Field Trips Starting!

One thing I love about K12 are the fabulous field trips. There's already been a couple activities, but October will give us the opportunity for an outing pretty much every week.

This week, we'll go to the zoo. Then, we'll see Phantom of the Opera at Kingsbury Hall. A couple Halloween/Pumpkin Patch trips (which my boys are not quite too old for,) later in the month. The boys are excited for these adventures--it's just great to get out of the house sometimes and see the world around you.

That's one of the greatest advantages homeschooling offers, isn't it? And K12 does it beautifully.

I'm afraid we won't get too much school work done this week though. Monday we'll be at Primary Children's Hospital for what I expect will be at least half the day (our first appointment starts at 7:00 a.m. ~ oy!), for Charlie to see a cardiologist who specializes in Marfan's syndrom. Then on Wednesday both the boys will see their allergist for help with asthma and allergies. Then the zoo on Friday.

Um, yup. Not a lot of time for school, but we'll do our best. That's another thing that's great about homeschooling ~ some weeks you just don't get a lot of schoolwork done and you know what? That's okay too.

Have a great week everyone!

So Why DO You Homeschool?

This is probably the question people ask me most often. Here's what I tell them:

Xan was one of those guys who was done his work far more quickly than everyone else. And then he would proceed to go around the classroom "helping". He got in trouble for being out of his seat. He got in trouble for talking all the time.

Was his work completed? Yes. Was his work done correctly? Yes. And was he considered a "trouble maker"? Yes.

Charlie was a guy who struggled with just about everything--even by the end of Grade Two he couldn't tell you the alphabet all the way through without hesitating, or even needing a reminder or prompt here or there.

And yet, he was being promoted to Grade Three. Do you see a problem there? I sure did.

Xan needed to be in an environment that would keep him actively engaged and challenged. Charlie needed to be allowed the opportunity to master his material. Both of these problems can be addressed by having my boys school at home.

And here's how it works: Xan's done his school material most days within two hours. He gets to spend the rest of his day reading, playing on the computer (yes, I allow this as long as chores and school work are completed) and writing, or whatever he wants.

Charlie, who used to get barely 50% on his spelling tests, now practices his words walking back and forth on the couch. Now he typically gets 100% on his spelling tests.

My children are learning how to manage their time, how to recognize their own strengths and weaknesses, and they are mastering the material the public school was willing to pass with far less than mastery.

I think I made the right choice. Totally.

Why do you homeschool? Or, why are you considering it?

A Day in the Life

Today begins our third week in our third year of homeschooling and using the K12 virtual academy.

I almost didn't homeschool the boys this year. I felt like such a failure at the end of last year that I thought there was no way I could do it again.

But, man. Am I glad I didn't give up.

Because this year is already going so much better than the last couple years and I have every reason to expect that it will continue to go well. Of course we'll have our rough spots, but as long as the good outweighs the bad, it's all good, right?

So, I thought I'd give a little glimpse into what our days are like right now:

8:00 a.m. ~ Boys get up, one of them showers, they get their teeth brushed, tidy up their rooms, make their beds, go downstairs and get started on their chores.

Their chores are: Feed and walk the dog, scoop the poops in the backyard. Unload the dishwasher. Take out the kitchen garbage (recycling and regular). Plus other chores as needed.

Have breakfast ~ they prefer just cold cereal, so they get that themselves.

They play on their computers until I'm ready to start school.

8:20 a.m. ~ I exercise. Or at least, that's the plan. :)

9:45 a.m. ~ Check my email, log in to the K12 site, settle in to start my day at the computer.

10:00 a.m. ~ Usually around this time we're ready to start school.

Right now we're only doing science, which we will have completed by the time we take our Christmas break. We'll add history to the core subjects in the New Year.

We do a lesson of science together. We sit on the couch with my laptop, a child to each side of me. We take turns reading through the screens, then we do our science test in an open-book fashion.

The boys then work through their lessons, with occasional help from me.

