If you are wondering about how homeschooling is going to change your life read this post. Of course this is not some sort of road map, but it is an interesting look into one mother’s thinking after two years of homeschooling.
This was originally published in December of 2007, a few short months after we started homeschooling. I decided to drag it back out and update it. I hope you enjoy it. Updates are in blue, because blue is easier on the eyes, in my opinion.
4. Educational freedom. My children have the ability to change their course of study within the guidelines I have provided for them. For example, this year, we are studying biology. Throughout the year, we will study animals, the human body, and plant life. Within that framework, they are able to pick what they want to study. This is a major plus when it comes to motivation.
We don’t do school the way we did in December of 2007. In fact, we have pretty much changed everything we did (we still use the same math program). Now, my children have less say in what they study, but they are all much happier in what they are studying.
4B. Time to explore their own interests outside of school time. Since we changed the way we do things, my children are typically done with school by noon. This allows them to explore both the outside world, as well as explore ‘academic’ interests not being followed in their course of study.
Tags: homeschooling, homeschooling family, kids and learning, reasons to homeschool
At the HEM News & Commentary, Mary Nix addresses Escalating Home Visits by Authorities in Japan and elsewhere. In Japan, longtime homeschooling advocate Kyoko Aizawa has legitimate concerns, and there are alarming comparisons in the United States.
Tags: home visits, homeschool home visits, homeschooling in Japan, Japan, Kyoko Aizawa, Mary Nix
In the July/August 2009 Home Education Magazine, Mary Nix interviews long-time Texas unschooler and founder of the international Rethinking Education Conference, Barb Lundgren:
Mary: How has the conference changed over the years?
Barb: While Rethinking Education has always been an unschooling conference, I would say that the biggest change throughout the years was to move from calling it a homeschool conference in it’s early years to declaring it an unschooling conference in more recent years. I have witnessed a dramatic evolution in the “type” of family that attends, the way parents interact with their children, the unconditional support that parents want to be offering themselves and their families.
Since 1984, Home Education Magazine has delivered focused and extensive coverage of homeschooling with the most timely articles, interviews with homeschool personalities, regular columns by outstanding advocates for homeschooling, and writing which shares the joys of a family life that homeschooling makes so easy.
Tags: Barb Lundgren, HEM Interview, homeschool conference, Mary Nix, Rethinking Education conference, Texas unschooler, unschooling
AllPosters.com is dedicated to bringing customers the best selection of posters and art prints in the world, including entertainment and specialty posters, decorative prints, and art reproductions. Their Education category includes posters on Literature, Science, Health, Natural Sciences, History, Social Sciences, Teaching Aids, Technology & Industry, Humanities and more.
Tags: AllPosters, education posters, homeschool resources, homeschooling, homeschooling subjects, posters, teaching aids
When I bumped into a link to a site of homeschooling quotes I am not sure what I expected to find, but once I started reading I just kept reading because I like quotes, and this is a good collection of thought provokers. From the site:
These life-learning, life-affirming quotations will help you find the right words to explain your homeschool lifestyle to skeptics … or help you take the homeschooling plunge … or maybe help you remember why you decided to homeschool in the first place!
Some are serious and some are just plain silly; enjoy them for what they are!
Here is one that has a special relevance for our times:
As Paul Goodman has said, and it cannot be said too often, at the turn of the century, when only six percent of our young even finished high school, and half or less of one percent went to college, the whole country was run by dropouts. But now all roads lead through school. To fail there is to fail everywhere.
~ John Holt
There are a lot more worth the time at Homeschool Quotes
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream.
~ Mark Twain
Tags: homeschool wisdom, homeschooling, homeschooling quotes, John Holt, learning, Mark Twain, school
