sure I can be that comfortable with it myself. I've basically decided to try an electric approach that borders on unschooling with unit studies thrown in. My kids would really balk at school-at-home workbooks daily and such so I'm not going there. My kids will be in 7th and 4th grades next year. Anyone here do unit studies? Anyone unschool? Anyone have to deschool first? Please share...I'm in the planning stages for next year.

**daughter of pearl** · 03-28-2010, 01:03 PM

What's unschooling?

**kattails** · 03-28-2010, 01:16 PM

seems like we are living the same life....this is going to be my first year homeschooling for some of the same reasons you stated, so I am eager to hear responses from others. my children are going to be in 5th and 1st grade.

I was looking into homeschooling groups as well and it seems that if you don't live in the Wake County/Raleigh/Durham area there's not alot of options. it seems as if NC is not very homeschool friendly, especially our county

**valerian** · 03-28-2010, 01:39 PM

Originally Posted by daughter of pearl

What's unschooling?

Unschooling is child-led/child-interest learning. The child's interests lead the learning process. For instance, you don't sit and do workbooks unless the child wants to. The parent's responsibility lies in "strewing" items around that might spark the child's interest and helping the child find the materials to learn what they want to learn, etc. At least that's how I understand it. My fear is that they might not learn enough to pass the entrance tests for certain colleges and universities. Also at the point my kids are at now, I feel like they don't want to learn much of anything. They say they hate school.

**valerian** · 03-28-2010, 01:49 PM

Originally Posted by kattails

seems like we are living the same life....this is going to be my first year homeschooling for some of the same reasons you stated, so I am eager to hear responses from others. my children are going to be in 5th and 1st grade.

I was looking into homeschooling groups as well and it seems that if you don't live in the Wake County/Raleigh/Durham area there's not alot of options. it seems as if NC is not very homeschool friendly, especially our county

I know what you mean. Actually NC is supposed to be very homeschool friendly...just not so it seems in our areas. I think it's probably much, much better in the largest cities. I did find out on the Internet that Greenville has a homeschooling group. Have you checked them out? Try an Internet search. I was going to do that 'cause we're in New Bern, an hour from you. We have maybe two tiny museums here and not very many other things for kids either. I was very disappointed with the group here. That's why I thought we'd give Greenville and Jacksonville's groups a try this time around. We could use the support. I wish we were closer to Raleigh. Do you have sons or daughters or one of both? Are you going to the homeschool conference in May in Greensboro? I have been thinking about going, but I'm not sure yet.

**2ndGenGranola** · 03-28-2010, 04:38 PM

I homeschool my 3. I love it. I find the term "homeschool" quite funny as we are seldom home. I started out with packaged materials all from one company but have now branched out according to the kids interests (we went to a "harder" Math and Science). That is as close to "unschooling" as I will ever be as I am not a fan of it.

I don't to a coop either. I find those to be more for those who are insecure in their various subject skills and want others teaching the "hard" subjects. I love Science and Math and want to teach every bit of it myself. I don't think we could find the time to fit it in anyway. We are on the homeschool swim team. Some days I feel like we live at the pool. No complaints though. Four days of intense PE is more than they would get at the public schools here.

There are so many great materials to pick from now -- and for all learning style. It is hard to pick just one!

**KathleenCG** · 03-28-2010, 05:02 PM

What's the "electric approach?"

**IntlMom** · 03-28-2010, 05:08 PM

Originally Posted by KathleenCG

What's the "electric approach?"

lol!!!

she meant "ECLECTIC", I'm sure. It means a little bit of this, and a little bit of that.... no one set of books from one company or even one grade level.

I homeschool my spec needs son, and my gifted son attends a 3 day a week school and is home Wed and Fri with home assignments. But I am not a good one to ask - cause I miss the great little public school we went to in small town Kansas. The one where the kids sang "Away in the Manger" and "Silent Night" at the CHRISTMAS program.....*sigh* I am homeschooling cause we HAVE to, not because I love it. (my spec ed childs greatest struggle is the area of socialization.....I know all the arugments about how socialization is not an issue for homeschooled kids, but for him, it is. He needs the every day, all day with other kids to see how "typical" kids function and react to life)

**zakity** · 03-28-2010, 05:36 PM

We homeschool.

