When homeschoolers are older like mine, the role of the homeschooling mom drastically changes. Some of my roles are:
Debate partner: Because EVERYTHING I say turns into a long drawn out conversation.
Guidance Counselor: As we prepare for college entry.
Academic coach: As I help them navigate the requirements of different teachers to make it to the finish line of a good grade.
Taxi Driver: As they have to be everywhere, and at the same time
Nervous passenger: As they begin to drive me places.
Maid: As they are far too busy to clean up after themselves.
Life coach: As I try to impart to them years of knowledge and experience.
There is so much more, but these are the things on my mind this evening.
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Bargain shopping for college
I spent the summer watching my niece and almost-son prepare to go to college. The last of the two, my niece leaves in the morning. As I have a child starting college in the fall, and another the next year, I am very interested in the process of gearing up to go to college. It just looks plain expensive.
Being the consummate planner, I have purchased two trunks and have began to put things aside for my son. This way, I can purchase items he will need on clearance, and pay less than what I am watching others pay. I am excited about the prospect of having an excuse to budget shop for the next two year.
The subject of textbooks is a bit scary to me though. First, the amount of time you have to shop for college books is severely limited. You don't get your textbook list until a week or two before school at most. Second, there are no clearance sales to help you stockpile textbooks.
My friend did have some success at getting textbooks for less than half price from Amazon.com. There were ebook options and used book options. The only problem was shipping time for the books in print. If you have a source for a great textbook option, please drop a note.
Being the consummate planner, I have purchased two trunks and have began to put things aside for my son. This way, I can purchase items he will need on clearance, and pay less than what I am watching others pay. I am excited about the prospect of having an excuse to budget shop for the next two year.
The subject of textbooks is a bit scary to me though. First, the amount of time you have to shop for college books is severely limited. You don't get your textbook list until a week or two before school at most. Second, there are no clearance sales to help you stockpile textbooks.
My friend did have some success at getting textbooks for less than half price from Amazon.com. There were ebook options and used book options. The only problem was shipping time for the books in print. If you have a source for a great textbook option, please drop a note.
My five favorite homeschool books
It's show and tell time. Here are my favorite books for homeschooling. You could actually have these books and need little else (through grade 6).
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How long to study for each class?
We may have a problem with the online classes. Already.
As homeschoolers my kids have spent 1 hour a day 4 or 5 days per week on most classes. They have spent 90 minutes a day without fail on math and foreign language. So that is no more than 4 to 7.5 hours per class weekly. This is true whether they are studying someone at home, or in a local class.
The online classes they are taking through the county is recommending 12-20 hours a week per online class. (I am pretty sure that's what they said during the orientation chat) That's just crazy. Weekly, this would be almost 2 1/2 hours a day to 4 hours a day per class. Multiply that by 5 classes (which my kids are not taking) and that could take 12 1/2 to 20 hours a day. So much for having a life or sleeping.
I think they are seriously over stating the time it takes to study the material and pass the tests. I am hoping that this is a loose recommendation, and not a requirement. I will find out.
Fortunately with my son taking only 2 classes per semester and my daughter taking 1 class per semester, they will still have time for other endeavors. I am recommending they are signed in to their accounts for the minimum amount of recommended hours per week. As they are only available to do online school 4 days during the week, I will probably get them to so a weekend session. My kids have already resisted homeschooling on the weekend.... but college is coming up fast. They are going to have to get used to studying daily.
update: Did some quick research. On the college level "Generally, the rule of thumb is that you should study approximately 2 hours for every one hour of classroom time. For example, if you spend 4 hours a week in a particular class, then you should spend 8 hours studying and doing homework." http://news.everest.edu/post/2008/03/study-hours The low-end recommendation for these high school courses are pretty close to what is recommended to pass a college course. So if a public school would spend 5 hours a week in class and then do 10 hours a week in homework for that class, they can expect to do very well. Since my kids are in highschool, I am going to recommend to them that they spend the minimum 12 hours per class (especially since they are hard classes I cannot teach at home) and re-evaluate it as we go along.
Bottom line, I wouldn't recommend any homeschooler take a full load of 4 - 5 classes. There would truly be not time for sleep.
So my question is, how much time do you spend studying each day... at the high school level? I'd like to hear from public school families too.
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As homeschoolers my kids have spent 1 hour a day 4 or 5 days per week on most classes. They have spent 90 minutes a day without fail on math and foreign language. So that is no more than 4 to 7.5 hours per class weekly. This is true whether they are studying someone at home, or in a local class.
The online classes they are taking through the county is recommending 12-20 hours a week per online class. (I am pretty sure that's what they said during the orientation chat) That's just crazy. Weekly, this would be almost 2 1/2 hours a day to 4 hours a day per class. Multiply that by 5 classes (which my kids are not taking) and that could take 12 1/2 to 20 hours a day. So much for having a life or sleeping.
