I think the absolute *best* way to homeschool is to find out when and how your family is at your best and go from there. It’s so easy to start with a method and try to squeeze ourselves into it, rather than figure ourselves out and find methods that enhance our unique family style.

@Tsh, I like what you said about loving your family culture. We love ours too and in so many ways it’s what gives us the confidence to know that even though we don’t have all the answers we’re doing okay by our kids.

Thanks for the thoughts Renee

But this is just the reminder I need — to be us. I really love our family culture, and one of the things that gets me excited about homeschooling is that it can really nurture that well. So why would I try and swim upstream using something that’s just not “us”?

Thanks for the wise words!

I like your questions. They give me something to chew on.

Thank you

Math is the main subject that is deemed “needful but less delightful” in our home! I fully understand the “pulling teeth” scenario over just a few minutes of Math. Feel free to use my term … I can’t say that it makes getting the Math done easier, but it sounds nice anyway !
Blessings,
Catherine

We knew we were going to homeschool before we got married. I was going to homeschool conferences before we had kids! We have done unit studies, unschooled, Montessori, relaxed, eclectic and project based learning. Even though our core curriculum is virtual right now, I still consider us unschoolers. We may start a unit study on Picasso because we are going to see an exhibit at the museum, we might take a class at the library on African drumming to celebrate black history month, we do field trips with our HS group, family field trips, lap books, and we volunteer at places we love (the library and the air museum.) My kids are in worship dance, girl scouts and Civil Air Patrol as their ‘social’ activities. We rarely stay home, it’ s a wonder we get any ‘school’ done at all, but then homeschooling doesn’t mean you have to be home to learn. Learning happens all the time, that’s another thing that makes each HS family different, the ways we let our kids learn. Maybe we do a virtual school, a once a week options school, maybe we read lots of books out loud or do hands on experiments, maybe we actually stay home (and like it) or maybe we are never home (and like it!)

In one area though, all homeschoolers have a common goal – that is to see that our children are given the tools they need to not only learn, but love to learn. In fact, our HS groups name is Common Ground HS’ers because we all have the common ground of wanting the best education for our children; how we choose to implement that varies as do the paths that lead through life.

(((Angie – Yes, we loosely follow the K-12 and Kaplan curriculum for the older kids. I went with a virtual school because: 1. I like the curriculum 2. It is flexible and allows us to learn core concepts while still doing unschooly things 3. It does give me a feeling of control over what they are learning and when (but I know that learning is also repeated so if they they don’t ‘get’ something it will come up again. Think about history, it often repeats in 3 year cycles in school: ancient, classical, middles ages, modern; sometimes ancient/classical are together, thus every 3 years you get back to it.)

Also the answer to that question used to be no, we did not follow a set curriculum for my son’s first 5 grades and my daughters first 2, we unschooled and I checked in on the book ‘What your (x) grader needs to know’ to see what the PS was doing.

My kids never had a hard time with the decision because we were always homeschoolers. They never went to daycare, preschool, or school, and their friends always told them bad things about school so they didn’t want to go. My best advice for you is get in a group! Our HS group has about 120 members (so really not very big) and it is our social/schooling outlet. We have co-ops,. field trips, park days, teacher night outs, playdates…enough to cover any holes we might have in our education, social or otherwise. I actually just wrote an article on questions about homeschooling for our HS group, you can find it here.

http://highlandshomeschool.homeschooljournal.net/2010/02/04/questions-about-homeschooling/

Other good advice is – relax! The younger they are the easier it is to get started HS’ing because much of learning at that age can be found in everyday things and in play. Good luck!)))