I'm quite new here, new to homeschool and everything - we took our oldest son out of public school just this week so everything is still rough and new for all of us. Right now he's working through a series of tests so we can learn what he knows, and where he has problems. He's autistic and problems with how public school has dealt with his disorder - or, rather, differential treatment of him - is the main reason for us switching over and getting away from the faulty public school system. Anyone else who switched? Want to share your stories? (Of course, anyone's input is welcome, not just people who've switched over) Also, if you did switch, how did it affect your career and personal education goals? Do you regret it sometimes, or do you wish you had done it sooner?
I wish I had never put my dd in ps to begin with and my youngest will never go to ps. My oldest dd is 11 and went to ps from 1st - 4th. Horrible experience in 4th. We love hs'ing and will never look back!! We never regret it. We have a laid back style and believe that everything can be a learning experience.
Anyone else who switched? Want to share your stories? (Of course, anyone's input is welcome, not just people who've switched over) Also, if you did switch, how did it affect your career and personal education goals? Do you regret it sometimes, or do you wish you had done it sooner?[/QUOTE] We pulled dd out mid year K last year. Was really rough about the first 5 months. She's been in preschool since she was 3 1/2. She's very social, always used to being around other kids. So for us the struggle was filling in THOSE gaps because she is an only child. I was a stay at home mom while she was in regular school. I've worked part time off and on since she was born, and I worked full time for one year. But for the most part I've been home. I have no regrets yanking her nor does dh. Although weeks like this week I'd like to send her back LOL. We have one good day and the rest of the week is a rollercoaster. Didn't effect my career as I really don't have one lol.
We began HSing our 3 kids (ages 9,7,5) in March when we moved...they had previously been in a Dept of Defense school in KY....so they've been a bit more "sheltered" than a public school (which is a good thing). My husband is in the Army and has been in the Middle East A LOT over the last 4 years and we wanted to have as much family time as possible and not subject to the VA SOLs and their rigid attendance policies. Best decision we have made in the lives of our kids. They are re-discovering their love of learning and our oldest is no longer held back. Her gifted ed. class at school was just never enough to motivate her to reach her potential. Can't see us putting them back in public school anytime soon ....as of right now, they all want to stay with homeschooling and its working well for our family. Rhonda C.
How does it work to have multiple age children in home school? We have four children, two are school age. We pulled out our oldest, but our 2nd is still in - he's not developmentally challenged and enjoying the social aspect of school to the fullest. However, after taking our oldest out I'm questioning whether leaving our 2nd in is a good idea. Thoughts on that?
I took my ds out of ps this last Feb.. Yes, I wish I would have taken him out years ago, well actually never sent him in the first place. I have my days where I second guess myself on my decision, but all turns around just as fast. I just remind myself that this is all for my son and he needs to come first and his ed is very important to me. I am a stay at home mom so it does not really effect my daily routine. I also have a 3 yr old and we are doing preschool this year. I just think with the lack of good ps that I am so glad I have this option to do this for my children. I hope this makes some sense, I am multitasking and going a mile a min.
I forgot to add ..... It didn't effect my routine at all. I had already quit the law firm I worked at about a year earlier to stay home. I suppose it actually made my days and my daily routine way better than before!
My oldest went to school for 3 years, prek through first grade. He's on the spectrum as well - no official diagnosis as of this moment, but we now have a doc and will be calling on Monday to make an appt... and eventually approach. (HF, Asperger's most likely. Everything I've read sounds like it was written to describe him.) I let him finish the end of the year his first grade year - he's very schedule oriented (to the point that if it changes too quickly he has meltdowns, especially back then). The MAIN reason I pulled him was because the school was not doing for him what I felt needed to be done. I've always known something was "up" with him, always known that his "issues" were NOT behavioral but social. I now understand about the autism SPECTRUM. The language disorder he was dx'd with in school (semantic pragmatic disorder) is highly associated with hf-asd, yet I was never told this nor recommended to have him evaluated. IN all the time he was in school, I was made to feel like his "issues" were my fault, that I was not a good enough mother to him. I'm so relieved now to know that this simply isn't true. Anyway. He's now 8 and doing fantastically. Best thing I ever did, and I also don't see us going back. I also have two youngers, a 4yo and a 3yo, and we work on preschool things with them as well. The multilevel thing has been fairly easy for me to implement. Some subjects we study the same things - Bible, for instance, which is incorporated with science, art, and history and so those are all studied together. When my oldest does his math work pages, I work with the calendar and number recognition with the youngers. When my oldest does his grammar lesson, I work on phonics with the youngers. Everything else we do together. Before I pulled Christian, I was a sahm as well. I have several years of college for music education. Growing up, I always wanted to be a teacher. Isn't interesting how God puts a desire in our hearts, and then fulfills that desire in our lives in a way we never even thought of?? I know this is right for us, right for me. I'm meeting more people of "like mind" than ever before in the ps "social system". (That's a laugh. PS doesn't teach socialization whatsoever; it's a sink or swim, throw them to the sharks methodology.) Anyway. That's us.
