Not Another Homeschool Blog

I don't know that I ever promoted the homeschool-hybrid program my kids attended, but now I feel I must.  You see, my kid graduated last year and right now would do anything to spend just one day back at her homeschool program. I picked daughter up from school last Friday, at 4:30 sharp.  It was the earliest she could get out of her on-campus job, and she had me high-tail it straight to the Artios Academies Hoe-down.  It is a yearly square-dance fundraiser the "school" has every fall.  Initially, she was coming home for a doctor's appointment on Monday morning, since she had a couple of days off (and a somewhat serious health issue), but as chance would have it, it was also hoe-down weekend, so that worked for her. She was so excited to go that she had worn her cowboy boots and the ugliest square-dance skirt ever all day (at college), and she jumped in my care excitedly raring to go.  So as any good mom would do, to make my kid deliriously happy, I drove her...

I realize the title is a bit redundant, or perhaps more of an oxymoron, but homeschool classes and programs have been very valuable to us. I feel  classes outside the home was the thing that we needed to give my daughter (especially) the extra boost to get into even her most far-reach college choice.  She was able to show that not only had she met the recommended academic guidelines to make her college ready, but that she had far exceeded it by taking as many elective classes as she did core classes. Now classes outside the home are not for everyone.  There are certainly many pros and many cons.  I will list some of them for you. Pros of outside classes: Reference letters:  We had to find people to call on for academic and other references for college admissions and for internships and such.  The outside classes provided plenty of people to call on to help with these letters. Mom is not the font of all knowledge.  In fact, I actually despised...

Please correct me if I am wrong, but I just got an email from homeschool.com advertising for IQ Academy which serves a handful of states. Not only is the program free in these areas, but students also receive free laptops. This give me the impression that it is public school at home, making the kids technically public school students and not homeschoolers. Now I don't care which program people use as long as they know the difference. The email I received blurs the lines. Read more Notes From a Homeschooling Mom Visit Me at the Families.com Homeschool Blog Visit My Education Column at Examiner.com Great Deals on School & Homeschool Curriculum

I have often mentioned that my homeschooled kids attend a homeschool "school" type program. With a new location opening up in Texas , I thought I would take the time to tell you more about it. Masters Academy of Fine Arts is a program that entwines the arts with history so that the child is immersed in history. Each year a different historic period is covered. There are six periods in all and each year the child will learn a different history. If a student stays in the school 12 years, he will go through each time period twice, at different levels, of course. My children have been in the program since our second year of homeschooling. This is their fourth year in the program. My daughter takes the fine arts/history program, and my son has moved up to the Artios program for high school and is concentrating on film design. He plans to study Multimedia design in college. In addition, our location also has a program called Cordis, where the kids also take their academic ...