ErinE Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 OFF TOPIC Your 8yo is doing Dino 101? Does she just watch the videos? Are the videos interesting? CP loves Dinos and knows all sorts of facts about them, and I'm running out of documentaries and books that have info he doesn't already know. Just wondering if this will be a good fit for him. hmmm..... Yes, we watch the videos and discuss. The videos are approachable for her so long as I'm there with her. Given the specific descriptions, I think she would feel a bit lost watching on her own. I really enjoy this course. The production is very well done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 OFF TOPIC Your 8yo is doing Dino 101? Does she just watch the videos? Are the videos interesting? My 8 year old just watched all the videos on lesson one and got 4/5 for the quiz. He likes dinosaurs more than I do. I just signed up for this course so that he can watch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ErinE Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 FWIW, I've heard through the grapevine that the $25k/yr tuition is a "teaser" rate to fill the school and that the tuition will eventually go up to $40k/yr. Makes me furious that my friend who lives in AZ gets to have a tuition-free BASIS charter school for her kids, but the only one here in CA is a pricey private school. This isn't uncommon. Several well-regarded private schools we explored made it clear that the total cost wasn't just the list rate; parents were expected to contribute to the capital campaign which was a substantial portion of the tuition. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
musicianmom Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 (edited) * Edited May 23, 2022 by musicianmom Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
momto2Cs Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 I don't control what they read. I don't require a rotation through topics. I don't attempt to "balance" their selections. I don't make them memorize any terminology. Your younger kids won't be young forever. Your homeschool evolves. You find your groove. Your children get older and help direct their studies due to their own interests. You provide them the resources to feed those interests and help them explore the options. But......at 9, they are 9. It doesn't have to happen today. A world of learning takes place between 9 and 18. The best education for our kids doesn't have to be perfect. It doesn't have to come in a traditional classroom form. It doesn't have to be presented by experts. (Ironically, I know nothing about physics at all!) What I have found with my kids is that education needs to be owned by the student. The motivation needs to come from inside. The resources need to fan the flame for a love of learning which motivates them to always want to pursue more and have success in the process. They don't have to have textbook labels or vocabulary/short answer/tests assignments. The successes are measured according to their abilities, not according to any other outside standard. And those successes and the interests end up becoming so much more....college majors, careers, and thriving adults, I agree with everything 8 said here, but especially the bolded part. My ds is 13 now, and until this year, I have really assisted him in setting goals for each year, selecting his studies, etc. But, this year (8th grade), he is owning his own education. We've been relaxed about science over the years, taken time to try unschooling, and so forth, and I am glad now that we approached things the way we did. He is vested in what he is learning, and is challenging himself beyond what I would have done at this point. He is studying (conceptual) physics - which involves his first non-math textbook in addition to other reading, chose AoPS for math, and is memorizing mathematical formulas because he wants to. I provide help when he needs it, the materials that he requests, but he is taking charge of his own education beautifully. I do not give him tests, or worksheets. I don't make him memorize things, or follow a particular rotation in any subject. I do provide him with books I see at the library that I think he might enjoy, but that's the extent of my input on his current reading. Is his education perfect? Absolutely not. Like Rose's daughter (post #9), my writing expectations are above his current abilities. So we work on that. And he will improve. For my dyslexic dd, age 11, my expectations are very different. She needs more of a nudge than he does in everything except math and science. Most of our focus currently is on her reading skills, which need a fair amount of work, but again, we are making progress. She's a documentary nut, as long as the documentaries are related to science, so we're quite relaxed in that area, though she seems to pick up a lot from this approach! Is their education what I planned originally? Is it what I thought we would want? Yes, and no. I have come to realize that they need more input into their education than I had originally allowed for, back when I had a year-by-year plan, which we have since dropped. Homeschooling is an amazing journey in its own right. Now, in response to the original question, to which I must again reply yes, for the most part. I agree with many others on here that the public schools tend to have things backward overall. Too much work at too young of an age, and far too little later on. Middle school has been referred to more than once on these boards as a sort of holding state, in which they are reviewing material, and waiting to get to high school, all without being challenged. I think that high schools have plenty of issues of their own as well, and that the combination of academic [busy]work and the pressure to do x number of extracurricular activities is overwhelming to many. Should a child really spend 7 hours a day, 5 days a week in a classroom, and then have an additional 2-4 hours of homework as well as whatever sports/art/music/etc. activities that they are participating in? Do we expect the average adult to spend 8 hours a day at work, and then do "homework" for another several hours, all while cooking dinner, running errands, playing chauffeur, and so on? Adults are instead often times told to "leave work at work", but then we don't make that a possibility for kids. I also think that this is a bad idea in regards to biological issues, as teens need more sleep than at other stages of life, yet many skimp on it in order to accomplish all that they have to do. As far as homeschooling and high expectations, I think it is exactly what Silver said above... we see one family doing amazing science projects, another creating historical reproductions, or learning 3 languages, and we assume we have to wrap that all up in one little neat package to present to our kids. On top of that, we expect to have the perfect homes, perfect food, and more. Some of that pressure inevitably trickles down to the children. Of course on the flip side, there are schools, both public and at home, that demand too little of a child. It is a fine balancing act! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
