HPC, I was never particularly involved with other homeschoolers because I live in a rural area where the only homeschool group I encountered made you sign a statement of faith to participate. I have no problem with faith, but faith is pretty personal and individual. The document they wanted me to sign looked like an itemized legal contract, and some of the items seemed really bizarre and offputting to me! It just seemed like a very cliquey group that was based out of one particular church. I didn't feel remotely welcome, and got more criticism about unschooling from them than my inlaws...lol. We saw a lot of the cousins for socialization, had hunt seat lessons with other girls Elle's age, and she went to the YMCA's after school play group twice a week while I was working out. I did a lot of reading about unschooling, and to be honest...I mostly just trusted myself and took a leap of faith. Worked out really well for us! (but no, I'm not naive enough to think it would work for every child with the same results) Your kids are seriously different kids! That must be incredibly challenging for you...to see certain things come so easily to a couple of your children, while the others struggle. It definitely makes you wonder what roles nature and nurture really play in the grand scheme of things. That's a hard thing to think about....that the choices you're making for your kids might not matter as much as you think they do. That said, each person has potential, and each kid can have his/her own sort of genius. Sometimes it's a serious journey to find it, and find a way to help them be the best version of themselves they can be. But as parents, that's what we do, right? We knock ourselves out exploring every avenue, every possibility, every chance for our kids to be happy... and live fulfilling, satisfying lives. I think a really important element of getting results, is modeling desired behaviors yourself. I think another really important element of getting results...is getting some help when you run into walls. There's so much research being done on learning. How we learn, why we have particular difficulties. There are resources available to evaluate and help kids who have specific struggles. It's also really important to make sure you know you own limits, and have your own support system. Being a mom of a kid with learning challenges is stressful and difficult. It's worse when your own stress is unmanaged. Make sure you have support, so you can support him!