Our kids never went to public school, because our local ones are pretty bad. But they both went to a private school, Zach from K5 thru the first half of 3rd grade (when we pulled him out) and Eli, just last year, for full-time K4. Homeschooling has been a really great fit for us, and I can't imagine going back. As far as teaching two, I've only been doing that since August. Even though we pulled Zach out of school last December, we decided to leave Eli in through the second semester of last year. He's very outgoing and I believe he would've had a hard time leaving his buddies and his teachers in the middle of the year. Anyway, it's been a bit of a struggle finding him the friends he needs. But other than that, they're both doing great. I actually find it EASIER to teach both at home than it was having one in school the first part of this year. Our time was still very much dictated by the school's schedule, and Eli often asked why he couldn't stay home, too. He is learning a lot from listening in on his brother's lessons, and the two of them have become much closer...closer than they've ever been. I've battled lots of insecurities over my ability to do this, but the longer we do it, the more I realize how easy it actually is, and how much my children are learning. And they are both so much happier! Anyway, good luck to you! Kari Mom of Zachary (9) and Eli (5)
Hi and Welcome This is my first year officially homeschooling my almost 7 y.o. son. Last year my kiddo attended public school kindergarten. I'll answer your questions before I start a rambling vent about the experience of last year. How did homeschooling affect my career and personal goals? Well, I have been a SAHM for 7 years, so it's not too different than before. I stay at home with my almost 4 y.o. dd too. I did think (daydream) that after I had my older one in school that dh and I would have another baby or that I would find a part time job, but I guess that wasn't in the plans (at least not for now). Sometimes (on bad days) I do rethink my decision to homeschool. On other days I wish I would've done this last year. My mother, who is a public school teacher, fully supports the homeschooling decision especially since she visited my son's school last year. She actually begged me to get him out of that environment. My mother sees that I am happier this year and that my son is doing well. I wish you all the best with homeschooling your son, Littlechoochoo! Here goes the long story..... First off my son is a quiet, highly sensitive and anxious type of kid. For some reason a large classroom environment was not the best place for him. His kindergarten teacher knew my son was smart, but she was very frustrated with him because his fine motor skills were lacking. She couldn't figure out how to get all of his knowledge channeled through his fingers. My son cried with frustration because his mind was farther ahead than his hands. My son would also cry about social events that happened on the playground and in class (teasing, pushing, bullying and scary abduction stories being told). The other kids started to tease him and call him cry baby. My son's teacher invited my husband and I in for a meeting with 15 professionals. The premise of the meeting was to help every learner succeed and have the school adjust to the child's needs instead of the other way around. I thought the meeting went well and we all came up with some strategies to help my son. However, a month later my husband and I were invited into another meeting that did not go well at all. The principal, school psychologist, teacher and aide were there. They basically said I had to get my son tested and labeled with something in order to have any accommodations made. The meeting seemed to be the exact opposite of the first meeting. The school psych. said, "Your son is very bright, but he has issues." Also, my son was signed up for the half day kindergarten program and he was the only one at the school doing that (parent's have the "choice" in our district). The staff urged my husband and I to put our son in the full day program or he would fail kindergarten. They also suggested I put my son in social skills class because he wanted to make friends with the adult teachers and didn't know how to interact with his same age peers. Unfortunately, at that meeting I didn't take too kindly to these statements and I got quite snippy. That is typically not the way I act. My husband and I came away with from that meeting like we had been kicked in the gut. I also felt like I was a horrible mother and that I some how messed up my son. My husband felt like ripping our son out of that school that day. After a long discussion my hubby and I agreed to let our son go for the full day kindergarten program and to let him attend social skills class. The first few weeks of the full day were tough for my son, but he did get used to it. He still had horrible days as well as good days. One of the other issues with the school was with the lunch time. My son said that at lunch he would get his food stuck in his throat and chest. I guess I didn't think too much of it at the time, but I think that him having a hard time digesting due to lack of time. One day my son came home and asked me when he was suppose to talk (because he was being encouraged to be more talkative and socialize with his friends more). I told him he could talk at lunch and recess. He replied, "We can't talk at lunch! Lunch is for eating not for talking!" I thought he was being silly, but it was true! There was a no talking policy for most of the lunch period because they only had 15 to 20 minutes to get in line, sit down and eat. The kids got yelled at to not talk and to eat fast. The lights were shut off and they got stars taken away on a chart, if they weren't quiet. The parents of the school were upset with this policy. We were invited to express our concerns with the principal about the fast/no talking lunch time. The principal basically said it needed to be brought to the attention of the school board because the school needed more help and better scheduling=$$. My hubby volunteered to speak to the school board. That very next day I had a phone call from the superintendent, who basically said that's too bad, but that's the way things are (lunch time isn't going to change). I tried to brainstorm some solutions with her, but she shot down every one of my ideas. About a week after that hubby and I had another meeting at the school about our son's progress. The meeting was alright. We had the original gang of 15 people at this one. The teacher reported that my son's issues were gone and things were going well! It was amazing that in three short weeks of full day kindergarten my son was ready to move on to first grade. My husband and I both got this feeling that the meeting went too well and everyone was soooo overly nice. Basically, there were to be no more meetings about my son because his case was considered closed. Over the summer my hubby and I came to the conclusion that it was in our son's best interest to homeschool. We are all happier and healthier this year!
