Homeschooling

I'm a mother to 4 year old Rueben. I fear he maybe a bit dysgraphic or crippled by perfectionism. but results in him not really drawing and only practicing letter forms for very short time periods.
I think he'd like a pen pal, (i've asked he said yes) everyone loves getting mail right?So any takers?

In reference to a post last month, I have decided to collect a little data on homeschooling. Of course, I've read quite a bit on the subject, but kept no copies of anything. After ten years, I thought the question had been settled. People have done studies, and anecdotal evidence abounds. I just want to collect a few to print and keep on hand whenever relatives and others put the pressure on me to put my ADHD teen into public school for 'social reasons', as if conformity were the answer to everything.

Thanks.

Public school started Monday. MY school starts next Friday. Someone sent me this today, and it is going on my list of reasons to homeschool!

Student Locator Program

While religious reasons do not factor into my decision to homeschool, these verses do come to mind:

Proverbs 22:6 
Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

1Thessalonians 5:3 
For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.

Thank God no one is putting a locator tag on my children. They aren't perfect, but they do tell me what they do -- even the bad stuff! (I try not to freak TOO much.) BTW, I have a homeschool grad in college. Will this locator stuff follow students into college? Or will sense prevail and they throw out this insane notion?

I have a 5 year old son who is beginning "real" home school curriculum in a week. We have been doing pre-school on our own for two and a half years. Now that we are getting to where his work needs to be done and evaluated by someone outside our home, I need some advice. He hates to work on his handwriting. He will procrastinate and dawdle for an hour, regardless of bribes of rewards for a finished lesson or threats of consequences for not doing his work. It does not matter if he is given just his name to trace or a page of words or numbers, so I do not think it is because it is either too difficult or too easy. He can write all is letters and numbers, but after not having him practice with tracing for a few days, his handwriting becomes illegible. He loves doing workbook pages, reading and flash cards, and is a very visual learner. But 80% of the time will not do his handwriting work. We do live in a small house with two younger siblings, but we do our best to keep him in a separate room where it is quiet for him. I have tried sitting with him and encouraging him along the way, I have tried leaving him in his room to do the work on his own, but what works one day does not the next. Help? This is so far the only subject we are constantly butting heads on, and I am stressing out on how to motivate him to do his work come next week.

Wondering if members that are out in the Pacific NW area had other local groups that they are part of for events/programs/interests/even just chat/ I am on a few email groups but thought I would also reach out here to see if I can get some more info. I am Seattle area but travel quite a bit through Oregon, N. Cali and ID. Respond or add me as a friend!

Hailey

Recommendations of music books for learning to play the recorder? Has anyone used Oak Meadow's book? (I've never bought anything from OM.) Other books you used and loved/hated?

This is for my 7yo as a first-time learner and also for reteaching myself to read music and play it again.

I noticed that the beginning and the end of the school year bring more questions, so I'm going to ask one of the old timers:

What books helped you the most when you were deciding to start homeschooling?

My favorite book was Home Learning Year by Year by Rebecca Rupp

With it, I designed what I was going to do from Pre-K through high school graduation. I didn't follow every yod and tittle in the book, but it helped me realized that I was doing the right thing.

Does anyone have any experience with Singapore Math? My daughter is 7 and we've finished most of the first grade-level math requirements, just a few pages left in a Kumon subtraction workbook. I'm looking to try something else for grade 2 because getting her to complete the Kumon worksheets has become a huge struggle. We also use Brainquest, flashcards, and sometimes extra worksheets I print out. I've seen Singapore mentioned in forums before but never paid enough attention. Does anyone have any experience with it, good or bad? TIA.

As much as I love the K12 curriculum that we're doing (using a virtual academy here in California that pays for it), I'm finding myself so stressed. I'm trying not to stress and not to let my stress show. But I'm still worried.

This is the beginning of our 4th week homeschooling. Part of me really loves it. Part of me is scared half to death. I'm so afraid that my kids won't "catch up" and will fall even further behind as time goes on. There is just so much that the K12 curriculum demands of my kids and not enough time in the day to do it all. If we did everything every day then we would have to start at 7 am and finish at 5 pm. That's way more than I can reasonably expect, let alone want, my children to have to do.

I'm going to give K12 till January. If I still feel this way then I'm going to consider doing this without them. I figure by January we'll have been homeschooling for 2 months and I should have a more accurate assessment of what we're capable of under their intense curriculum.

Part of me really wants to do this on my own. There are so many things that my area, San Diego, has to offer kids. There are workshops, free museum days, clubs, and just all around fun and educational events and whatnot. I keep picturing us doing all these fun and exciting things. Instead we're pouring over books and its a struggle to get them to do any of it.

I have so many ideas. Some of it will be book based. However, I also want my children to explore things. They're both very much kinesthetic learners. There's a group I signed us up for that does nature Walks and the kids do all sorts of science stuff. The aquarium used to have workshops on the weekends for kids. There are always cultural events. We have Sea World, the Wild Animal park, the San Diego Zoo, and all sorts of other things which could really enrich their science. There are tons of libraries throughout San Diego and each one has events, workshops, and clubs geared towards children (some fun adult stuff too).

The way I see it, if I wrote my own curriculum we could utilize all of this. We could use the library's book clubs to help get the kids more into reading. We could do all sorts of hands on science (for example they could learn about eco-systems by looking at the tide pools along the cliffs at low tide). When we do history and social studies they can do projects that teach them way more than just plain old reading would. We can learn foreign languages as a family (which we are doing now and loving). The possibilities are endless.

That is what I think of when I think of homeschooling. I don't think of children locked inside their homes pouring over volumes of books only doing one or two fun (ie. hands on) lessons a week.

I don't know what I want the most. To have a charter (ie. the virtual school) tell me what to do, when to do it, and focuses more on overall progress rather than individual learning. To be fair, K12 does a lot for the kids. I just feel like we could be doing so much more, in more depth, and if it's more enjoyable then the kids will learn more.

Am I being realistic here or does it sound like I'm being more of a dreamer rather than having my head rooted in reality?