I agree that some deschooling is going to be needed. I tried to explain to him today that learning and "going to school" are NOT the same thing. His desire to learn was squelched starting 4th grade. As they get older school is more desk work and it gets boring. He started to see school as torture and honestly I thought it was when I was growing up. I dropped out. I don't want this to happen to my son. People often question how the last grade I actually completed was 8th grade. They always say, "You seem so smart. How can this be?" And I've had to explain to them that learning and attending school are not synonymous. After about two years out of school I began to enjoy learning again. I read a lot and then there was the advent of the internet which put so much information directly at my finger tips.
I am in complete agreement with crazymama above. This was a hard pill for me to swallow as a new teacher. My son is ADHD so there were many days when he was not cooperative, especially when I tried to assimilate the traditional classroom into our dining room. I had to retrain myself to accept the fact that the beauty of homeschooling is the fact that you make it what you and your child want it to be. And here is a little known fact, homeschoolers tend to test better than their peers in the end. Weather the storm and stick to it.
Thank you for this. I've been thinking and thinking of ways to sneak schooling into the day without him knowing. He does play Minecraft and so he's having to do some counting. I'm thinking of how I can incorporate this into learning. Also, instead of the whole sit down and read a chapter of such and such book I'm going to go back to how we used to read books. I'll read a page and then he'll read a page and we'll do it in the evening and instead of doing boring worksheets I'll have him journal daily. I need other sneaky ideas? Anyone? Maybe I should start a new thread for that.
Have you checked out diy.org? I think it would be a great tool to help parent and child make the change from school to what learning can be like at home.
That's the reason I said MOST don't....a lot of states do not require yearly testing. I have heard time and again from parents to deschooled, or had a lax year, and their children tested just fine. I personally would not be overly worried about it. I personally was burned out with school in 7th grade due to a lot of things. (long list). And thankfully my mom let me deschool after that for about two years. I was still in public school though! lol She just said do what ever and don't worry about it, just get through....I didn't fail but I didn't kill myself to be on the honor roll either...by 10th grade I was back on course. If she had pushed me...I really don't know what would of happened, I think I would of snapped! Scholarships are great, but kind of useless if you have a child that doesn't want anything to do with school because they are totally burned out...highly unlikely they would want to go to college or be near a school. however, letting a child deschool and detox for a while, may help them get that learning mood back. Sounds like you have a good plan in place Michele, I would go on with that. I would sneak learning in with lots of field trips. Most boys love science...do you have a science or space museum near you? Ours even has classes (for homeschoolers especially!), and for blowing stuff up and all kinds of things. A local college here also host free Saturdays for kids, they come in and sign up to do any day of Science classes they want! They get to take three classes that day. My dd only in K last year, chose dissecting sharks, blowing up rockets, and looking at flowers under a microscope. But, they had like 20 different classes they could choose from! It was great. So you may want to contact any local community colleges you have in the area and see what they have with that too. Hmmmm sneaky.....hmm...have to put on our thinking caps but a lot of it will have to do with what he likes to do and what his interest are too. If you deschool and encourage learning about what he is interested in, it's highly likely he will learn a lot about all the skill he needs on any test he is given. So glad my state doesn't require tests. lol haha
Last year was our first year and my girls were "supposed" to be 5th and 6th grades. We did some school- we had more time off than on. We did a lot of things together and a lot of interest led library trips ect. This summer we are fully into our studies and my girls are doing great in 6th and 8th grades (yes- ODD, who is dyslexic, skipped 7th at her request and is doing fine.) I think that last year was so special- we became a family again in a different way than we were before. That lax year gave us time for the influences on our kids to switch from outside, secular influences to parents and faith. The transformation in our girls is just so amazing!! My hubby, who was a little skeptical, is fully on board now and says they will never go to school again! All that to say- enjoy your time. Ask him to pick a topic and then read about it, watch documentaries, write letters to professional organizations requesting info ect. He'll have a blast!
