Home schoolers?

[GrayMatterWife]

I know a couple of y'all homeschool elementary schoolers. Could you give me any starter's guidance? Where do you go in a big city to find support groups and other home schoolers? How to you provide socialization? How to you choose a curriculum? What are the benefits and drawbacks of home schooling (for child and parent)? How do you handle foreign language education if you do not fluently speak a foreign language?

Full disclosure: I am VERY happy with DS's current school. I am looking ahead to all my options after we move once DH has a job post-fellowship (as of July 2012).

[v-girl]

A friend is using Rosetta Stone for her girls to learn Latin. As for groups? There are a lot of homeschoolers in DFW. Finding groups wasn't hard. Google is your friend. Will think more coherently after a diet coke.

[SoonerTexan]

I wasn't homeschooled, but my siblings were for 3 years. They had some issues with a Catholic homeschooling group that turned out to be ridiculously fundamentalist (I was the evil sister that went to public school and wore jeans *gasp*), but she found a lot of good options. In MS, my sibs used to go to "school" one day a week to learn Latin and take other classes. It was neat.

Upside--they got a great education those 3 years (they were pulled out when we moved to Mississippi and the elementary sucked)

Downside--She had a REALLY hard time getting them back into school when we moved to Texas and the schools were excellent. Lots of discrimination in our district--I think someone filed a lawsuit later. They immediately wanted to hold them back a year and to get into the correct grade, they had to take the tests kids who want to SKIP a grade take. Including Texas History, even though we had just moved from a different state. My mom had to do a lot of fighting to get them in. Ironically, they are all A/B students with no discipline issues--the principal was just being an asshat.

[bobk]

We're just about to complete our first year of homeschooling (Kindergarten). We live in a big city in the Northeast, so homeschooling and its support groups are quite common. The public schools are generally horrible and private schooling is too expensive, especially on a resident's salary. Just use Google to search for groups in your area - hopefully you'll find something.

For a curriculum, I ended up using a Catholic one based in California called Kolbe. I'd heard positive things about it, and registration and books was around $300, so I wasn't too worried about trying it out. It's worked out very well for us. We only spend about 2-3 hours a week with it. That doesn't sound like much, but she goes through the lessons pretty quickly and it's reassuring to know that she has mastered things that kids her age are expected to. A lot of homeschooling families don't use any curriculum at all, but I'm not comfortable with that.

I don't worry at all about socialization. My daughter has always been outgoing and communicates well with people of all ages. One day a week she goes to a homeschooling enrichment program. It's basically a group of about twenty kids with two or three adult facilitators. They spend the day doing science experiments, crafts, and playing different games. It's a good chance for them to make friends and do some activities in a group setting. We're also pretty active in our church, so she sees lots of other kids there too.

As for foreign language, I know there are small groups available in the area but I haven't been able to convince my daughter to try them yet. If you are willing to learn at the same time, I'm sure there are a lot of programs available online.

Overall, homeschooling has worked out well for our family, especially with all the resources available in this area. For me, the biggest drawback is the constant sense that I should be doing more. My wife has a crazy schedule, so I end up doing just about everything around the house (shopping, cooking, cleaning, finances, etc.) . That, plus taking care of our two year old and working part-time from home doesn't leave me with very much quality time to spend with our older daughter. I think a lot of homeschooling parents struggle with that, but in our case it's exacerbated by the "training lifestyle".

[SoonerTexan]

I ended up using a Catholic one based in California called Kolbe.

I think this is what my sibs used.

[diggitydot]

Any recs for language arts for 3rd/4th grade? DS has made huge strides this year, but I want to keep up on the work over the summer so he can hit the ground running next year.

ETA: We have Rosetta Stone for Russian and Spanish for the kids. It's pretty much kicks ass. They love it.

[Deebs]

I don't home-school, but we do move a lot. Every city we have lived in has home-schooling programs in a variety of locations/resource - the libraries, park districts, children's museums, zoos, all seem to have programs for children who are home-schooled (and this is in three very different cities). Not an option for core curriculum, but definitely could be used for socialization and to augment whatever you're doing.

[v-girl]

We used Language of God this year, but will be going back to Easy Grammar in the fall. Much more repitition -- my girls need that. Much of our curriculum is from Catholic Heritage Curricula.

[PrincessFiona]

I am not currently homeschooling an elementary-aged child. As for LA and math though, I can't recommend Stanford University's EPGY program enough. They do have a program for elementary school-aged children. It is spendy though!
As far as foreign language is concerned, you might look into the area's german/danish/spanish (whatever) organization. Our Germanic Institute (for example) in St. Paul offers a Saturday language program and these things are fairly common throughout the US. If something isn't nearby, you could also consider a summer camp program.

There are many homeschool organizations and I think you have to try them out. I did try the ST. Cloud one and found it weird. My daughter takes dance classes and this summer she will be going from one camp to the next all summer long to provide her with socialization. Next year, she will be taking 4 dance classes including a homeschool class. Many gyms, dance studios etc do have homeschool courses.

Kris

ETA: Stanford link http://epgy.stanford.edu/courses/index.html

[Tenacious_D]

Keeping my eyes and ears open on this because we are trying to start a preschool coop here.

[Chrisada]

I think homeschooling is amazing! As a former teacher, I can see so many advantages of being able to teach your child on his individual level on his own time.

[diggitydot]

Awesome info, ladies. Kris - thanks for the link. We'll definitely be checking it out!

[PrincessFiona]

One of the great things about Stanford is that the early grades are computer based. You login and the exercises pick up where your child left off. They have a low graphic quality math races game that is quite good despite the graphics.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[diggitydot]

That style would work perfectly for DS. His ADHD is off the charts, but he does really well with anything on the computer, especially if he can control the pace.

[GrayMatterWife]

This sounds stupid, but what intimidates me about homeschooling is the socialization stuff. I have no idea how to provide that for my kids if they are not in school. Dumb, I know.