What do you think homeschool kids are not well prepared for upon entering college?

[wy_kid_wrangler04]

I got to thinking about this after a local homeschool friend said her son was not prepared for the amount of homework given in college.

 

My dd is going to school to be a vet. We had a pug that died of PDE at just under 2 years old so ever since then she is on a mission to be a vet and find answers.

 

That got me to thinking what should I be doing to better prepare her for the transition from Homeschool to College student? Any thoughts?

[Jane in NC]

If you hang around this board (and the related College Board), you will learn that sweeping statements about preparedness (or lack thereof) cannot be made. Some of us have students who fit immediately into a college classroom--some as early as age 14! Some have students who cannot bear to be away from home--while others have students who cannot wait to fly back to their colleges before their winter break is finished. (Waving hand here.)

 

I have heard parents say that homeschoolers are not prepared for college level math. But then again I know of a number (including my son) who received AP Calculus credit or AP Statistics credit. As high school students, they did college level work.

 

To be honest, the thing that worried me the most was writing. My son's college requires all first year students to enroll in a writing intensive seminar. He had no difficulties.

 

Homeschooling students are often adept at research and knowing how to use their resources. Great skills for college!

 

If your student wants to be a vet, I would check into volunteer opportunities near you. High school is a great time to develop passions and do hands on work in areas of interest. Work backwards from the goal: what science and math classes should your daughter have in high school to help build a solid foundation for undergrad?

 

Good luck!

Jane

[FloridaLisa]

As usual, Jane's comments are on point. ;)

 

It's hard to generalize and name the weakest area for college-bound homeschoolers. For every anecdote showing that one is weak in organizational skills, you'll hear another story showing a student on top of her game. I think any student following the educational paradigm set forth in the WTM is going to be well prepared for college.

 

Having said that, there are skills that will help the student transition. Outside of the foundational math, reading and writing skills that a college student needs, students should have a good grasp of: study skills, following a syllabus, meeting deadlines, studying for and juggling multiple end-of-sememster exams and advocating for oneself.

 

HTH,

Lisa

[Hannah C.]

Based mostly on my personal experience being homeschooled, public schooled, and then going to college, these are areas that *could* be weak [in no particular order]:

 

1) Social skills/level of shelteredness -- if the homeschooled student has very little opportunity to interact with people outside his/her own family, and/or has been very sheltered, they will probably have issues adjusting to the college environment. HOWEVER, most homeschoolers don't actually fall under this as you all know. :)

2) Note-taking skills.

3) Time management and organization.

4) The often utter inflexibility of deadlines for papers.

5) Paper writing skills.

6) Science lab experience could be lacking.

 

All of these will depend on the homeschool experience the student had, however. There are plenty of homeschoolers who wouldn't have an issue with any of these. There's so much variety in how homeschooling happens that I personally think it's impossible to say that "homeschoolers will always have issues with x in college." And any homeschool student who takes dual credit classes or co-op classes, as so many do in high school, will learn a lot of these skills through that.

[Tullia]

I look at this in general terms because circumstances differ so much. First on my list would be diligent work and high expectations for academics using college prep materials. Second would be working on time management skills-- especially making wise use of time on a day to day basis, and learning to juggle work/deadlines for multiple classes. Another thing worth cultivating is learning to be proactive about asking questions and using errors as a starting point for learning what went wrong and exploring better problem-solving strategies.

[Hunter]

One of my boys was planning on science heavy college work...before he changed his mind...but...anyway...:-)

 

I was cautioned to worry more about his reading and math skills than to worry about trying to do high school science at home.

[Brenda in MA]

is that you look for opportunities for your student to be away from home for at least a week and more responsible for himself/herself. My boys have attended scout camp every summer since they were 11 yo. They were there with kids they knew from their troop, but they were away from us. My oldest had a harder time adjusting than his brother -- but I think as Jane said, the ability to cope with being away from family is probably very much dependent upon the personality of the particular kid.

 

My oldest didn't have too much trouble adjusting to being away at college. He says that the best thing we did for him was having him take CC courses his senior year of high school while he was living at home. He drove himself there and dealt with the profs completely on his own. When he wanted to take a 2nd semester course for which he didn't have the prereqs (but we thought he'd be fine), I made him go and look up the professor of the course and make his own case for why he should be in that class. He was a little reluctant, but he was very glad he did persist because he got into the class and really enjoyed it. He's had no trouble looking up professors or TAs at his away college and getting help when he needs it.

 

HTH,

Brenda

Edited January 30, 2011 by Brenda in MA

[Jane in NC]

 

Having said that, there are skills that will help the student transition. Outside of the foundational math, reading and writing skills that a college student needs, students should have a good grasp of: study skills, following a syllabus, meeting deadlines, studying for and juggling multiple end-of-sememster exams and advocating for oneself.

