You’ve brought up a great point about my second dd. I can see this as a situation that would work for her. It’s my little boys that I feel the most angst over, really. I feel a little guilty that my girls had so much time with me homeschooling and they might not. thank you for the encouragement!

I think I’ll have this tattooed on my forearm so I can read it over and over as needed. Thank you for sharing your family’s experience.

We are requiring dd to participate in at least one academic team activity; that’s one of the big reasons we sent her. She also plans to try out for the tennis team next month. I am hopeful that once she is able to take AP classes, she will find her niche.

Yes, I do think the challenge will increase next year and possibly even next semester. Thank you for sharing your experience!

Thank you for sharing your experience. I find it comforting to know others have faced similar circumstances with positive results.

Thank you for sharing your experience. It is very encouraging! And especially thank you for the bolded sentence. I’m going to hang my hat on that one.

Yes, the volunteering is too much. I enjoy teaching a lot, but this year I just bit off more than I can chew. My children are in the co-op, so it mostly does benefit them. Thanks for your insight! @heartlikealion

@Terabith THANK YOU for that encouragement

@Happy2BaMom Have you been talking to my dh? ?. You’re exactly right. One of the reasons we put her in school is because we don’t have any alternative either in our homeschooling community or even another school. I AM hopeful that some of the feeling that she’s just learning to play the game will improve or disappear altogether as she gets into harder classes. Most days she doesn’t feel the way I do. It’s my problem.

@Terabith my 12 yo has severe anxiety and ocd, and that’s always in the back of my mind—how would school be for her? That’s another complication. Sigh.

Thank you, @Terabith. I definitely started to feel that pushback from my eldest and that was a big part of our deciding to send her. She had a somewhat rocky start in ps but has now semi-adjusted. Her younger sister (12 yo) is an entirely different personality, and I can see that she might never choose to go to school. However, I still have to carefully weigh the pros and cons of me not being able to bring in some kind of income for our future needs.

Thanks for your response, @Arctic Mama. Our stress isn’t exactly about our current financial situation. It’s more like it’s preemptive stress over what we see coming. I guess in my heart I’m wondering how to decide if homeschooling when we have other decent options makes the most sense for our family financially for the long haul.

My dd14 went to public high school this year for the first time ever as a freshman. This was a difficult-to-make but mutually-made decision. She is doing very well academically but says things about learning that make me sad (i. e. she has learned very quickly how to play the school game), and I fear that her three 100+ averages (yes, 3 out of 4 classes) mean not that she really gets the material but that she’s good at school. Both my dh and I were good at school, so I’m not surprised, but still—I had high hopes that she’d be challenged. So far I can’t say that she has been, and yet she’s enrolled in one of the best schools (some would say THE best) in our area and one of the better ones in our state. Despite my angst over her being in school, it has been good in several important ways. She no longer answers to me for her school work, and that has helped our relationship. I think she can look back now with appreciation (a little bit) on the past nine years. She seems happier in some regards because she’s busier; it was very hard for me to keep her social well full. I feel like I’m at a crossroads that has partly been brought on by this foray by my dd into ps, partly by my own return to work as an adjunct community college instructor, and partly by a possible midlife crisis. ?. My youngest child is five, so we’re in the thick of phonics and counting. Above him I have an 8 yo boy and a 12 yo girl, in addition to my ps-er. I’m feeling torn. I need to make money, and I need to feel more secure about our future. It’s not insecure—my dh has a good job with benefits, etc. HOWEVER—life with four kids is expensive. We’re looking at braces for three kids in the future, cars and insurance, college, etch I also feel the clock ticking (I’m 44) and like to think I can still do something that contributes to our financial future. Teaching part time at the CC is a lot of work for me (I teach English, so I grade a lot of essays). It’s very hard for me to feel like I am doing a good job on all fronts. (Not to mention the fact that I’m TIRED.) I also volunteer to teach three classes at our weekly co op. I believe in homeschooling. I love it, I love being with my children, and I love how much it has meant to our family for a decade. But. At what point (financial, emotional, personal, whatever) did you decide to pull the plug and do something else? How did you decide?

We got to visit the Carle in December of 2016. It was everything you’d imagine!

I’m reading and following this thread with great interest. My oldest dd has decided (with some “encouragement” from her parents ?) that she’s going to give public school a try next year. We’ve never been completely married to homeschooling forever and ever, amen, though I think in my heart of hearts I wanted to. Then dd became a teenager and I can see the benefit for everyone of her having someone besides me to answer to. Next year will be her freshman year of high school, so it seems like the time is right. We have three younger children, the youngest of which is five. I am likely also going to go back to work very part time (24 hrs every two weeks) as a public library aide in the next month, too. I have a MLIS degree but no one (outside of school librarians, which was my last full time job) gets paid for their training in my area. Still, I love public library work, so I think it will be worth it to me. I feel like sending my eldest off to public high school is a watershed of sorts for me. Does this mean everyone will follow? I don’t know. I am 44. I know that life seems a lot shorter to me now than it did when my eldest was the age my baby is now. I also really see the need to bring in a little money. Teenagers are expensive! This past school year was really hard and I ended the year pretty burned out. I think I can generate enough enthusiasm for a few more years, but I’ll have to dig really deep to see my little guys all the way through to high school. Full time library work is definitely a future possibility, and it’s something I think I would enjoy. Still, it makes me really sad to think this fun and fulfilling ride might be coming to an end sooner than I expected. I’m just trying to stay open to the possibilities and walk through the doors as they open. It helps that the school system we’ll be a part of is considered among the best in our state.

Let me start with a couple of disclaimers: 1. My eldest child will be a ninth grader next school year, so I’ve never actually homeschooled high school. 2. We used BYL 7 but not completely as written. Now that that’s out of the way: I used this spread over two years for both my daughters together in grades 7/8 and 5/6 (though she’s an old/mature 6th grader). This is definitely a cultural geography course rather than a physical geography (or whatever other kinds of geographies there are that focus on geographic features and facts). IMHO you’d definitely want to find an additional spine/source for that sort of information and perhaps add in some mapping. I hope this is a tiny bit helpful, disclaimers notwithstanding.

I for one can’t wait to have your insight all in one place, 8!

I want a chauffeur to run my big kids to their activities so I can stay home with my little kids. Then I want a chef and housekeeper to do all the work so I can do nothing but play with my littles.

I’ll play. I mostly lurk but your lists always look so accomplished that I thought it might make me feel accomplished to participate. ? ✅ school with my 2nd grader ✅ lunch with read-aloud /circle time ✅ world geography read aloud with 6th and 8th graders; check math, geography narrations, Latin with 6th grader ✅Out the door by 3 to take 6th grader to play practice ✅dinner and errands ✅ Church ✅ school prep for tomorrow in the middle of all that: switch laundry and keep the 5 year old happy

What a deal!

Wow! You racked up!

I just got my Audible email regarding the latest 2-for-1sale. Anybody care to share not-to-be-missed titles from it? https://mobile.audible.com/sp/2for1.htm?ref=a_home-page_c0_zing_0&pf_rd_p=43d9a42f-1b83-41b4-9d72-482dbe662a41&pf_rd_r=ZNF6G7JTWCV8HB6RB372&

Thank you! These look very good!

Thanks for sharing!

Thanks to everyone who responded. I’ve never seen the books in person, so your input helps a lot. How would I homeschool without WTM?