One thing about me is that I’m always reading. Looking for support or for new ideas. If there is something I’m interested in, I’m looking for books, blogs, articles, etc to get more info. Given that, it makes sense that I do a lot of reading about home schooling.
Over the years I have leaned more and more toward unschooling. I’ve posted a bit about that before. That is where we have settled with my younger three kids. My oldest was using Citizens’ High School for her high school lessons. We love Citizens’ and feel it is an awesome choice for doing high school at home. My husband and I both used it our Senior year to graduate and get our diploma. It was a natural choice for us to get our oldest daughter signed up as soon as she was ready for high school. As we worked our way through the lessons and subjects though, I felt less and less sure of our choice. We were moving from such a natural way of learning and moving into “get it done and get it over with” type of thinking. No, I didn’t know why we had to do that, but we did, so just get it done. She didn’t see why she should learn this stuff and so we were fighting our way through.
But, I felt she needed an accredited high school diploma. She has no plans to go to college, but I thought she should have that just in case. I was scared that a diploma from our private school would be a problem. Then I read this article from Princeton. As you can see, they ask for many different things from their home schooled applicants but an accredited diploma is not one of them.
And I read this article about how well prepared for college home schooled kids are. There are many benefits home schooled kids get that make them ready for college. Being more independent is, to me, a huge one. Also, they are better socialized and ready for the real world. These are things that my kids are going to get out of home schooling and it doesn’t require them to use an accredited program.
I thought about why we are homeschooling. There are many reasons (I covered some here.) One huge reason is to make sure our kids keep their love of learning. The love that every child is born with and deserves to keep. My child was not loving learning from her high school classes. It was torture. It was pointless. And after reading the above articles, I realized it just wasn’t worth it.
So, we are finishing out this “year”, her freshman year, because these four subjects are paid for and we have them. She finished her language arts a while back and just finished her world history and earth science. Now we are working our way through Algebra. Slowly. Painfully. I’m trying to make it more fun and point out all the real life uses, but she hates math and this isn’t helping. I’m not worried about getting it “done on time” or anything. I’ve reminded myself that we are homeschooling so that we can go her speed. If we need to camp out on this topic, we will. I loved Algebra once I got it. I took Algebra 2 and was looking forward to Calculus and Trigonometry and I’m not really a “math person”. So, I am hopeful that I can find that switch for my daughter and turn her on to the subject too. If not, we will work through it together and not look back. 🙂
So what are we going to do?
Well, first I looked up our state’s laws to find out what was required for graduating high school. All schools in Kansas have to cover a minimum number/type of subjects to graduate their students. As home schoolers in Kansas, we run as a private school. So, we need to cover those subjects as listed and then can issue our own diploma when we decide she has met those requirements. Easy. This article also covers the typical high school subjects and some typical ways of covering them. You may want to keep track of what your child does as you go along so you can have a college portfolio ready by the end of their senior year.
We are going to go about high school in an unschooly way (I made that word up). My daughter is a voracious reader. She is always looking for new books to read. She is also very open to suggestions from me. So, for Language Arts, we are going to keep track of the books she reads and include the quality books she reads in a reading list to include in her portfolio. This portfolio is not required by the state of Kansas, but something I want to have on hand as a type of transcript of her high school years. If she decides to go to college, it will be ready to be made into a college portfolio. Since she is open to suggestions, I will be able to include a few books from lists of classics and such each library trip. She loves to write, so I’ll ask her to have small samples of her writing to include also. If toward her Senior year she starts to show interest in college, we will include practice for more essays, research papers and the like. Science will be covered by reading material she picks up at the library and field trips we fit in over the years. Knowing the science expected by the state, we will focus her reading on those topics, but she will be free to explore any subjects that grab her attention. Social Studies/Government/History/Civics will be done the same way. Mathematics is going to be slightly less unschool like. She will do a ton of learning just with life and such. She will help me grocery shop, play games, eventually get a job, etc. We will also find fun projects and activities on Pinterest to do. These will include her younger siblings and be a great way for her to learn and also integrate previously learned things deeper by teaching them. Even so, I will also have her do some time on Khan Academy each day. This is a simple way to keep her moving forward and have a way to show progress for her portfolio. This won’t have a major focus though and should only take 10-15 mins a day, so I’m hoping it won’t be a source of frustration for her. The final two subjects required are Physical Education/Health and Fine Arts. PE/Health is no problem. Think of all the ways you can cover that each year and we only have to show one year. Health is an ongoing discussion as life progresses. I’m hoping to find a CPR/First Aid class for her to take also. Fine Arts is also no issue here. My daughter is hugely into drawing and I will include samples of her drawing in her portfolio. I also will encourage her to read up on art history during her library trips and we will include these books in a reading list.
I’ve come to realize that I am not comfortable with following one line of thinking for my children as they grow and then suddenly change it for my teens. My teens are just as capable of learning what they need to know and following their interests as my younger children. I think it’s even more important for them to learn this way. How wonderful is it to have a chance to deeply develop your interests and possibly grow those interests into a career? That’s the thinking behind unschooling my kids for high school.
thelovelylittlelinewife.wordpress.com 