Educationally Speaking: Fall Homeschool Update

November 16, 2022November 16, 2022 / Lisa R. Howeler / 3 Comments

Homeschool has been trucking along fairly well this year. Our days have been filled with more book learning than hands-on learning for the last couple of weeks.

Little Miss and I are still working with math and reading/English curriculum from The Good and The Beautiful. She’s not fighting me as often as she was last year when I say it is time to do our lessons.

For Science, we are using the space curriculum from Apologia’s Creation series.

We finished our history and are now doing individual unit studies. Last week we finished a book about George Washington Carver which I combined with videos and an art project where we recreated paintings of his. Well, I tried to recreate one, but she sort of did her own thing, which is fine as long as she was enjoying herself.

Next up is a unit on Native Americans and I have ordered a fiction book — Children of the Longhouse by Joseph Bruchac — that I hope will tell a Native American story in a creative way and allow us to talk about real-life events. I looked up a bunch of picture books about Native Americans but our library only had one of them so I’ll either have to buy them or look at larger libraries.

A couple of weeks ago when it was still nice enough outside for Little Miss to jump on the trampoline, we had an assignment in our reading/English book for Little Miss to orally relay to me a story she made up.

One day she spent three straight hours working on the book, using my computer, even with my messed up “s” and “w” keys which sometimes work and sometimes don’t. Since then she’s asked a couple of times to work on her book and wants me to publish it for her at some point, which I hope to do next year.

The Boy is still working with his grandpa a couple of days a week, which is part of his life skills education, in addition to his regular schoolwork.

For his book-based schoolwork, he is reading about Medieval History via The History of the Medieval World by Susan Wise Bauer, Biology through Apologia, and classic literature in the form of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, which he is actually enjoying. He also has math through CTC Math, which is an online program and grammar through FixIt! Grammar.

We have been trying to secure him a place at a school near us for next year that is similar to a trade school but seem to be being stonewalled because he is homeschooled and not enrolled, even though under state law we are supposed to be able to access those programs as well. The local school district will not return phone calls and it is very frustrating.

Hopefully it will work out.

The Boy is 16 now so we will be starting driving lessons soon, but first we will be studying the manual, which is now online. My husband printed it out for him, but The Boy isn’t in a huge hurry to get his license so we will take our time in that area.

I need to find a field trip for us in the next month or so and I think I’ll look into a couple small museums near us that have Native American artifacts. Winter seems to have started a little earlier with temperatures already in the high 20s or low 30s and our first snowfall coming yesterday, so any field trips will have to be inside at this point.

If you are homeschooling, how is it going for you? If you aren’t, how is school going for you children or grandchildren?

Educationally Speaking: homeschool round up

May 31, 2022May 30, 2022 / Lisa R. Howeler / 7 Comments

It’s hard for me to believe it, but this week is our final week of homeschool.

We are finished with most of what I wanted to complete before the end of the school year, but there is still tons I wish we had been able to shove in. It seems with homeschooling is you never exactly feel like you are finished. You also never exactly feel like you did enough. When you go back and look at the entire year, though, you usually realize you did a lot more than you thought you did. Still, I often look back and think about how much more I could have taught or included in lessons.

We are tying up some loose ends this week, including writing an essay and a book report for The Boy. Little Miss needs to finish up a few math lessons so we can put part one of this particular level of math behind us and pick up with part two in July, which is when we can start recording school days for the next year. While I do plan to do some math with her starting in July, I don’t plan to start full on school. I want my kids to have a break where they can be kids and have fun during the summer but for Little Miss, I know it is important to keep the continuity going so we don’t have to do too much review at the beginning of next school year.

Also, this week I have to start putting together a portfolio of schoolwork for each of them to present to the evaluator next week. The evaluator will then type up a summary of our work which essentially is a sheet of paper that tells the school district we are in and the state that we did what we were supposed to do as set by the homeschooling law in Pennsylvania.

I have to present that evaluation by June 30^th to the local school district office. I also plan to present them with an affidavit that declares our intent to homeschool for the 2022-2023 school year. The affidavit isn’t actually due until August 1, but I usually present the evaluation and the affidavit at the same time. Last year I completely missed the deadline for the evaluation, but the district secretary was very understanding and accepted it anyhow, telling me that as long as I had it in before the next school year started then it was totally fine. Whew. I breathed a sigh of relief when she told me that.

While gathering together material for the portfolio, which includes a sample of all the work we did this year, I also have to have a list of any textbooks we used and any books we read.