Okay...it is not quite the same, but we did an at-home charter school (santioned by the school district) for K and it was fine, but not for us. I found that I really wanted to be on my own schedule (year-round), and in completely in charge of my DD's education. At first I thought I needed to be accountable to 'someone' (ie the charter school), but I'm now much more confident. My DD teacher was very nice but by the end of the year I felt like I was teaching to a time 'schedule'. I had to maintain the same 'hour' guidelines that PS adhere too, which is ridiculous when HSing, IMO. First grade would have been double the hours that K was. My girls will probably never go to PS. Just today, 3 elementary schools were in lock-down where I live and the 3 police officers were shot. The shooting didn't happen at the school, but they were locked-down until 6 pm this evening because the was standoff nearby. Although the news reports were a bit confusing, it looked like they bussed the all the kids to a 'safer' school, and parents could p/u their kids there, but parents with no transporation had to wait for their kids to be bused back to the original schools. I know they were trying to keep the kids safe, but can you imagine the chaos this must have been??! WIMom...I'm glad you shared that about your son. My 6 yo DD sounds a lot like your son. I'm sure if we were in school she would have 'issues', but I am 'anointed' to deal with her!
Our first three children went all through public school and our oldest went to a local C. college for Criminal Justice and is now a policeman. Our twins went to A.S.U. and one teaches high school while the other one is a social worker. None of those three loved public school but they did great. Fast forward a few years and we adopted four of our foster children over a few years time. The first one is mentally handicapped and loves public school. The school system has worked with us and helped him get into a regular high school and he will graduate this Spring with an Occupational Diploma. He is very proud. Our other high school senior came to us later. He was already a freshman when we adopted him. He just lives to get out of school. He loves the social aspect of public school. He grew up in foster care and only wants to get out of school and be "all grown up". You know, where nobody tells you what to do! He is a great kid but getting ready for a rude awakening. Our home schooled kids are our girls. Our ninth grader couldn't multiply in 7th grade and our 4th grader got great grades in second grade but was so far behind! We took them out and home schooled last year for 8th and 3rd grades and saw wonderful progress. We now do 9th and 4th and never plan on going back to public school. I am so excited about our boys graduating this Spring. It will release me from the public school system! Homeschooling did change our family but only in good ways. We are so much closer now. My girls are getting to know their daddy now. He is home four days a week and helps with their schooling. He is here to see them during the day. He does lots of their science with them and they have such fun with the things he does. We do things at our pace and don't have to teach to the test. We don't start off on day one worrying about the EOGs. I can't say enough good things about homeschooling. I wish we had never put any of our kids in public school but I guess I wouldn't appreciate what we have now if I had never experienced public school. By the way, my older kids, even the teacher, totally support our homeschooling. Beth
when we pulled ds b/c of reading & behaviour problems, we left dd in school b/c she was very social, and liked school. I was convinced that she would hate hs, miss the other kids etc. A year down the track, she started hs b/c she really wanted to - felt she was being left out, wanted the freedom and the extra mummy time and everything that ds was getting. and she didn't want to be in school without him. both my kids love hs. they have overcome their challenges, rediscovered the joy of learning, and are flourishing. My only regret is that we didn't do it sooner. It has changed my career goals - I still work, but it is no longer my priority. But I don't see any of that as a negative
Congrats on your decision to hs. We pulled our dd last year (Oct) from school. She was not learning to read and was a year behind in reading, Kindergarten level writing and 1 year ahead in math. Major signs for learning disabilities. I won't go into details but the school refuse to acknowledge she needed intervention/help. Quick note, her older brother has learning problems too, which also runs in families. I admit the first 2 weeks were hard, she refused to cooperate. I sent her to her room and told her she couldn't come out until she was ready to cooperate. Well she showed me, about 2 hrs later, I had to make her come out of her room. We finally got into the swing of things. My best advice, you are not a ps. I made the mistake of trying to run hs like a ps. It created stress on me and her. I've learned to relax, if it takes us two or more days to get a concept, so be it. If we miss science/history we can do it later and have fun with it. Now I am hs her older sister, we are relearning how to work with 2 kids. I love it though and wish I had done it with the oldest child. I have alot of good days with some bad ones here and there. Honestly though, some of those bad days are mom induced. Off the topic, with seeing all the media regarding what is going on in schools now, I believe God lead us to hs. Good luck :0) Quick note, before hs, I researched and talk to many people. I did find out children with disabilities do far much better with hs. I found this to be true with ours.
