When I say I homeschool, I get all kinds of questions. Sometimes I think I probably give them a longer answer than they are looking for, because I ALWAYS have alot to say....about any subject! I can talk you into insanity, it's something I am working on. However I really talk alot when I have something I feel passionate about. Homeschooling is something I feel so passionate about and get more hooked every year. This is our third year, so imagine what I will be like by the time my kids graduate....IMAGINE what I would be like if I had started when they were young! Oh My! I may not have any friends, because I would bore them to death with my endless talking! Wait, I do that anyway, so never mind. I obviously have some very patient friends!!
Anyway, one of the things I learned this year is to document, document, document. So that my kids will have a good portfolio when they go to graduate. Since they don't really have report cards...which I love! I mean really, a child either accomplishes/learns something or they don't. Yes they can learn a little or alot about something, but in the end, they either know it or they don't. How do you put a grade on that, by how many papers they did? You can turn a completed paper in, but that does not mean you learned anything let alone retained it! ooooh! I sooo can get off track easy...
Anyway, our first year of homeschooling, my oldest was going into 6th and my youngest into 4th. I sometimes wondered if it was allowed to homeschool with less than 5 kids....it is... we are a rare breed, but we do exist! Our first year, we used videos...that were taped in a classroom, so it was basically, realllly just schooling at home. While my son could get through anything, he has amazing focus (it comes from his dad's side, as you will quickly see, MY focus is all over the place) my daughter is ALOT like her mama, and it was a struggle for her. Lots of tears, lots of uncompleted work and a lot less hair later, we realized....this is not the route for us.
So the second year, I still felt incapable to teach them myself. As many people reminded me as well.... However I was not going to give up. I heard the first year is the worst anyway. So I found another program, it was all on the computer and interactive on the computer, by interactive, I mean they played a few quirky computer games and watched little video clips. Again, my son can do anything, however I did notice he was much more easily distracted this year. My daughter, started strong, finished, well again we did not finish it all and again I lost a bit of hair....if we kept going like this, I was going to need a wig!
So this past spring we went to a homeschool conference! Oh man! I wish I had done that from the beginning! My friend did tell me to go, but I do not travel downtown (where it was held)I am too chicken! So I did not go, I made myself suffer through two years of wrong schooling! This past spring, it was on MY side of town and so I went. We bought all the sessions on MP3's. I HIGHLY reccommend doing this! For one, you can not attend every session at the same time, and also you can go back and re-listen to them over and over, PLUS if you get the flu the second day, like I did, you aren't going to miss anything!
I learned I COULD teach them myself, with some help from the books in the library and MUCH prayer to God! I also decided to try to put the FUN back into learning. So I picked things that not only did they WANT to learn, but that they NEEDED to learn, like Consumer Math, ok, they don't necessarily NEED Forensic Science, but man it IS fun to learn!!! Here is a link to my post about what we decided to use/do for school this year www.momoffrank.blogspot.com/2012/08/new-adventures-in-homeschooling.html
From here on out, I think if people ask me about homeschooling, I will put their true interest to the test and say, here, read this blog. Because if I get started on this, we will BOTH be here forever!
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