For Little Miss we used:

Notgrass’ Our Star Spangled Story for history/social studies

Spectrum Science for science

CTC Math and The Good and the Beautiful for Math

And The Good and the Beautiful for reading/English

Notgrass also included half a credit for English with their course because their curriculum comes with a selection of historical fiction books to be read with the book.

As part of the English part of the Notgrass curriculum we read:

Benjamin West and His Cat Grimalkin by Marguerite Henry

Toliver’s Secret by Esther Wood Brady

Freedom Crossing by Margaret Goff Clark

Mountain Born by Elizabeth Yates

The Year of Miss Agnes by Kirkpatrick Hill (which we hope to finish by next Friday)

These books were read in addition to the books I read to her at night, including the Little House on the Prairie books, the Misty of Chincoteague books, and the Paddington books.

The Boy’s curriculum this year included:

CTC Math for Math

Notgrass for World Geography

Notgrass for Economics

And Apologia Biology for Science

For English, we used a few sources, including Fix It! Grammar, Apologia American Literature and the books which came with the Notgross World Geo curriculum

Books that The Boy read this year included:

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Know Why You Believe by Paul Little

Blood Brothers by Elias Chacour

A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

And Smoke and Mirrors by Neil Gaiman

We had four or five more books we were supposed to read as part of his geography course, but we ran out of time, partially because I added To Kill A Mockingbird to our reading on my own and partially because The Boy already had a lot (and I mean A LOT) of text to read in his other subjects.

One thing we didn’t do enough of this year was field trips. We had a couple of trips in the beginning of the year but then we were hit with Covid and then high gas prices, so the field trips were put on the back burner. That didn’t stop the kids from learning things from their grandparents and others and through other activities at home.

What I like about homeschooling is that learning isn’t only done through established curriculum, but from everyday activities. Homeschooling allows for a lot more flexibility than traditional schooling, as I have mentioned here before.

So far we have decided to continue homeschool for next year. If either of the children decide they want to be educated in a different way over the summer then we will revaluate that decision.

If you are a homeschooler how did school go for your kids this year? Let me know in the comments.

How homeschooling has made life easier and less stressful. Well, sometimes anyhow.

August 15, 2019August 14, 2019 / Lisa R. Howeler / 17 Comments

Homeschooling is not something I would recommend for the faint of heart yet here we are only two more weeks away from another year of homeschooling beginning and I, one of the most anxiety-ridden people I know, is looking forward to it, though I’m sure my 12-year old son is not.

Photo by Lisa R. Howeler (available on Lightstock.)

Last year was a bit of a bumpy ride when it came to a routine but this year I at least have a tentative plan for a routine and for lessons. I also have a better handle on the curriculum for this school year – in some ways at least. I don’t feel as panicked about curriculum as I did last year but like last year I am concerned about how we will pay for it all. Truth be told you don’t have to spend a lot to homeschool, but I’m a stickler for getting the best curriculum I can.

Luckily I snagged our history curriculum on eBay and there are other sites where you can purchase high quality used books or sets. Last year my brother, who is a librarian (and a blogger. You can find him at Still An Unfinished Person.), had some curriculum dropped off for the library’s book sale and he snagged it up for me, not knowing that part of it was what I needed to complete my son’s science unit for this year. Actually, that particular curriculum is geared toward eighth or ninth graders and my son will be in seventh this year, but he’s very quick with subjects that interest him and science does interest him. The only subject that doesn’t interest him is math, something I hope to remedy at some point.

I also think I’ll be using a Language Arts curriculum I picked up last year but thought was too confusing and advanced for him at the time. There is one other place we don’t have to spend extra money. Yeah! I really want a grammar and spelling curriculum this year, which adds to the budget but is much needed (probably for me too! Ha!)

My daughter’s birthday is actually after the cutoff to go to Kindergarten, but she’ll be five this year so we are stepping up her education and I hope to be able to pick up a full PreK and Kindergarten curriculum for her to add on to what she already knows.

Photo by Lisa R. Howeler (available on Lightstock).

Despite the extra costs that homeschooling can bring when it comes to curriculum, I truly feel homeschooling has been a blessing and perfect fit for our family in this season. For one, my son, daughter and I can visit my parents whenever we want, no longer having to work around my son’s school schedule. We simply take school with us. Last year my son also spent some days and nights with his grandparents and his grandfather taught him how to build things, pour concrete, repair tombstones, weed, and flatten the ground to prepare for a pool. The lessons he learns at his grandparents are well beyond the scope traditional education would provide for him and I love that.