 

HTH,

Lisa

 

 

My oldest didn't have too much trouble adjusting to being away at college. He says that the best thing we did for him was having him take CC courses his senior year of high school while he was living at home. He drove himself there and dealt with the profs completely on his own. When he wanted to take a 2nd semester course for which he didn't have the prereqs (but we thought he'd be fine), I made him go and look up the professor of the course and make his own case for why he should be in that class. He was a little reluctant, but he was very glad he did persisted because he got into the class and really enjoyed it. He's had no trouble looking up professors or TAs at his away college and getting help when he needs it.

 

HTH,

Brenda

 

I want to echo and add on to Lisa and Brenda's comments.

 

Regarding the syllabus: some profs give highly detailed syllabi, others seem to have ever evolving ones. This has frustrated my son who wants the big picture from the get-go.

 

Which is why Brenda's point is so important. There are times when the syllabus is not sufficiently specific so students need to spend some time in one on one conversations for clarification.

 

But I think these concerns are valid for any first year student making the adjustment to college life. High school (home or brick and mortar) usually has more hand holding than college.

[1Togo]

I was writing my reply as others were writing theirs, but learning to follow a syllabus is top of my list for prep. For most college classes, the prof gives the student a syllabus (usually via blackboard). The syllabus gives all the specifics of the course; i.e. class behavior, reading assignments, paper parameters, due dates for papers, quizzes and tests, and then the student is expected to manage the work. There is no planner filled out by mom or a curriculum provider. Teaching your student to work with a syllabus and giving clear due dates will help his transition to college. Go over the syllabus at the beginning of the year and let your student have it. Get them to schedule appointments with you to go over their work. It may sound contrived, but many students struggle with this, p.s. and private school students included.

Edited January 29, 2011 by 1Togo

[Gwen in VA]

One thing that helped my kids a lot -- taking a college class before they left home. Dh and I were able to coach them on how to approach the prof with questions, when to approach the prof, and then we were able to bug them until they did meet with the prof.

 

I think discovering in high school that most profs don't bite has helped them a LOT in college. Knowing when to ask for help is an important life skill. A friend of mine who is a prof says she is always amazed at how few students actually ask for help!

[creekland]

One thing that helped my kids a lot -- taking a college class before they left home. Dh and I were able to coach them on how to approach the prof with questions, when to approach the prof, and then we were able to bug them until they did meet with the prof.

 

I think discovering in high school that most profs don't bite has helped them a LOT in college. Knowing when to ask for help is an important life skill. A friend of mine who is a prof says she is always amazed at how few students actually ask for help!

 

:iagree: My oldest had one cc class before he left and did well with it. He's a college freshman now and has told me that he feels he was far better prepared than the majority of his peers. We've brought him up to be independent from a young age (not school related) and academically had him work on all of his subjects independently since 9th grade with us [parents] just grading and providing discussion. Over the years he learned to set his own deadlines and often finished before them. He always finished assignments before deadlines in his cc class and had a nice working relationship with his prof (who wrote awesome letters of recommendations for him).

 

I have no regrets. He's doing well with his life.

 

Middle son is on a similar course, but started with cc classes as a junior (2 of them). I would like him to take one more next year if we can afford it. His profs have already told him they'll write letters of recommendation when he needs them next fall.

[regentrude]

A friend of mine who is a prof says she is always amazed at how few students actually ask for help!

 

Yes! Or make use of the help that is already offered by the instructor.

Please tell your students to investigate all the opportunities for learning assistance offered for their classes. They might end up not needing any - but then, they might join a study session and benefit from it.

 

Universities are really pushing this. For instance, for the introductory physics class that I teach, I personally conduct 3.5 hours of help sessions for the homework each week; there are 8 hours of free tutoring available each week, and students have the opportunity to visit another ten hours of help sessions for a similar course... there should be no excuse for not having understood material or not having done homework.

Sadly, many students are in denial and won't accept that they need help- until they fail the first exam.

[Laurie4b]

I'll answer your question a bit differently than you asked it. To prepare my homeschooled students for college, I had them take a lot of outside classes, including community college classes. They got used to following a syllabus, to excellent and poor teachers, etc.

 

After my oldest ds took his first outside class in 9th grade and had a hard time adjusting to using a text book, I started the rest of my kids in outside classes in middle school. I think that's been a good decision.

[Susan C.]

Things I am correcting for #2:

 

1) knowing how to do a formal lab report

2) putting names on papers!! (that is how one professor knew ds was homeschooled)

3) literary analysis papers (not much of that in A Beka or BJU)

4) pushing hard when you need to

5) adhering to deadlines

6) keeping things going when you are sick

7) organizing their subjects and prioritizing

8) working in a group

9) communicating with professors for help or to know how they are doing

[Hannah C.]