momto2Cs Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 I have to confess, I checked out a local accelerated middle school charter this morning - not to send my kids! but just to see what they are doing in 7th-8th grades. I found that what we were doing met or exceeded what they were doing across the board, as well as having the benefit of being tailored to my dd's interests (i.e. she gets to read books she's interested in, rather than picking them off a booklist). Does it matter? I guess not. But I do hold myself to the standard that what we do at home has to be at least as rigorous as the most rigorous affordable local option ( I don't try to hold us to the standard of the local $25k IB private schools, for example. That wouldn't be an option for us anyway). That's just me, based on my own goals for my kids re: keeping doors open for college/STEM careers. Now, how we go about meeting the expectations is totally different, but yeah, I admit that I do pay attention and hold what we do up to the public/charter schools as a floor/minimum. An inquiring mind wants to know which one, so I can compare too. (I know, bad idea, but....) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chrysalis Academy Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 An inquiring mind wants to know which one, so I can compare too. (I know, bad idea, but....) :lol: Mark West Charter. They are one of the few around here that post such detailed info online - textbooks, course lists, reading lists, book report assignments, etc. It was interesting to check out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arcadia Posted September 21, 2014 Share Posted September 21, 2014 :lol: Mark West Charter. They are one of the few around here that post such detailed info online - textbooks, course lists, reading lists, book report assignments, etc. It was interesting to check out.We checked out Bullis Charter (Los Altos) on their school tour mainly because they offer Chinese as a subject from K-8. ETA: My district has the high flyers and the struggling schools. It's more of an inverted bell curve depending on zip code. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idnib Posted September 22, 2014 Share Posted September 22, 2014 Head Royce is a good private school in my area and I like to see what they do. (pdf) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chrysalis Academy Posted September 22, 2014 Share Posted September 22, 2014 Head Royce is a good private school in my area and I like to see what they do. (pdf) Yep, we definitely don't do all of that . . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
momto2Cs Posted September 22, 2014 Share Posted September 22, 2014 Head Royce is a good private school in my area and I like to see what they do. (pdf) :ohmy: :leaving: Yep, we definitely don't do all of that . . . Neither do we. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idnib Posted September 22, 2014 Share Posted September 22, 2014 I don't think their a opening is incorrect, but I'm cringing at that book list. Apparently we just want to shelter our kids overly much! I'm not understanding the first part of your sentence. Did you mean "approach" instead? What was it that caught your eye? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
8filltheheart Posted September 23, 2014 Share Posted September 23, 2014 Head Royce is a good private school in my area and I like to see what they do. (pdf) I'm bleh about their reading selections for middle school. But, I love their 12th grade yr ideas. Oh, yeah, I love them b/c those are the types of courses my kids get to choose all the way through school! :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kiana Posted September 23, 2014 Share Posted September 23, 2014 I'm bleh about their reading selections for middle school. But, I love their 12th grade yr ideas. Oh, yeah, I love it b/c those are the types of courses my kids get to choose all the way through school! :) They have all these great, fascinating, awesome courses in english, science, and history -- and then the math options are all calculus, statistics, or programming. Where's the number theory? cryptography? history of math? logic? bah. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
8filltheheart Posted September 23, 2014 Share Posted September 23, 2014 They have all these great, fascinating, awesome courses in english, science, and history -- and then the math options are all calculus, statistics, or programming. Where's the number theory? cryptography? history of math? logic? bah. LOL!! That is where I am out of my comfort zone. I didn't even look at the math options other than noticing that they do incorporate some AoPS titles (peripherally anyway.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idnib Posted September 23, 2014 Share Posted September 23, 2014 Huh. That was a funky iPad typo! I meant to say that I liked their scope of skills and basic philosophy, I think it is quite appropriate - but most of the reading selections are quite mature and an older student would get more out of the same material. Just because one can comprehend the text doesn't mean they understand the richness (like me reading The Scarlet Letter in sixth grade - I got it, but I didn't get half as much as I would have in reading it new as a 16-20 year old). The Great Gatsby? A Streetcar Named Desire? Lord of the Flies? Maybe it's just my sensitivity and literary snobbery, but that's like having a ten year old read The English Patient and expecting them to make the links between biblical imagery and geopolitical commentary! Those books take more life experience to really benefit from than most middle schoolers have, and some of the material is quite mature in a way I find morally objectionable. That's just me, though :) I'm not a big fan of their reading lists either, but I do like to think of them as a good gauge of reading level. And I like their descriptions of what they're doing each year. It helps me think about my own goals. I've gone back in my thirties and forties and read books I even read in my twenties and realized all kinds of things I missed the first time. Past a certain level, I think a lot of good literature is that way. Maybe the best time to read it is in your nineties! I haven't read Streetcar so I can't speak to that. I think Lord of the Flies is fine, although I seem to be one of the few people who really didn't like it and felt the symbolism was ham-fisted. It's a good reference to know; people seem to use it all the time, especially on homeschooling discussion boards. Gatsby is one of those books I think can be read in each decade of life after the first one; like a lot of good literature, it seems to shift with life experience. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idnib Posted September 23, 2014 Share Posted September 23, 2014 Oh, I forgot to add another school I like to check out: Boston Latin School. (Look under the Academics tab for various subjects.) Here's some interesting history of the public school. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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