Are you a former homeschooler?

[msjones]

If you're after-schooling, are you a former home-schooler?

 

I'm strongly considering putting my boys in our local public school next year. After 5 years of home-schooling, I'm feeling tired, resentful, and ready for a change.

 

If you are a former home-schooler, how is the after-schooling going? Can you do it along with the homework from the school? How much after-schooling do you do? (i.e. just math, or math and science, or?)

 

Are you pleased with your decision to enroll your students? If so, why? What are the biggest challenges?

 

Can you tell I'm conflicted? Not an easy decision... It reminds me of how I felt when I decided to home-school. And that wasn't fun...

[Sara R]

Yes, I am. I put my kids in school for health reasons when I got diagnosed, but I was already thinking that my older child needed a change of situation.

 

In my state, we have the right to homeschool part time. And the schools are mostly good socially, and there are a lot of good charter school options with better curriculum than is available in the regular public schools. Those things make a difference. Without them, my kids might still be at home.

 

Here is our current situation:

 

6th grade dd with dyslexic symptoms and attention problems: attends full-time at a charter school that uses Spalding phonograms and Saxon math. Last year she was super behind, so I homeschooled her for 1 1/2 hours each morning to catch her up. This was successful, but she is still behind in math and spelling. So we before school these subjects, since she wanted to attend full days this year.

 

She doesn't seem to learn Saxon well, so we go slowly through another math curriculum 10 minutes a morning so she won't be introduced to a math concept for the first time through Saxon.

 

Spelling required more tweaking, with the help of the teacher (since they assign spelling words as a class, and most of the words are way too hard for her). He assigns her the 10 easiest words, and then I assign her 20 simple (4th grade level) words. I test her at home and send the score to the teacher. Luckily the school and teacher are willing to work with me here.

 

4th grade son: accelerated and quick to learn. He is in a public school dual language (Spanish) program that uses reform math. He wants to compete in the spelling bee. I want him to learn grammar.

 

He wants to homeschool part days, so we just started again this week. He is here in the morning. I work him hard, but he says he wants to be worked hard: math (Kumon and Singapore), handwriting, spelling bee drill, Vocab from Classical Roots, FLL 4, review of Spanish words learned at school (which he doesn't learn to mastery there). He eats lunch at home and then walks to school.

 

1st grade dd: bright, not confident with phonics yet, learning "balanced literacy" (i.e. word guessing) at public school, school teaches reform math. She just needs about an hour a day with me. Luckily the public school has two start times ("tracks"). I keep her home for an hour in the morning and homeschool then, working on Phonics Pathways, R&S Math, WWE 1, Shurley grammar jingles, and her school spelling words. Then she walks to school with the neighbor kids at the later school start time.

 

Working after school is hard, especially if the academic work you expect of them is hard (as phonics is perceived hard to a beginning reader). They are tired and want to play.

 

Prioritizing is tough. I figure if the school teaches the subject acceptably (i.e. Shurley grammar with oldest dd), I let them teach it. I just want to fill in what the school isn't teaching, or what my child needs more review of to learn. We try to do what you can before school. 10 minutes of focused work every day adds up, even for older students. If you can carve out 20 minutes before school and use it to focus on skills that your student needs, that might be all your student needs.

 

And focus on skills. Content can be taught by guiding their free reading choices, or through audiobooks in the car.

[PiCO]

If you are a former home-schooler, how is the after-schooling going? Can you do it along with the homework from the school? How much after-schooling do you do? (i.e. just math, or math and science, or?)

 

Are you pleased with your decision to enroll your students? If so, why? What are the biggest challenges?

 

I am a former homeschooler. Oldest dd is a sophomore in high school, in a pre-IB program. She has tons of homework and does sports, so I just make sure she is understanding her math and science and she's keeping up in English, History, and French. Her workload is really too much to do any supplementing.

 

Younger dd is in 5th grade at a Core Knowledge charter school. It's a good school, and she has a great teacher. They use Shurley English and have good programs for science and history. Dd is in Algebra 1 this year, but unfortunately has a sub-standard teacher, so I am supplementing with Singapore 6 and will continue with NEM or AoPS when I'm done with that.

 

I also limit the TV/video games so we have time for lots of good discussions.

[msjones]

Yes, I am. I put my kids in school for health reasons when I got diagnosed, but I was already thinking that my older child needed a change of situation.

 

In my state, we have the right to homeschool part time. And the schools are mostly good socially, and there are a lot of good charter school options with better curriculum than is available in the regular public schools. Those things make a difference. Without them, my kids might still be at home.

 

Here is our current situation:

 

6th grade dd with dyslexic symptoms and attention problems: attends full-time at a charter school that uses Spalding phonograms and Saxon math. Last year she was super behind, so I homeschooled her for 1 1/2 hours each morning to catch her up. This was successful, but she is still behind in math and spelling. So we before school these subjects, since she wanted to attend full days this year.