6) keeping things going when you are sick

 

:iagree: Didn't think of this one because I was almost never sick in college, lol.. In college you can't necessarily miss class just because you aren't feeling well. In my experience, unless you were throwing up, coughing constantly, or had a fever, you wanted to be in class anyway. This will vary based on the difficulty of the class and the class or college attendance policy.

[Brindee]

Well, my dd ended up much more independent than we'd planned, as we moved away instead of her being able to live at home. Her biggest challenge has been balancing schedule of work and school. She had to learn to submit assignments online and on time...and missed a couple of deadlines. But so far, the biggest thing is filing her taxes this year - in time for the FAFSA and understanding all the changes that have occurred and how to account, tax-wise, for monies spent, etc. In other words, it's not the school stuff at all, it's the life stuff, and I think that would be mostly the case for any student moving into independence.

:iagree: This was how it was for our oldest. He did great scholastically. He got 99.8% on his daily work/tests/quizzes in College Pre-Calc, so wasn't required to take the final. He got A's and an A- in his other classes. EXCEPT...... the only struggle he ran across was his writing class. The teacher was notorious for giving low grades. No matter what the students turned in, NOBODY got more than a C in her class! He's a good writer, so that was frustrating, and un-called for I think, because it lowered everyone's gpa's!

 

The practical stuff that Laurel mentioned above? Yeah, he's not so good at that. :tongue_smilie:

Edited January 30, 2011 by Brindee

[JennW in SoCal]

I didn't see this in any of all the very good replies.

 

The thing my youngest was not prepared for was the dog-eat-dog challenge of crashing courses. Thanks to all the budget cuts in CA there are fewer sections offered at the cc and state universities, and classes fill up before the lower priority students can register. It takes strategy and dumb luck to get the classes you need and want. I don't know how to prepare someone for that other than talking about the reality before they get there and being supportive while they are so stressed out when crashing during the first week of classes!

 

Other than that, my younger ds has figured out all the basics of college (community college) class survival on his own without much trouble.

[Negin]

Nothing to add. Just want to say that I'm saving all this very helpful info. Thank you all for posting such great tips. :)

[3byzaz]

I just wanted to chime in that I was just so encouraged by an article that just was posted on our homeschool group email loop. It was from the Old Schoolhouse Magazine, I think, and it talked about how successful homeschooler's are in college now. It was called Colleges Nationwide Recruit Homeschool Grads.

 

I tried to link it here, but it didn't work. I'm not sure I can copy the whole article from my h.s. site?? Anyway, it was very positive and sited several statistics as to why colleges are going after homeschoolers. Of course, it did talk about BJU's college, but it was also in general. I thought it was very positive and helped me to think I could actually do this!?!?!

[ChristineMM]

My oldest is in grade 8 and has sights set on engineering. This means this year we ramped up the academics. In 2 cases he is using popular public school high school texts for science (one chosen by a co-op and the other by a private tutor we hired to help prep the kids for science olympiad competition of physics event; it wasn't me pushing for textbook learning this year).

 

I can already see the difference in our old HS methods which at first were unschooling and all fun and hands on and then Charlotte Mason then aa relaxed WTM classical, compared to then a lot of input of info but not much written spitting info back out and no tests. Relaxed homeschooling is what we had and that son was very hands-on learning.

 

As part of ramping up this year to handle a full high school courseload that includes hopefully calculus before college and also bio, chem, physics and some tests either SAT subject tests and maybe even a couple of AP tests....this for MY son means more reading including getting used to using textbooks not just great living books, more articulating thoughts in writing via papers and essays, more studying to memorize and getting used to being tested in 'the school way' not just me having a casual discussion about "oh what did you think of that reading you did"?

 

That's what I have to add to the other very good comments here about time management, strict deadlines etc.

 

Remembering back to my days starting college, I breezed through high school. I was swamped in college with long boring textbook readings and no teacher checking that I did the homework. The readings were unrelated to the class lecture so I could skip readings and no one would know and I didn't think it mattered. With midterm being the first test I was then swamped to realize there was no way I could cram in 1-2 days for all subject readings plus memorize stuff. I also felt there was a volume of info & didn't have a sense for what of it was important or what would be on the test. I also resented the short tests as felt the rest of my studying was "a waste". I was used to "the school way" of "if it mattered it would be on the test". I basically flunked out my first semester and floundered in my second before leaving college. (I went back a few years later when I was more mature and more committed to earning a degree.) I plan to help my sons be better prepared than I was.

 

I am currently looking into study skills tips to see what creative ideas are out there and am trying to match the techniques to my very right brained son's mind for the most chance at success in college.