My kids attended ps for a few years before we started hsing. My oldest had the most problems. After an incident in kindy were he ran away from school and no one noticed for 2 hours then tried to hide the fact, I pulled him out mid year and we homeschooled. At that time he was being screened for the behavioural concerns that had been there since 6 months old. After spending 2 weeks in the children's mental ward of the hospital it was determined that academically he was behind because I homeschooled him, and his bad behaviours were due to my bad parenting. I felt like crap and felt obligated to put him back in public school, albeit a different school. The problems continue to get worse, and despite my helping him with homework etc he still wasn't "getting it", his behaviours got worse, his teacher did recognize his struggle with social skills and did step in and help him there but academically he was struggling. Going into 2nd grade we found a new shrink for him, who finally diagnosed him as having severe ADHD and anxiety disorder. There was some speculation if he is on the spectrum but nothing definitive on that. SHe also requested the school do further testing, turns out that despite his high IQ (109), he had a very very slow processing speed. The rate that school was covering new material was too fast. They would be moving onto new concepts that built upon old ones before he understood the old one. The result was at the end of grade 2 he could barely handle early 1st grade work, his anxiety was throught eh roof with melt downs, bedwetting, lack of eating, his ritalin dose was continually being increased, he told me he wished he was dead. It just was not a healthy situation. I decided to homeschool him at the end of the school year, much against his ped's wishes. We spent almost all of 3rd grade focusing only on emotional/behavioural concerns, correcting all the damage done by public school. By May I was able to reduce his meds down to a 1/3rd of the dose he had been on, and he was asking to do school work, he was ready to learn, his ped apologized for being against hsing and has acknowledged it was the best choice I could have made for him. I had my little boy back. This year we are focusing on academics, we still have more bad days than good, but are getting through it, and I still see continual improvements in his emotional/behavioural issues. I have had to increase his meds due to his major growth spurt over the summer unfortunately but they are needed. HE is now up to an end of 3rd grade level even though he is "technically" in 4th grade, it is a huge improvement from where he was when I pulled him. My DD is another issue entirely. SHe attended ps for K-1. She has ADHD and conduct disorder combined with an extremely high IQ (122). CD is a very difficult disorder to work with, her teachers learned that the hard way. SHe spent everyday in first grade in detention, got suspended, had 4-5 hours of homework nightly because she refused to do her work at school. I am sure the teachers partied whent hey heard we were not returning. Like her brother I spent the 1st year hsing focusing on behaviur and reframing her thoughts. This year she is in 3rd grade but is doing almost the exact same work as her brother so is doing end fo 3rd grade work already. He needed me to slow down, she needed to be challenged more so it worked well to teach them both at the same time with the same materials, makes it so much easier. My 4 year old will never go to ps, he does attend preschool in our church 5 days a week, and loves it but I don't really count preschool as part of the school system. I mainly put him in it because he wanted something that made him a big boy and to play with friends. With a new baby at home he needed something that was just his since he was losing his place as baby of the family. In addition to him going to preschool every afternoon I work with him at home on his own "school" work. We do patterning, lapbooking, etc. Baby will never attend ps either. I have such a bad taste in my mouth from our past experiences in ps. That's not to say hsing is perfect, heck at least, at least once a week I am wanting to send them back just to get a break from the bickering, and the whining about work etc. But I do see how well they are doing and the changes in their worldview etc. DS says he will never go back to ps, he is going to hs right through high school. I warned my sister last night that when it comes to grade 12 math I am recruiting her to teach(she is a grade 12 math teacher, I hated and still hate that level of math and never really got it), so the family is starting to see this as a long term thing, not just an "experiment" for a year like my mother thought.
swellmomma you sure had a tough time, but it sounds like you have done really well. my ds also says he will never go back - we'll both still be here in years to come!