 

She doesn't seem to learn Saxon well, so we go slowly through another math curriculum 10 minutes a morning so she won't be introduced to a math concept for the first time through Saxon.

 

Spelling required more tweaking, with the help of the teacher (since they assign spelling words as a class, and most of the words are way too hard for her). He assigns her the 10 easiest words, and then I assign her 20 simple (4th grade level) words. I test her at home and send the score to the teacher. Luckily the school and teacher are willing to work with me here.

 

4th grade son: accelerated and quick to learn. He is in a public school dual language (Spanish) program that uses reform math. He wants to compete in the spelling bee. I want him to learn grammar.

 

He wants to homeschool part days, so we just started again this week. He is here in the morning. I work him hard, but he says he wants to be worked hard: math (Kumon and Singapore), handwriting, spelling bee drill, Vocab from Classical Roots, FLL 4, review of Spanish words learned at school (which he doesn't learn to mastery there). He eats lunch at home and then walks to school.

 

1st grade dd: bright, not confident with phonics yet, learning "balanced literacy" (i.e. word guessing) at public school, school teaches reform math. She just needs about an hour a day with me. Luckily the public school has two start times ("tracks"). I keep her home for an hour in the morning and homeschool then, working on Phonics Pathways, R&S Math, WWE 1, Shurley grammar jingles, and her school spelling words. Then she walks to school with the neighbor kids at the later school start time.

 

Working after school is hard, especially if the academic work you expect of them is hard (as phonics is perceived hard to a beginning reader). They are tired and want to play.

 

Prioritizing is tough. I figure if the school teaches the subject acceptably (i.e. Shurley grammar with oldest dd), I let them teach it. I just want to fill in what the school isn't teaching, or what my child needs more review of to learn. We try to do what you can before school. 10 minutes of focused work every day adds up, even for older students. If you can carve out 20 minutes before school and use it to focus on skills that your student needs, that might be all your student needs.

 

And focus on skills. Content can be taught by guiding their free reading choices, or through audiobooks in the car.

 

Wow. Great info here! You're doing a lot. I'd love it if I could squish that much in in the mornings. The school is only a block away and doesn't begin until 9:15, so I think I could at least do a math lesson for each boy, and possibly spelling for my younger (who really needs it). I hadn't even thought about doing it in the mornings, but that does make sense.

 

Thanks for taking the time to respond. It is very helpful to see what someone else is doing. I do hear many of the neighbors complain about the homework load, so I know that would impact what I could plan.

[KNF-TX]

I homeschooled all of my children for ten years. It was a wonderful experience and I have no regrets, but I am so happy I put the kids in school this year. I was a nervous wreck before they started. To my suprise and delight, they are thriving in public school and so am I. I love having the balance to clean and persue my own interests while they are gone. I feel that I am a more patient and focused mother when they come home. I was able to make the decision by telling myself that I could always bring them back home if I wasn't happy. For the most part I really like their schools. What I don't like is the homework that they need help with after school when they are tired and just want to play. Because of homeschooling, I do know how to be strict and make them get it done before playing so it hasn't been that painful. I do wonder why they can't get their work done in eight hours, but I'm not complaining because the good seems to outweigh the bad.

 

Good luck with your decision. Just remember that you can always try it and if doesn't work out, you can bring them home.

[sixpence1978]

I only homeschooled my kids for the past 2 years. This year they are in a very small private school. I was a mess while making the decision, but they are really thriving.

 

My DS is in 3rd grade this year. He's very shy and soft-spoken. We had a lot of trouble last year getting him to think on his own and work without me guiding his every step. I am constantly amazed at what he is coming home doing.

 

My DD is in 1st grade this year. It has been a bit of a difficult transition for her, but I am seeing her improve steadily each day. There are some days where it is hard to watch her struggle though her work, but all of a sudden it clicks and she sees how much she has learned.

 

We did have the luxury of being able to shop around for a school to find one that has a curriculum that we liked.

 

I am finding that I don't have much extra time to "afterschool" by the truest sense of the word. We have to be out the door by 8:00 in the morning to get to school as well, so the mornings are not good.

 

What is working is not really having a separate curriculum for them to cover at home, so much as really helping with homework and trying to fill in missing gaps. For example, my DD comes home with books in which she doesn't always know all the phonics. So I will go over those sounds with her. Their math is Saxon, so I haven't had to supplement there. The only place where I feel the largest "hole" would be in their spelling work. So I do have a list of spelling rules and try to help explain why their words that week are spelled a certain way. We also do work through a read-aloud each night before bed.

