Homeschoolers who choose not to do co-op or many extras

[treasuremapper]

Meghan's Mom, that was my experience with co-ops as well, and I am so sorry that it happened to you. I hope your sweet daughter is feeling better, it sounds like some scary medical stuff the two of you had to go through.  

 

I won't do a co-op again.  It was hard on my family and hard on my marriage (because the workload was so huge that my husband was dragged into it). Looking back, it was an unpleasant ordeal that went on for two years.  It was a huge mistake that lead to my homeschool burnout that lead to my decision to enroll the kids in public school.

 

On the bright side, I have a few connections from the coop (not friends, connections, except for one).  But those connections  are not enough to justify the pain we went through.  

 

I found comfort in reading the lists above about things that can kill a co-op.

 

I feel there is still a lot of healing to do around the issue of homeschooling.  This helps.

[Saddlemomma]

I don't simply because they don't have them anywhere near where I live.  There is a homeschool group and we meet once a month, but our area is so vast (Aroostook County in northern, ME) that there really is no central place to have a co-op. Homeschoolers here are spread far and wide apart.

 

One of the parents does do PE at a rec center for anyone who wants to go, and there are usually quite a few kids who migrate and go.  For us, this would be a 45 min trip one way.  By the time you count in the hour class and the traveling time, we would have to pare down our day quite a bit for other classes.

 

So the reason for not doing co-ops for us is inaccessibility.  We do, however, engage in several extra-curricula activities, as you can see in my siggy.  While they do provide social opportunities, we were less concerned about the social aspects and more interested in the skill being learned and Dd's enthusiasm for the class itself.

[Momof3littles]

Nearly all co-ops in my area mostly require a statement of faith I won't sign, or are not academic, and at this point I'm not willing to carve up my day substantially for that.  We formed a small academic co-op 4-5 years ago with long-time HSing friends and acquaintances.  The mix of people has changed over the years, but 2-3 of the core families have remained . We usually have 4-5 different families.  It works well for us as we have similar goals for our children, our kids are academically similar, and I find there is definitely value in it for us.  But most larger available co-op options are not really my cup of tea.  We structure our plan around our goals as a small group, so it is customized to what we are looking for for our kids.

 

 

[rocassie]

We do enrichment classes as opposed to a co-op because I am not required to participate and there is much more flexibility.  It is also more expensive so the kids only take one class.  Oldest is in American Heritage Girls which meets once a week.  I don't like having a lot of activities because of the time away from family and cost.

[IsabelC]

We don't have any 'academic' type co-ops around here, and there are certainly no "drop and go" type sessions. The home education groups we have are either purely social, or mainly social with some organized activities that aren't academic in nature. Basically play group but with older kids. Reasons I have not wanted to have included:

1. Too far to drive and just took up too much time out of the week

2. Activities often not suitable for my kids (either really basic things we'd done before, or things the kids weren't interested in)

3. Kids there were overly cliquey and didn't try to include newer kids

4. Kids (mine) refused to participate or behave decently

5. Parents not always friendly

6. Expectations too onerous (eg you are made to feel inadequate if the food you bring isn't home made or doesn't conform to whatever food fad is current)

7. Judgement from other participants over both education style and other parenting choices

8. Parents not guiding their kids the way I expect (eg kids are mean to another kid and parents either ignore this or encourages the kid)

 

I didn't have all of these issues at the same time or with the same people!

But overall, and most of the time, I have found the experience takes too much time, money, energy and/or stress for too few benefits.

[Wabi Sabi]

I have zero interest in co-ops. I do find value in outsourcing certain lessons, but from a purely practical standpoint, If I'm going to make a commitment of time and money, it needs to be something I genuinely cannot teach or an experience that I can't replicate or facilitate at home. For us this means I'd rather put my time and money towards piano lessons, native speaking language tutors, swimming lessons, etc. rather than co-ops. 

[IsabelC]

For those of you that say that co-ops take too much time, how long/how many days a week are co-ops in your area?  In my area, co-ops are 1 day per week and you can take 1 class or 5 classes or anything in between.  Parents can drop and go (most do, Moms love free time) or you can stay.   Some high school classes are two days--Chemistry, A &P come to mind.  Just wondering what co-ops look like in areas where joining one takes too much time away from academics. 

 

A typical homeschool group where I live would be scheduled to take 2-3 hours. It would take me at least two hours to get ready - this includes getting all the kids up, fed, clean, dressed and ready to go plus preparing food to share with the group (this is generally expected to be specific kinds of food to cater to organic, vegan, gluten free, dairy free, sugar free etc kids). About half an hour to drive there. Two to 3 hours for the session. Half an hour to an hour extra because these things nearly always run late and you don't want to drag your kids away early because they have only really gotten into it during the last half an hour. Half an hour to drive home again. Another half an hour or more to deal with inevitable meltdown on the part of at least one kid. Then spend the rest of the day doing the housework you didn't have time to do in the morning and, if you're lucky, doing some quick 'schooly' stuff with the kids. Feed kids. Spend evening complaining to spouse about how you are exhausted and have achieved nothing. Wonder if it would be better to move somewhere remote and raise them as Prairie Kids.