My parents seem to have agreed on letting me home school myself instead of going to public school. Thank you everyone for your help on my question, it helped me convince them But I have a problem. My dad wants to know how I will go about home schooling myself. Do I need special textbooks? I have an idea of opening my textbooks, and starting from the beginning, but learning it in depth and taking notes, drawing pictures with annotations etc. He thinks that it would be foolish to go into this without some sort of guide or help. We don't want to spend any money though, and no online schools. I have to be able to home school myself while they are at work. Thanks
Some others might have better suggestions, but worst case, could you convince them to buy the book What Your ___ Grader Should Know? You buy the one for your age/grade level and, though they are more geared around the education system in the USA, you could easily follow it as a guide to what you should be delving into online and via the library. You might have to be more creative than simply following a textbook, but it certainly would help you make sure you are learning what you need to know.
I know that the school system in the UK is set up a bit differently then here in the U.S. so a good starting place might be your local school. Have your Dad or Mum ask for a scope and sequence for the grade or form (I think that's what you call it in the UK) you are in. If they can't provide one maybe the place you register to home school can provide one for you. After you have the scope and sequence for your particular grade, you can fill in what you will need. You may be able to use your local library, or if you are close to a university, you may be able to use their university library. You can also find curriculum/ textbooks on line or from a home schooling group in your area. First get a scope and sequence, then make a good plan/schedule of each week showing how much studying you will be doing in each subject. If you can demonstrate to your parents that you are being responsible by making a plan and sticking to it they may feel even better about homeschooling. If you have trouble making a study schedule you can ask here for help. Marty
Thanks And yeah, I guess I do need help with the study schedule. I know I'll probably get text books from the library, and ideas from the internet, but how do I make it into a solid time table? I know I want to do History, Geography, Spanish, Art, Maths, Science, English and maybe PE (I can just run around the block or exercise during that period). Oh and a little French, along with my own language which I have to learn better. That's a lot of subjects, and I don't know if I can fit them all. I'v been thinking of doing a two week time table. Instead of all the subjects in one week, I'll do them in two weeks. Would that work or would I forget things after not doing them for a week?
One idea might be to schedule yourself in blocks (that's how the local high schools do their schedule). For example, study Spanish, Art, Math, and Geography on A days and English, French, History, and Science on B days. You can do PE every day by doing a 15 minute run when you're day gets especially boring. Then just alternate every other day. I'm not homeschooling high schoolers, so I don't know how well that would work, but it's an idea.
Good for you, Diya! Good luck on your homeschooling journey. You're getting some great advice already, but I wanted to point you towards some free homeschool materials links here: http://fivejs.com/homeschool-for-free/ I think some of this (maybe a lot of it) will be geared towards younger kids, but hopefully there are some materials you can use or maybe one link will lead to another more helpful link for you. Also check out Khan Academy. Tons of free videos on just about all subjects. You may find this is more geared for your age, though there are no supplemental materials (I don't believe) on this website, just the videos and tutorials. It's been great for us for math, though! The videos do a much better job than I can on some algebra lessons that I was struggling to teach well to my 16 year old.
Be sure to check out this message board. It is for high schoolers. http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=5
If money is tight, the amount of time spent studying is an issue and you want to be able to study things in depth I'll make this suggestion. Combine subjects so you can study multiple things at the same time and go in depth. For example: the Napoleonic War= English, Spanish and French history, the geography of Spain and France during that time period= geography, the economic impact of the war on Spain, France and Britain= math (you can use statistics), write a report on the war in French= language. Just that one topic alone would knock out 4 subjects and you could get quite in depth. A two week time table would work. The important thing to remember about what ever type of schedule you use is this: set an end of the year goal then divide the subject up into smaller "bite size" pieces. Make sure the end of the year goal is realistic and fits into your scope and sequence. There are lots of free resources on line and the ladies and gents here should be able to point you to some if they haven't already. Hope that helps! Marty
There are books available - the same ones used in schools - for every subject covered by the GCSEs and A-levels and whatever. Anything we suggest that's geared for the US will likely not be as suitable for the UK. Check with the UK Home Education sites online - they'll have your best advice. They'll be able to tell you how to go about taking your tests and getting your scores and all that, that we in the US know nothing about. I believe the whole of the British National Curriculum is online (with worksheets and all that too). There's Khan Academy free online for math. http://home-ed.info/gcse.htm This page has info about taking GCSE and IGCSE. http://home-ed.info/home_ed_articles/curriculum.htm This page has suggestions for curriculum.
I don't have an ereader... But I've now got good text books and things to use Thanks everyone. Oh and arrangements for home schooling is taking longer than I thought...it's gonna take about 1 months or so...
I would highly recommend an ereader. It's an incredibly powerful tool. So many wonderful books that are free once you have the ereader. And the lowest price Kindle is now down to 80 clams. That is an incredible deal.
Some websites that offer free curriculum are: Old Fashioned Education, Ambleside Online, and Tapestry of Grace (offers 3 weeks free lessons that you can print off) Paperbackswap is a great resource...you join for free and I've gotten many homeschool texts and workbooks from this site. Curriculum Share is a site where people offer free homeschool texts. Hope this helps!
