Tuesday, August 7 How do you homeschool?

Tuesday, August 7---How do you homeschool?
Scheduling, classical education, unschooling, getting the kids to help with chores, how to be "mom" and "teacher" at the same time, special needs, teaching an advanced child, how to teach the tough subjects, teaching high school, teaching with babies and preschoolers in the house, budgeting for homeschool supplies, notebooking, etc., etc., etc...

Well I still have to put in some hours as a medical transcriptionist each day so our school schedule has to work around that. In order to get schoolwork done at all, they have to be able to work somewhat independently. I give myself a list and I give each child a list. I make these on Microsoft word and print them out on Mondays. They have a list of things that need to be done before mom finishes work and then we do things together in the afternoon.

So on the morning list, I'll have transcription, exercise, and some household chores and they'll have things on their lists like eating breakfast, brushing their teeth, exercise and household chores. Then we'll have lunch and meet around the kitchen table, read and discuss our unit study and then give assignments and then usually split back up, with mom staying with youngest son to help him stay on task. The older 2, ages 11 (as of yesterday!) and 14 can work on their own in the afternoons as well.

We use a mix of things as far as curriculum goes. I've spent way too much time shopping for curricula since we've been homeschooling.

We're planning to start tomorrow!

Back to Homeschool Week Challenge - Monday

Monday, August 6---What led to your decision to homeschool?
Why do you do what you do? What brought you to homeschooling? What factors played a part in your decision?

We started homeschooling our oldest because we just weren't ready for him to go to middle school. I had read an article in a magazine about this family that kept each one of their children home for just one year, to bond with them during the difficult middle school years. Then I started reading everything I could about homeschooling. We didn't really have any problems with the local public elementary school, so we decided to leave the other 2 enrolled there.

Then the oldest and I plunged into a World History study that turned out to be a lot of fun and that broke the ice, so to speak, for bringing the other two home. Hey, we could do this and then after a few weeks of the new school year, it seemed that we should do this for them. Neither one of the other two kid's school years were going very well.

The girl, who is always one of the youngest in her class with an August birthday (TODAY!) was 'holding her own' in the second grade when she finished it, but when they moved her up to third grade, they put her in a split class with fourth graders and told me that they'd only put the most advanced third graders the split class because they could handle the work with less instruction. Hey, wait a minute. I attended her parent/teacher conferences last year! I knew that she was doing fine, but was not advanced and not ready to go it alone without much instruction. She was the youngest kid in the class. She quickly started having problems in third grade, getting stressed and upset because the teacher hadn't told her how to do anything and the teacher's aide would only say "I'm not the teacher, so I can't tell you anything." I ended up spending around 3 hours every evening re-teaching everything to her. Meanwhile, youngest son, in first grade, was crying every day and begging us to homeschool him and my husband's work schedule was such that he only saw the kids on weekends. Homeschooling everyone was starting to look like a no-brainer.

We finally took the plunge in September of that year and we have never looked back. Not once. This way of life/schooling is just so much better, it's unbelievable. It's hard to explain to anyone who hasn't experienced it, but it's like walking all your life and suddenly realizing you could fly.

Can you tell we like homeschooling? Of course, as I write this, we've been out of school for about 8 weeks. After the whining starts on Wednesday, I might not be as quite as positive, LoL. ;-)

Back to Homeschool Week Challenge

Randi over at I Have to Say is hosting an event called "Back to homeschool week" I'm going to try to do it every day on my blog next week. We are actually going to start school next Wednesday if everything goes okay so this is really an appropriate time to think about why we're doing this!

Here's the rules and everything that I copied from Randi's blog.

"Next week, here on my blog, I will be hosting "Back to Homeschool Week". There is a topic for each day and my hope is that my fellow homeschoolers here in the blogosphere will participate by posting their own experiences on their blogs. This is the time of the year that our thoughts begin to turn towards curriculum, planning and scheduling, and I thought that gathering together to encourage one another would be beneficial all of us.

Below is the list of topics for the week. I tried to keep the topics broad so that way we will have lots of different ideas and things to discuss. You may participate for all five days or just for one. Whatever you have time for.

Monday, August 6---What led to your decision to homeschool?
Why do you do what you do? What brought you to homeschooling? What factors played a part in your decision?