12:00 p.m. ~ We break for lunch. The boys make lunch Mon/Tues/Thurs/Fri, and I make lunch on Wednesday. They each picked two lunches they'd like to make; I taught them how to make it, and now we have a menu for the week so each boy knows what and how to make lunch.

Most days Xan is done school for the day by the time we break for lunch.

1:00 p.m. ~ Around this time, or maybe a little earlier, we head back into the office and finish up school.

And that's it! Pretty easy, right? Even if we have harder lessons on a day, there's plenty of time to get it done and still have our work completed before their friends get home from school.

In the afternoon, I write for a couple hours while the boys play. Usually they like to play on their computers and I'm okay with that as long as they play with friends when the local public school gets out.

We also have piano at 2:00 p.m. on Tuesdays and karate lessons a couple nights a week for a couple hours each night, and scouts once a week.

I hope this helps put your day into perspective. How do our days differ from your own?

One Week Down, Thirty Five to Go

And, amazingly, we didn't die!

We didn't even cry ourselves to sleep every night!

Charlie did cry the first two days, bemoaning his unwillingness to try at school, math in particular. But by Thursday he'd remembered, or realized, again that things are not so bad at all when he keeps a positive attitude.

AND, we've done science every day and didn't hate it as much as we used to. Huzzah!

So all in all, it was a much better first week than we'd even dared to hope for. I really had been nervous about homeschooling this year. I felt like I was completely sucking the previous two years and while the boys progressed, it was hard, hard work.

Now, I'm sure you're thinking, well nothing good in life comes easily. And that may be true, but let me tell you, it sure is fun to have a school day with smiles instead of tears.

How about you? How have your first days been?

Making a Schedule You Can Live With

Well, today marks the beginning of our school year. I school my two boys at home--not traditional homeschool, because we use the K12 curriculum which has a charter here in Utah so we're subject to all the standardized testing (which means I can't break my kids--or at least, mostly!), but still, homeschooling none the less. As you can imagine, homeschooling, being a career writer (that's my fancy way of saying I'm not writing for a hobby, but for publication), and running a household with all the myriad responsibilities that entails and all the other stuff that go into making a life, starting today I'm going to be busy. Or busier. ;)

I've had some people ask how I do it. And the answer's simple: I make a plan.

And then I always get asked: How do you make a plan? But that's not quite as simple.

Still, I thought, since this is fresh on my mind, I'd share my schedule-making method.

1. Make a list of all the different parts of your life. My list includes: health, family, school, writing, home.
2. Under each part (above) list what your daily responsibilities include. Mine says: HEALTH/exercise, FAMILY/family prayer, family scripture reading, boys' activities, WRITING/1hr, networking, etc.
3. Then, beside each responsibility or task, mark how much time you need for each. For instance, I need a solid block of an hour and twenty minutes for exercise every day, and an hour for writing plus an hour for networking (or more, lol.)
4. Make a list the hours of your day on the left, then block off each hour on the right with your activities.
5. Remember that any good schedule is one that can flex as needed--your schedule is there to help you, not hinder you!
6. Also remember, your schedule is yours. Don't worry if you think you do less than someone else. If it helps you manage your time, and more precisely manage what's important to you, then your schedule is working. Yay!

And just one more thing. I had a wise and kind friend offer me some advice my first year homeschooling. When asked how she handles all the demands on her time, particularly those that come from other people, she said, "I just remember that a yes to someone else, is a no to my family." That advice has helped me more than any other.

So I say to you, whatever it is that's important to you, no one else will value it as much as you do. Stick to your guns and remember a yes to something/someone else, is a no to what's important to you. Protect your time and give value where it's due in your life.

How do make sure the things you value most in life get the time and attention they deserve?

Back in the Saddle and School Events

Yay! I'm still here! It's kind of embarrassing coming back after so long a hiatus, but perhaps you'll imagine I was just taking the summer off. You wouldn't be wrong ;) Just maybe there's more to it than that. Like laziness. Lack of creativity . . . Hmm . . . I think I like the summer holiday idea much better!