Another aspect I enjoy about homeschooling is that I no longer dread the end of August, knowing it will be a crazy rush of trying to buy school supplies and back to school clothes and pay for books and tuition. I also no longer have to dread my son being gone all day long. I’m one of those weird parents who actually likes having him home with me and being able to interact with him throughout the day and the school year. I know that before too long he’ll be grown and out of the house and I’ll miss those moments together.

Photo by Lisa R. Howeler (available on Lightstock)

Lest you think my “poor unsocialized” kid and I are attached at the hip, however, we are involved with a local homeschooling group to encourage interaction with other children of various ages and also make sure my son spends time away from me so neither of us contemplates running away from home, screaming and arms flailing.

Just because I like having him home with me during the week, doesn’t mean I never let him have a life away from me. I don’t know why I’m desperately trying to clarify that my son isn’t unsocialized, but it’s probably because I’ve heard the weirdest ideas about the lack of socialization of homeschooled children. There are some people that seem to believe that homeschooled children don’t ever have interaction with other humans and are being held hostage by their parents in a dark room with only a tiny light to do their school work.

Actually, maybe our children are being held hostage by us in some ways since we make them actually learn during the day, often without the breaks for recess or study hall that traditional school allows for. Poor kids. Ha. But they are definitely socialized – either by joining with other homeschoolers in a type of co-op or by interacting with adults when their parents drag them to stores, the mechanics, church, or doctor’s appointments. My son has developed a bit of social anxiety, but I don’t attribute that to homeschooling, I attribute it to a bad experience he had in traditional school and also the fact he’s a preteen (for two more months anyhow) and that’s a natural stage for preteens.

Look…he’s being social with other homeschoolers. Just look at them all. Ha!

Incidentally, many homeschool students are able to complete their work in about four hours and devote the rest of their day to other educational or life skills related activities, including socialization. The reduced hours my son was “in school” during our first year of homeschooling last year was actually disconcerting to my husband until I pointed out that our son doesn’t have to wait for other students to catch up before he moves to another lesson, doesn’t have to wait in homeroom, doesn’t need a 45 minute lunch break, doesn’t get recess or study hall and his extracurricular activities are simply included in everyday activities.

This isn’t to say that these activities held in a traditional school are wrong or not appropriate. Not at all. They have their place and reasons. I’m just explaining that may be why a homeschooling student doesn’t seem to be in school “as much” as a “traditional student” (for lack of a better word).

There are many other benefits to homeschooling, for our family anyhow, and among them is no longer having to buy our son an entirely new wardrobe at the beginning of each school year. At his previous school, he was required to wear polo shirts every day and on Friday he had to wear dress shirts, khakis, dress shoes, and a tie. We needed to budget for those expenses, in addition to the cost of books and tuition, every summer. Also eliminated from the budget are the various lunch items. We no longer need to pack sandwiches and snacks or provide money for a snack card. Instead, he makes himself a sandwich for lunch or I cook him leftovers.

The grocery budget may have increased in some ways since my son procrastinates from work by declaring he needs a snack every couple of hours. Last year I finally told him he could eat his snacks while working and that cut down on the procrastination at least. We will see if it helps with the grocery bill at all this year.

Photo by Lisa R. Howeler (available on Lightstock).

One other benefit of homeschooling I’ve discovered is that I can learn along with my son. The fact I am learning things I never learned in public school or college has made me more aware that maybe my education wasn’t what I thought it was, or maybe I was simply in a total tachycardia related fog all through high school and a sleep-deprived haze in college. I don’t know, but homeschooling my son has made me feel like I still have a lot to learn about history, especially.

In addition to me having the chance to learn more about a subject, my son also can spend more time on a particular subject or unit if it interests him. We can take the time to really focus on what he is interested in and expand on lessons, while making sure he still learns his other subjects. Often in his other school they had to end a unit or simply “never got to it” and then the next year they’d start back at the beginning of a subject, so to speak, and still never progress past certain points in the subject, especially when it came to history.

I can’t tell you how many times the beginning of the year would start learning about the pioneer days, end with the Revolutionary War and then repeat the next year. It was the same when I was in public school. I swear we never learned past the Civil War when I was in school, so by the time I graduated I knew very little about history beyond the Civil War. At least I knew all there was about Pennsylvania history, though.

I’m sure I’ll update my homeschooling journey on here throughout the year and hopefully, it won’t be a tearful post, asking questions like “what was I thinking???”