I think they are seriously over stating the time it takes to study the material and pass the tests. I am hoping that this is a loose recommendation, and not a requirement. I will find out.
Fortunately with my son taking only 2 classes per semester and my daughter taking 1 class per semester, they will still have time for other endeavors. I am recommending they are signed in to their accounts for the minimum amount of recommended hours per week. As they are only available to do online school 4 days during the week, I will probably get them to so a weekend session. My kids have already resisted homeschooling on the weekend.... but college is coming up fast. They are going to have to get used to studying daily.
update: Did some quick research. On the college level "Generally, the rule of thumb is that you should study approximately 2 hours for every one hour of classroom time. For example, if you spend 4 hours a week in a particular class, then you should spend 8 hours studying and doing homework." http://news.everest.edu/post/2008/03/study-hours The low-end recommendation for these high school courses are pretty close to what is recommended to pass a college course. So if a public school would spend 5 hours a week in class and then do 10 hours a week in homework for that class, they can expect to do very well. Since my kids are in highschool, I am going to recommend to them that they spend the minimum 12 hours per class (especially since they are hard classes I cannot teach at home) and re-evaluate it as we go along.
Bottom line, I wouldn't recommend any homeschooler take a full load of 4 - 5 classes. There would truly be not time for sleep.
So my question is, how much time do you spend studying each day... at the high school level? I'd like to hear from public school families too.
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Getting used to online classes
My son can finally access his online classes. It looks like his teachers are a TON more organized than my daughters teacher. My sons Physics and Financial Math teachers dropped his assignments into a calendar, so it is clear what has to be done what day. If he needs to get ahead, due to another obligation, he can still do that, but it is clear how they should pace themselves.
My daughter's Spanish teacher just inserted weekly dates into her syllabus. Pacing will need to be done ourselves. Also it is not very easy to determine what she should do. We had to compare her syllabus to what was online and interpret what needed to be done. I think we will get the hang of it though.
I feel like being organized and meeting deadlines will be the key to doing well in these classes. I gave the kids a one subject composition notebook for each class. We glued the syllabuses in the first few pages, so they can refer back to them and check off what they have done. As they deduct 10% for each day an assignment is late, it is important to check and re-check deadlines as they progress through the courses.
This in not my ideal way to homeschool, but for older kids about to go out in the world, I feel like they need to get used to dealing with different kind of students while I can still assist them.
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My daughter's Spanish teacher just inserted weekly dates into her syllabus. Pacing will need to be done ourselves. Also it is not very easy to determine what she should do. We had to compare her syllabus to what was online and interpret what needed to be done. I think we will get the hang of it though.
I feel like being organized and meeting deadlines will be the key to doing well in these classes. I gave the kids a one subject composition notebook for each class. We glued the syllabuses in the first few pages, so they can refer back to them and check off what they have done. As they deduct 10% for each day an assignment is late, it is important to check and re-check deadlines as they progress through the courses.
This in not my ideal way to homeschool, but for older kids about to go out in the world, I feel like they need to get used to dealing with different kind of students while I can still assist them.
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Public school parents, remember you are your child's guidance counselor
I am finding that in my area, several families are being hit up for money because their students needed to take extra classes to be able to graduate. I thought it was an isolated incident until I started asking the question "is your senior ready to graduate?". I keep hearing no.
The good news, is that there are ways to make sure your child graduates on time. There are local online and private schools from which the public school MUST accept credit.
If you find yourself in this position, check out
http://highschool.unl.edu/ and
http://ce.byu.edu/is/site/courses/highschool.cfm
If you can't get anywhere with the school's guidance counselors, then go to the board of education.
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First day frustrations with online classes
As I have mentioned a gazillion times recently, my son is taking classes for his Senior year with Georgia Virtual School.
He has done orientation several times and there was some kind of glitch with the software. According to the online support team, his orientation shows he finished it this morning. (Though it was his fourth or fifth time doing it.) He can access his classes tomorrow, a day late.
My problem is that it seemed that they didn't want to acknowledge that there was a software problem. It had to be due to him making a mistake. Meanwhile this kid really knows his way around a computer.
Here's hoping he can get into his classes tomorrow as assignments are due every Friday night at midnight.
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He has done orientation several times and there was some kind of glitch with the software. According to the online support team, his orientation shows he finished it this morning. (Though it was his fourth or fifth time doing it.) He can access his classes tomorrow, a day late.
My problem is that it seemed that they didn't want to acknowledge that there was a software problem. It had to be due to him making a mistake. Meanwhile this kid really knows his way around a computer.
Here's hoping he can get into his classes tomorrow as assignments are due every Friday night at midnight.
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12 grade year of homeschooling, Finishing Strong
We are almost done with my college prep series. There will still be a video on completing the transcript. Stay tuned... meanwhile, ...