 

It works well here without being overwhelmed. I think the biggest thing I have learned from homeschooling is how to explain things maybe in a different way to help them understand what is being worked on at school.

[MIch elle]

My older ds wanted to go to school so we found him an excellent all boys Catholic high school to attend. My younger one will attend the same high school when the time comes.

[BabyBre]

If you're after-schooling, are you a former home-schooler?

 

I'm strongly considering putting my boys in our local public school next year. After 5 years of home-schooling, I'm feeling tired, resentful, and ready for a change.

 

If you are a former home-schooler, how is the after-schooling going? Can you do it along with the homework from the school? How much after-schooling do you do? (i.e. just math, or math and science, or?)

 

Are you pleased with your decision to enroll your students? If so, why? What are the biggest challenges?

 

Can you tell I'm conflicted? Not an easy decision... It reminds me of how I felt when I decided to home-school. And that wasn't fun...

 

 

I homeschooled three dc for four years and absolutely loved it. Dh insisted 2 years ago that dc go to public school and, for the sake of marital peace, I agreed.

 

We're in our third year of afterschooling and I'd give anything (except my marriage, I guess) to have my dc back home again. I spend a lot of time in their classrooms and around their school and the things I see every week have me shocked and horrified to think they're surrounded by this 6 hours a day. With the exception of dd's current teacher who I am extremely pleased with, I've been very, very frustrated fighting an uphill battle every day to make sure my kids are being challenged in the classroom. Their teachers have fallen far short of doing their jobs, including but not limited to ignoring my wishes, keeping me out of the classroom, ignoring the accelerated needs of my dc, and I feel, flat out lying to me. Dc's 1st grade teacher was a 30+ year teacher in her last two years of teaching and I think she had done thing in her classroom her way for so long, no pushy homeschooler was going to tell her what to do.

 

The kids get a packet of busywork every week to do at home. It's really not hard to finish unless we're really busy that week, not that they're even graded on it. You can see what we afterschool below. Nearly as much as we were before full-time school.

 

You can probably tell I'm not pleased with the decision to enroll in ps. The crap I see every day in their school is one of the greatest reasons we started homeschooling in the first place (I pulled ds16 out in the 5th grade). It's very hard for me, but dh is deliriously happy and the kids usually are, of course. We've made some great friendships and I've learned A LOT, but I'd bring them home (probably half-time at this point) in a heartbeat if I could.

[NavyWifeandMommy]

We are moving in a few months and hubby will be gone 90% of the time. We are looking into the DoD schools for our children. We will finish out the 09-10 school year and prepare them for school for the fall.

[Carmen_and_Company]

I hs'ed for 10 years, but do not afterschool per say. My DD, Storm, attends a classical school based on the WTM, thus no need to supplement, but I do read literature selections along side dd, and assist her with math and science when needed.

 

My youngest attends an art school, and I only require Blaze to read historical literature and study Latin, as the content of his classes tend to follow Charlotte Mason, and I'm content.

 

We will work though the summer on language arts, Latin, and mathematics. Storm also will begin the 9th grade Great Books list so she'll have a little head start on next year's school reading list. I'm excited that I get a 2nd pass through the ancient's.

Edited December 20, 2009 by Carmen_and_Company

[mchel210]

I had my girls in PS last year...and now in a Catholic Private school. I am very happy with their school. They love it. My son is still homeschooling but he is going to PS for HS next year. He applied for a Culinary Arts HS so I am hoping he gets accepted. He is dying to get back into school. He has done all of Middle school with me. I am looking forward to being home and being "mom" again and not his teacher. I still afterschool with math and IEW writing for my girls...and give them my own books to read. I cant imagine my son will have time for my books...but I will help out if needed.

[butterflymommy]

3 years ago I put 3 of my daughters in a private Catholic School. I did feel like a failure but had a great deal of respect for the principal and teachers who are absolutely wonderful people. However the school takes on a lot of "charity cases," and there are a number of troubled students there and many students with academic delays (many students have repeated grades at least once). My daughters are light years ahead of their peers academically, they are not challenged at all and two of my girls are begging to homeschool again because it is so boring.

 

However-- all three enjoy the social aspect of school so I am torn-- since they are doing fine academically, do I keep them in school just for the social experience--? Or do I pull them out and challenge them more?

 

I homeschool my son-- he has been homeschooled since K. Also I plan to homeschool my 4 year old.

