Blessedfamily Posted October 23, 2009 Share Posted October 23, 2009 Particularly if your child is very advanced in one or more academic subjects, have you already determined you'll need a tutor? Or, have you already had to hired a tutor? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Laura Corin Posted October 23, 2009 Share Posted October 23, 2009 Calvin has an online tutor for Classical Civilisation. This is more because he is heading for a particular exam and there's no one text book that fulfils the requirements for it. In general, his areas of excellence (arts, literature, etc.) match my areas of expertise, so I've otherwise been able to keep pace. If he were staying home past the age of 14, I would definitely need help with teaching maths. We are looking for a Mandarin tutor; I am teaching him in the mean time, but I'd like to find a native speaker. I haven't felt the need of a tutor for Hobbes yet. He goes to a Saturday school for Mandarin, and I back up the teaching at home. Laura Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blessedfamily Posted October 23, 2009 Author Share Posted October 23, 2009 I suspect I may eventually need a math tutor or let dd take outside classes. I need to look through some higher level math and see how much I remember. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JennW in SoCal Posted October 23, 2009 Share Posted October 23, 2009 I think you will know when you need to find a tutor or outside class. I have used tutors and outside classes for different reasons. One reason was to help my ds with learning challenges -- he needed someone who could explain things better than I, and someone trained to deal with his specific learning issues. Another reason was to have another adult for my kids to answer to when they were middle school aged. They were far more motivated to please another adult than to please me, an issue which they grew out of. The third reason will be coming up as my current high school ds heads into Algebra II/Trig/Pre-calculus. I am not a math person, and will be of no help after he finishes geometry! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lionfamily1999 Posted October 23, 2009 Share Posted October 23, 2009 I think I would have needed to hire a tutor if I pulled my kid out when they were in high school and I had to just jump in at that level. My son is 7. I am studying now for the near future. I work with him and ahead of him. I'm hoping that is going to help. :iagree: Right now, my hope is I'll be able to stay a step or ten ahead. Of course, at the rate they're going (and with Miquon and MEP introducing such a new way of thinking of numbers), I may be behind pretty soon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted October 23, 2009 Share Posted October 23, 2009 (That mine aren't all that advanced...) I accidentally handed some parts of my older one's education over to other non-family people when he was 11. (My father did tech-ed/shop type stuff, and applied math.) He began peacewalking, which exposed him to lots of religion, cultures, politics, and history, as well as a smattering of other things. Having non-family mentors turned out to be very important. Traveling independently turned out to be very important. Academically, I began struggling in high school. The community college kept me from having to relearn chemistry and math after NEM3, and helped with communications (writing/speech/drawing). Now we know there comes a point when our children need to do independent things (like traipse around Europe for month or two or walk from Boston to DC), and that this doesn't really have anything to do with whether I can still teach them the academics. In fact, it is better if they do that while I can still teach them, because that sort of large project doesn't mix very well with outside courses' schedules. We've always thought it important that ours be able to be taught by someone else, but family and gymnastics takes care of that. Same with having extra parents. Ours need to transition into a classroom while they are still living at home, so we can help with that. We know that there comes a point when I can't do a good job teaching them the academics (like high school chemistry and writing). Foreign languages require exposure to native speakers. And we've decided that I don't want to teach calculus (although I'm sure I could) and therefore, they should take pre-calc at the CC also, to help the transition. The youngest has already done a year of peacewalking (with its history, politics, and religion). Part of that was in Europe, so that helped significantly with the French. The year before that, he had a tutor for French, a native speaker. This year, I'm managing the French ok with textbooks meant for 6th grade French children, but I have to listen to French story tapes to keep my pronounciation reasonable. I had a moment of panic at the beginning of this week when I realized that in theory, next year (official 10th grade/16yo) he would be ready for CC precalc but that would tie him down to an outside school schedule and I'm not sure we're ready for that yet. The CC is going to help me figure all that out. Phew. In 11th and 12th, he'll do CC chem and physics (hopefully), and speech and comp. He's doing fine with the drawing on his own. I should probably farm out robotics and computer programming, but he doesn't want to, so I'm letting him ineffectually mess about on his own a bit longer. Same with Latin - I should have farmed it out awhile ago, but he doesn't want to, so we are (once again) ineffectually messing about with it on our own. The easy way of farming things out means doing them more formally with some sort of class, and that ruins the fun. If I were really good, I'd have found tutors in those things for him, but... If I were really good, I'd have found a way to inspire him to continue to take piano lessons, too, instead of just letting him mess about improvising on his own. Sigh. It seems like we ask so much of him, though, between gymnastics and the academics (not really his cup of tea) and our close extended family and the peacewalking, that I hate to push. He himself has chosen which things he wants to put lots of energy into, with me pushing math and French this year, so I can understand why he might not want to study the other things formally and challengingly and time-consumingly. We are very definately homeschooling for reasons other than academic excellence. I always have to keep reminding myself that. This child doesn't want to spend all his time on academics, even though he can do them. Sorry - this post has deteriorated into this fall's panic/debate... I'll leave it in case any of it answers your question, though. I suspect these issues - how much to push, how much to try to do, how much to challenge, how to give them control and independence - these are things we probably all struggle with. -Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KAR120C Posted October 23, 2009 Share Posted October 23, 2009 Particularly if your child is very advanced in one or more academic subjects, have you already determined you'll need a tutor? Or, have you already had to hired a tutor? Fortunately for us, DS's strengths follow my own and DH's to a great extent, so we've not had a problem yet, and probably won't for quite a while. I could do math all the way to the point where he'll need to go to college (I'm not fascinated by Calculus so I'll probably send him off for that, even though I could teach it... and I've got several years' worth of algebra-based rabbit trails to follow anyway), science and social science and a wide variety of literature DH and I can handle pretty well (different areas for each of us), and languages we tend to learn as a family. Music we have to hire out. We have no idea where his musical talent came from unless it skipped a few generations. So he has private music lessons and a music theory tutor. And although I certainly could teach physics, we have a favorite physics teacher and a conveniently-located class, so DS goes to that too. But then I coach two math teams, and tutor some kids individually (math and sometimes science), and co-op for a history group and a literature group. So basically when our friends find their kids outpacing them in math, I'm the one they call! LOL Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
patchfire Posted October 23, 2009 Share Posted October 23, 2009 I will basically have to hire out modern foreign language from day one, and Latin past a certain level - I took three years of high school Latin, no modern foreign language at all. You could argue that outside music instruction is a 'tutor,' in which case we already do. I feel confident in my ability to teach the other core academic subjects, though I do like multiple perspectives on writing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blessedfamily Posted October 23, 2009 Author Share Posted October 23, 2009 DO the sciences get really difficult? I don't remember any issues in my own classes up to physiology and physics. But homeschool kids can take neat, different science courses than ps kids at high school level. Can't they? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cjzimmer1 Posted October 24, 2009 Share Posted October 24, 2009 Oldest is in Pre-calc. So far we're okay but I'm pretty rusty. Calculus will be upon us then. Again I could probably do it but not only would I be really rusty, I hated calculus and all that was beyond (I have a math minor so I took quite a bit beyond that). He'll be 12 and half or so when he hits calculus. A bit too young to send off for classes. My husband got a degree online and I was not at all impressed with how things were handled. I'm sure there are places that do well with but his school didn't and it has left me with a bad taste in my mouth so to speak for online classes. SO we will probably look into tutoring next summer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nan in Mass Posted October 24, 2009 Share Posted October 24, 2009 Not remembering is the problem. It isn't that they are particularly difficult; it is that I have to reread the textbook and figure it all out again, memorizing it as I go along, and I don't have time to do that anymore. Or soemtimes I have the time but not the energy. And then there is the question of labs. And the bio is much more chemical now than it used to be. Yes, high schoolers can take cool classes. There is one girl on the high school board who did the master gardener program as a science. -Nan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reya Posted October 24, 2009 Share Posted October 24, 2009 (edited) I'll need one for Mandarin RIGHT away. I am not able to teach that. It'll probably be grandma, though! Everything else except violin I can take through the high school level. I'd add ART to the list, too, if we were more serious about that. Weirdly, I'm considering a handwriting tutor! :tongue_smilie: (I already hire out gymnastics and swimming, of course...) Edited October 24, 2009 by Reya Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Truscifi Posted October 24, 2009 Share Posted October 24, 2009 I already have one for art, although we only see her a couple times a month. Ds is very artistic, and even though I minored in art in college, I find myself completely unable to teach it. I have zero musical ability (dh was a concert pianist until he gave it up in college, but his work schedule doesn't permit the time it would take to do music/piano lessons properly right now), so if he wants to learn music we will have to farm that one out too. Beyond that, I feel I have academics covered at least through 10th grade unless ds gets way ahead in something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mommy22alyns Posted October 24, 2009 Share Posted October 24, 2009 I think I'll be able to handle the girls through high school. Becca is not advanced in math, so I'm not too worried about that. Now music, that has been farmed out since day 1. DH has minimal musical ability and I have none. Becca has a beautiful little voice and picks up on tunes instantly and perfectly. She goes to a children's training choir and I really want her to learn an instrument, but she's not quite old enough for the group lessons at our arts center. Private lessons are just too $$$ with us in gymnastics too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Desert Rat Posted October 26, 2009 Share Posted October 26, 2009 I'll be needing a tutor in math for Huck is 2-3 years. Once he gets to Algebra II, I'm toast! I will probably outsource for science labs as well. Everything else, I've got covered.....I think! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crimson Wife Posted October 26, 2009 Share Posted October 26, 2009 We're considering the Stanford EPGY Online High School for when my oldest hits junior high (it now starts in 7th). Not necessarily because I feel I couldn't handle teaching her, but because my DH thinks it would make her a more competitive candidate for admission to a top university. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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