We unschooled for years because of some learning issues in the mix. But, instead of letting them lead, I really led them. I did the whole "ok, how do I get them to learn what they need to know without books of any kind". We did tons of history and science. We did Mad Science classes. We watched tons of history shows on PBS. We went to ren faires and civil war re-enactments. I had one who was interested in Medieval weaponry and we used that as a jumping off point. We would compare other times and their advancements to the Medieval times.

Now, we are eclectic. We use a cobbled together mix of school work to fill the gaps that we had from unschooling.

Actually, the oldest is doing American School for high school. We are planning on putting the twins in this fall.

**KathleenCG** · 03-28-2010, 06:13 PM

Thank you for explaining the "eclectic approach." I thought the "electric approach" would be rather shocking. . .

**valerian** · 03-28-2010, 06:58 PM

Originally Posted by KathleenCG

What's the "electric approach?"

Oops! Sorry I didn't proofread...I meant eclectic. My brain is going faster than my fingers and I keep catching myself leaving out a letter. Didn't catch it this time though. LOL!

**valerian** · 03-28-2010, 07:02 PM

An "electric" approach might work well some days though. Now where's my cattle prod? JK! LOL!

**valerian** · 03-28-2010, 07:05 PM

Originally Posted by zakity

We homeschool.

We unschooled for years because of some learning issues in the mix. But, instead of letting them lead, I really led them. I did the whole "ok, how do I get them to learn what they need to know without books of any kind". We did tons of history and science. We did Mad Science classes. We watched tons of history shows on PBS. We went to ren faires and civil war re-enactments. I had one who was interested in Medieval weaponry and we used that as a jumping off point. We would compare other times and their advancements to the Medieval times.

Now, we are eclectic. We use a cobbled together mix of school work to fill the gaps that we had from unschooling.

Actually, the oldest is doing American School for high school. We are planning on putting the twins in this fall.

What are Mad Science classes and where do you take them? Is that through the Internet? My youngest is interested in medieval times, but we don't have any faires around here. I did take oldest ds to one on the banks of the Thames in London once. That was a lot of fun...actually I just looked at our pics again just this last week...good times! Is American School through the Internet?

**valerian** · 03-28-2010, 07:06 PM

Originally Posted by IntlMom

lol!!!

she meant "ECLECTIC", I'm sure. It means a little bit of this, and a little bit of that.... no one set of books from one company or even one grade level.

I homeschool my spec needs son, and my gifted son attends a 3 day a week school and is home Wed and Fri with home assignments. But I am not a good one to ask - cause I miss the great little public school we went to in small town Kansas. The one where the kids sang "Away in the Manger" and "Silent Night" at the CHRISTMAS program.....*sigh* I am homeschooling cause we HAVE to, not because I love it. (my spec ed childs greatest struggle is the area of socialization.....I know all the arugments about how socialization is not an issue for homeschooled kids, but for him, it is. He needs the every day, all day with other kids to see how "typical" kids function and react to life)

Thanks for 'splainin'! I'm having issues today. LOL!

**danni** · 03-28-2010, 07:49 PM

This is our 2nd year homeschooling. We are in Canada though. We started because my oldest ds got beat up in his classroom. The teacher left the class for a few minutes and one of the kids pinned him to the floor and started punching him in the face. Ds is kind of a geeky kid so all the other kids just watched. The twins also need more one on one than they can get in public schools.
David is grade 12 this year and he does his courses online. The twins are in grade 7 and they do some courses by correspondence. Emily is grade 1 and she loves reading anything and doing workbooks. I have kept them all fully aligned with the Alberta curriculum mostly because if something happens and they need to go back to regular school I want them where they are supposed to be for their grade level and because the younger ones haven't decided what they want to do so we are not sure if they will need their diploma or not.
I'm not sure if there are even any coops here, never heard of them. We have facilitators that do home visits and they organize outings for all the families and the kids are all involved in sports, youth groups,cadets and girl guides.