Homeschooling: FAQs

While I'm a brand new, fresh out of the wrapping homeschooler, I DO get a lot of questions.

I understand the curiosity that others have. I'd be curious too about someone who takes it upon themselves to brave the playing field of education and be daring enough to carry this responsibility. I went to public school myself and was never truly exposed to a homeschooling family until I was an adult. I didn't have "homeschooling 101" as an option as I pursued my college education, so everything that I know about educating my children at home was obtained through my own research, study, and interactions with other homeschooling parents.

This will not be a typical homeschooling 101 Q&A listing. If you simply google "homeschooling" on the internet or visit your local library and check out the education section, you will get a wealth of general information about how to get started. This is just a short list of frequently asked questions that I've received in our first year, along with my gut responses.

If you're interested in learning the official requirements and regulations for your State in regards to homeschool, start here.

So, what sort of questions have I gotten over the course of our first year?

1) How do you know what to teach?

Let me first start off by saying that I've learned that the world of homeschooling today is vastly different from your Mother's time of homeschooling. Today, homeschooling is a household word so much that I would bet that you know someone that homeschools and with each passing year it becomes more and more common for a variety of reasons.

For a minimum set of standards on what I needed to teach my kids, I started with my State's requirements. Its important to seek out your specific State's requirements as there are varying degrees of regulations. In my State, I am required to submit test scores at the end of each school year on the 3 Rs - Reading (includes reading comprehension), WRiting (language arts - vocabulary, spelling), and ARithmetic. Nothing more and nothing less. Can I teach my kids other subjects? Of course, but I'm only required by my State to submit test scores in these 3 areas.

You may ask, why in just these areas? It is difficult to measure a child's knowledge in an area where a common set of evaluation standards isn't established. A child in the state of Missouri may have studied Fossils during his 5th grade year of Science, while a child in Nevada may have studied the parts of the body for Science. Not knowing exactly what scientific and historical topics all children have studied, its challenging to assess their common knowledge in these areas. In the area of the 3 Rs, there are a set of common standards and expectations that can be set for a child in each grade to assess where they should be as it comes to reading, writing, and arithmetic.

Beyond these three areas, I chose to teach them additionally in the areas of the Bible, History, and Science. For a look at what the kids learned in our first year, go here.

Once I generated a list of the kid's subjects, then I had fun selecting the material/curriculum that I would use to guide me in teaching them. That leads me to the next question,

2) Where do you go to find what you need to teach them?

Where do YOU go when you're looking for information on something? The internet! I started my search for a curriculum to cover the subjects on the internet. Unbeknownst to me, there is a plethora of companies out in the ether that develops curriculums specifically for homeschooling families. In  fact, the SAME curriculum that my girls were using in private school could be found and purchased if I so desired.

What's even more interesting is that there isn't for example just 1 math curriculum to pick from, there's are 100+ options based on how your child learns. You may have a kid that's a wiz at memorizing mathematical operations, while your second child would rather read a story or do a craft to learn about math operations. There is a curriculum out there in ALL subjects that you can teach, that is designed in varying ways so that you can tailor the way you teach based on your child's strengths and to meet their weaknesses.

Besides the internet, the other place you can go is to a location where homeschooling curriculum is sold, be it a Homeschool Convention, a School Teacher's store, or if you seek out a homeschooling group in your area you'll find at the end of each school year, parents sell gently used materials that you can get at discounted prices.

3)  How do you know that your kids are learning anything?

I believe that the best way to assess if a person has learned something is to ask them questions and measure their ability to answer accurately. I ask my kids a lot of questions as we homeschool.

In some subjects, I assess my kids' learning through written Q&A (i.e., worksheets, word fill ins, multiple choice questions, etc.).

Another way that I assess their learning is in measuring their ability to present and/or teach back the information to me. You can't teach something that you don't understand. My girls love to re-enact things. I have assessed their understanding of a book they've read through their ability to act out the story. They have gone so far as to write scripts, get into costume, and record themselves presenting a story through a skit. At other times they have simply dictated to me as I've typed what they've read, detailing their understanding of what has occurred in a story.

My goal in teaching my children is not to fill their heads with a bunch of facts, only to have them regurgitate it back to me on a worksheet only to find that they have no real understanding of the time, place, setting, historical context, or application of the information.

4) Do you have to test your kids?

Based on my State's requirements, I do have to test my kids and submit their test scores in the 3 Rs - Reading, WRiting, and ARithmetic.

5) What testing services and materials do you use?

http://www.setontesting.com/

6) When does your school year end?

End.? In our homeschool, schooling never ends! bruh ha ha ha...

When you educate your child at home, there are limitless opportunities for your child to learn. For our first year, we started about mid-August, took a week long break around Christmas, and finished our "regular" day to day school schedule at the end of May.

Throughout the summer, the kids will continue learning in all of their subjects with a "lighter" load, doing fun things like science projects, field trips, art exercises, etc.

7) To Date, what has been some of your favorite curriculum thus far?
Reading & Comprehension, History, & Science - Sonlight, Apologia Science
Spelling - Sequential Spelling & Phonetic Spelling (by Institute for Excellence in Writing)
Writing - BraveWriter (for elementary school years) & Institute for Excellence in Writing (Middle & High School)
Grammar - Easy Grammar & IEW's Fix-It Grammar
Math - Math on the Level (for Math-burnt out students) & Saxon (for Mathematically-strong students)
Foreign Language - BJU Press Online Spanish Courses

8) After your first year, is it worth it?

So... no one has asked me this question, but I would want to know the answer to it if I had asked all the other questions above.

If you were on a cruise ship lounging on the deck in the warm sun, and you happen to notice that your kid had tripped and fallen overboard, would it be worth it to inconvenience yourself to get up and find a life raft to save them? That's the sense of urgency I felt and still feel about educating my kids, myself at home. No, they weren't drowning with failing grades or gasping for air under a sea of difficulty in private school. They were actually doing quite well and I thank the Lord for all that they learned in their early years because it laid a beautiful foundation for our first year.

Their actions were sending out a distress signal for a Mom that was present in their life. Not just physically present, being home at dinner time with a painted on smile and ready to tackle hours of homework. They were calling out for a Mom who's attention wasn't competing with so many other distractions of the world. As I have seen the distress signal and have gotten up to pick up the life raft to be present with my children and use the gifts and talents that God has given me on them (and, not within the confines of the workplace), they have embraced this thing called homeschooling with open arms.

No, everyday of our first year was NOT a walk in the park or a picnic under a shady tree. There were tears, frustrated moments over a kid just not "getting it" sometimes, but these moments allowed us to practice grace, mercy, faith, and hope.

Hope for another year to come.

Yup, it was worth it.