We started back to school "officially" the last week of August, though I can hardly say we've made a real good try at it yet. Between one interruption or the other, including school activities, holidays, vacations, and illnesses, we've managed maybe a handful of actual school days. Not to fret though, we are still doing just fine and I'm not at all worried.

*grin*

I'm very happy to say that already this year I feel like there has been much improvement. We all felt ready to take on our year and not a single moment of regret for our decision to homeschool again. When we started back, we intuitively tweaked our routine just a tiny bit and for the few days we've been schooling, it's working quite well for us.

In general, I feel very relaxed and comfortable with my role in all this and the boys seem to have similar feelings. We're looking forward to a fun-filled and productive year. Yeah!

As for activities, we've been to two so far, the storytelling festival at Timpanogas and the State Fair today. Today's was the best ever because (drum roll please) we made a friend! The boys made a friend and I made friends with the boy's mother and hurray! It made all the difference in our enjoyment of the day. Never mind that we got totally rained out.

Last year I was a real wallflower at all the K12 events, but I'm determined to change that this year. I need friends. The boys need friends. Friends who are doing what we're doing. I'm very glad that today we made some real progress in that regard. Wonderful friends, too.

Tomorrow we having nothing going on but school so I'm looking forward to getting some real work done. I'd love to hear how you are doing. Have you started back to school yet? How's it going? Did you change how you are doing things this year from last? What are you most looking forward to? What are you most dreading? I'll answer my own questions next time I blog. Have a good one!

Looking Forward

I apologize for being a fair-weather blogger.

But probably my lack of blogging about our school experiences is a good indicator of what’s going on here. Nothing. No schooling whatsoever.

Oh, we met our 80% benchmark and were able to put in our order for next year’s materials. However, we so far are not doing what I intended to do, and that was to continue.

I thought it made perfect sense to do 80% during the school year, and then casually plug away at the remaining 20% over the course of the summer. That way, we wouldn’t have the loss of knowledge that so many students suffer from because of the summer break.

I tell myself that it’s all good. It’s only been a couple weeks since school ‘let out’ and it’s perfectly acceptable for us to enjoy a little holiday. I’m just worried I won’t follow through and get back to work when our vacation is over. We are leaving for San Diego this week and I hope that we can add some light schooling back into our life once we return.

In the meantime, these are the things I’m thinking about:

• I need to look into some schooling tips and advice for children with ADD. I found working with Charlie to be extremely difficult this year. If he was ‘in the mood’ or properly motivated/interested, he did great in school—if not, he did terribly. As in puddle-on-the-floor-crying-his-eyes-out terrible.
  
• Improving our school organization so that the boys can more easily see their materials. Cleaning out my drawers and stuff so I can better store their papers and such.
  
• Do some research into how to be a better homeschooling mom. LC seems to enjoy really fun lessons with her girls. Similarly, Aly, has blogged about neat experiences she’s had while schooling her children. I don’t do any of those things. I am a very task-oriented person with no natural sense of fun. At least, not when it comes to teaching. I do what I’m told to do, nothing more, and sometimes less. I’m not going to expect miracles of myself (that was last year and I let myself down horrendously. I refuse to do that again!) but I do want to be prepared with a few ideas at hand in case the moment strikes me as right and I can add a little flavor to our lessons.

I think that might be the biggest stuff on my mind right now. I hope to do better this next year. In fact, I know I will. I survived the first and hardest year of homeschooling with definite positives to shine the way into the future.

Our home life is happier, less caustic, people are generally more loving and less argumentative. We have greater respect for one another. We like each other more. Personally and socially, this year has been the best one since I became a mother. Now we just need to work on enjoying those same wonderful benefits in our academic life too.

What about you? Where are you at, as your school year draws to a close? Do you feel it went well? Are there things you will aim to improve this next school year? 

I just joined The Homeschool Lounge and would really like to increase my circle of friends who homeschool. I need to learn from you, I need your friendship.