[Guest]

I put my daughter into a private middle/high school last fall at her own request, after homeschooling and doing a co-op since K. Unfortunately the school was very rigid -- tons of homework, no wiggle room or negotiation room, insistence on make-up of ALL assignments if the child was sick (as mine was, three times, between Sep. and Dec.). There were things I could have taught her in ten or twenty minutes that would have smoothed her path in terms of what the teachers were looking for, or which would have added some helpful context to what she was learning, but she was burned out after school every day, had tons of homework, so there was just no time. We had to be up at six, leave the house at 7:15, got home at 3:30 -- she was so tired that at age thirteen she was going to bed at 7:45 each night, but was then unable to sleep from anxiety. I think afterschooling gets more difficult as the kids go to middle and high school, due to the homework load, longer school day, increased testing, and activities kids add because of college requirements (real or perceived). I found it just couldn't work for us at middle school level.

 

I pulled her out in December, again at her own request. I now have a child who sleeps as much as she needs to, and is slowly regaining her old joy.

 

We both agree, however, that we will not go on homeschooling as we did before, when I was her primary teacher for many subjects. I have not yet figured out what combination of things will best suit us -- we have no flexibility in terms of a part-time school day anywhere, which would really be best (am I ever jealous of the commenter above who has such a great part-time relationship with local schools!).

 

I think the key with homeschool burn-out is that after a certain age you have to leave behind the mom-and-kid-at-the-table model and try out other ways of getting to the same endpoint. Money is a huge issue with us, so tutors are out, as are most on-line classes (which my daughter would reject anyway). But homeschool classes are often fairly inexpensive and community college classes can be audited for free if you luck into a willing professor and fly a bit under the radar (i.e. don't require a formal grade on a transcript just yet). Still looking for the right combination of things...

[NavyWifeandMommy]

interesting to see my post from six months ago. We were planning on putting the kids in DoD and now that we are here, I am planning another year of homeschooling put may be using the school for their library and testing and speech therapy. Since we have to enroll for the speech therapy might as well take advantage of their library and testing.

[BabyBre]

I homeschooled three dc for four years and absolutely loved it. Dh insisted 2 years ago that dc go to public school and, for the sake of marital peace, I agreed.

 

We're in our third year of afterschooling and I'd give anything (except my marriage, I guess) to have my dc back home again. I spend a lot of time in their classrooms and around their school and the things I see every week have me shocked and horrified to think they're surrounded by this 6 hours a day. With the exception of dd's current teacher who I am extremely pleased with, I've been very, very frustrated fighting an uphill battle every day to make sure my kids are being challenged in the classroom. Their teachers have fallen far short of doing their jobs, including but not limited to ignoring my wishes, keeping me out of the classroom, ignoring the accelerated needs of my dc, and I feel, flat out lying to me. Dc's 1st grade teacher was a 30+ year teacher in her last two years of teaching and I think she had done thing in her classroom her way for so long, no pushy homeschooler was going to tell her what to do.

 

The kids get a packet of busywork every week to do at home. It's really not hard to finish unless we're really busy that week, not that they're even graded on it. You can see what we afterschool below. Nearly as much as we were before full-time school.

 

You can probably tell I'm not pleased with the decision to enroll in ps. The crap I see every day in their school is one of the greatest reasons we started homeschooling in the first place (I pulled ds16 out in the 5th grade). It's very hard for me, but dh is deliriously happy and the kids usually are, of course. We've made some great friendships and I've learned A LOT, but I'd bring them home (probably half-time at this point) in a heartbeat if I could.

 

 

It's interesting to read my post from 6 months ago, too. I stand by it, except to modify my last statement that I would probably bring them home only half-time. If given the oportunity now, I would have far less hesitation removing them from ps all together.

 

I'd also like to revise my criticism of teachers. This year, I've learned some things about our school district that makes it clear that teachers' hands are tightly tied in what they can do. That may sound far-fetched, but they're given substandard curricula and reprimanded, intimidated, and threatened with their jobs if they step outside of it or openly criticize it. They're told what to teach, when to teach it, and how to teach it, and they're not allowed to use their gifts of creativity and ingenuity to do it.

 

Dd's 3rd grade teacher was actually told by our principal and higher administrators NOT to require one difficult, struggling boy in particular to participate in class. He was to be allowed to pass his time looking at picture books (he reads at or above grade level) or doing whatever he likes to him quiet. I'm sorry, but any system that makes an arrangement like that has serious problems. He needs special ed attention and consistant discipline, not picture books and idle time.

 

So, I've changed my position to be strongly in defense of teachers. At least in our district, their union has sold them out to crawl in bed with district administration, they're charged with the impossible task of meeting 25-30 individual educational needs, they're given insufficient tools and freedom with which to do that, and then are blamed for the system's failure.

[1bassoon]

So, I've changed my position to be strongly in defense of teachers. At least in our district, their union has sold them out to crawl in bed with district administration, they're charged with the impossible task of meeting 25-30 individual educational needs, they're given insufficient tools and freedom with which to do that, and then are blamed for the system's failure.

 

Interesting thread. As a former public school teacher, and wife to a public school teacher, I couldn't. agree. more.