Tuesday, August 7---How do you homeschool?
Scheduling, classical education, unschooling, getting the kids to help with chores, how to be "mom" and "teacher" at the same time, special needs, teaching an advanced child, how to teach the tough subjects, teaching high school, teaching with babies and preschoolers in the house, budgeting for homeschool supplies, notebooking, etc., etc., etc...

Wednesday, August 8---Getting out there...
Extra-curricular activities, community involvement, volunteering, sports teams, music lessons, making sure your kids have opportunities to be social, co-ops, etc., etc., etc...

Thursday, August 9---If I had only known...
What have you learned on your homeschooling journey? What would you/did you change? This is an opportunity to encourage others who are just starting out or who are struggling with issues that seem unsolvable. It is also a perfect opportunity to tell us about one of those days made you want to throw in the towel. A funny story? Perfect!

Friday, August 10---Curriculum
What curriculum do you use? Where do you buy it? Have you found a "gem" that you must share with others? Was something in particular a complete failure for you and your kids?

Please feel free to post the graphic on your blog so that the word will spread to others. You can either download the image to your own computer or you can email me for the code. My email link is on the left sidebar or you can leave me a comment with your email address listed.

You may also feel free to cut-and-paste any part of this post into your own blog post so that others know what it going on. In each of my posts next week, I will have an auto-link so that you can link your own post from mine.

Because I know that opinions abound when it comes to homeschooling, I would hope to see everyone using this forum to encourage others, rather than to prove a point. My hope is that Back to Homeschool Week will provide someone with new insight and strength on their homeschooling journey.

I hope to see you next week!?

The Prize.

Yesterday, I told my kids that the public school kids had started back to school and they ought to have a 'not back to school' party. My youngest said that I should get them some kind of prize or bake a cake to celebrate. My oldest said "She already gave us a prize. She didn't make us go back to school today!"

Our Newest Addition.

We didn't plan to get this kitten. We found her under a bush at church, half starved, poor thing. I wanted to name her Moses, but my daughter won the naming war and named her Zoe.

What we're using this year.

I've been trying to figure this out all summer and since Pam in Colorado asked, I'll tell you what I'm going to try to do this year.

For my older son who is in high school, I've got an American History textbook called "Out of Many". We will all do American History together and use this book as a spine. The younger two won't go as much in depth. He will also be studying Algebra 1 from Key Curriculum Press, finishing up the English and Science from Alpha Omega that he should have finished last year and doing a computer class from Christian Light Education. I've purposely ordered from different publishers in the hopes that he will like one of these better than the ones we had last year (Alpha Omega Life Packs).

For my daughter who is in 6th grade, she will be studying American History with us. She will also be doing Sequential Spelling, Spectrum Grammar, Mammoth Math. We will be notebooking and she will be assigned books to read and report on.

For my youngest who is in 4th grade (I cannot believe that!), Sequential Spelling, Spectrum Grammar, Mammoth Math, notebooking and US History. He'll also be working on his reading skills, since they are a little behind.

For the US history unit we will also be using History Scribe, Christian Cottage and Konos, along with the free units I've gotten this year from the Homeschool Estore.
I figure I should use them since I've got them.

Here's a list of the ones I think I'll use this year.
Mapskills
Respected American Women.
Proverbs Copywork.
Weather Folklore.
Birds Lapbook.
Christmas Activity Book.
Labor Day.
Mother's Day.
Pioneer Projects you can build yourself.

I also have downloaded one on the Statue of Liberty but now I can't find it on my computer, which annoys me to no end. If you do decide to go to that wonderful store and download something, please remember to click on "save a copy".

So anyway, that's the plan so far.

When to start. When to start.

Last night I went to dinner with a bunch of homeschool moms. We all discussed when we would start school. The public schools in the area are starting tomorrow. One of the families in our homeschool group will be starting at the very end of August and most are starting somewhere in the middle of August. I'm still not sure when we will begin, probably some time next week. I need to get the house a bit more organized. I want to get the sidewalk done. I'm kind of ready to get started, but kind of dreading the whining that will probably happen and hoping I can be more organized this year. (hey, a girl can hope!). I've got all the supplies I need, now I just need to decide when.

Another blogger is giving away a TV!

All I have to do to enter is to be linked to it. So here's the link.