I have some questions...thinking of homeschooling

[Ali Kat]

Lately I feel like the Lord has put on my heart to homeschool my children. However, I am not the most organized person and though I have a degree in education, I am afraid I am not smart enough to teach my kids as they get older. Like when they get to advanced math and science?

Also, my first grader has learning disabilities and is on an IEP. How does that work when a child is home schooled?

And how do I find a co-op of homeschoolers in my area?

Any advice/suggestions would be terrific. Thanks so much!
~Ali

[Sealed]

Hi Ali:wave Have you tried googling your state + homeschooling? That is how I found our local and state (TN) homeschooling groups/ co-ops.

You could start at the HSLDA website. I believe they have links to all states. I am sure that there you can read about your state laws, different ways to register, umbrella schools, ect...

As far as being organized....well I am pretty much disabled in that area. :aha
My post should prove that! I had the same concerns as you: I am very disorganized, and how am I going to teach harder subjects once we get to them. However, I always remember that very clear calling from our Lord to HS, and that sort of puts all the fears to rest. I am sure that where I am called, He is there to help and provide.
And He has.

There are alot of options out there once your kids get into advanced subjects. You can find classes on DVD and online schools. There are co-ops, tutors.

My son, who is 12, has a language processing disorder and is a slow learner. HS has been the best thing for him! After 6 years of PS we decided he needed to be out of there! He is really doing well with HS. One great aspect of HS is that the education is customized.

Well, I hope that I have been some help. Here is the HSLDA site. Look at the column on the right side of the page. It will have 'In your state'. Click on that.http://www.hslda.org/Default.asp?bhcp=1

God bless you and your family!

[NewWorldOrder]

There are so many things to tell you, it will be difficult to put it in one post let alone one thread.

Know this, however, you can homeschool your children because nobody knows your children like you do. The first thing you will need to do is get educated on the homeschool laws in your state, and start reading books about homeschooling.

As far as the advanced classes, we send our daughter to a homeschool co-op where she gets the teaching for those classes. The best way to find them is to ask every homeschooler you run into. Also, if there is a homeschool related store near you, they should information on any groups in your area. http://www.HSLDA.org has information on the major homeschool groups for each state, and sometimes for each county in each state.

I don't know how to answer your question about IEP, because I don't know what that is. This forum is very informative, so you may want to read as many of the threads here as you can, starting with the sticky's at the top of the forum.

If you have any other questions, just ask.

[Itiswell]

Ali Cat,

Pray about it and don't be intimidated by "the experts" in the public school arena. Remember you and a public school teacher have different goals: the public school teacher can't be the advocate for your child the way you are - they have to worry about pleasing the parents of the thirty other children in your son's class, the principal, the school board, and meeting state objectives. You have to worry about teaching your son within the parameters of the Lord's will.

As mentioned by Sealed and NewWorld Order, there are many resources available to homeschoolers. We have been homeschooling three children for 4 years now, one was always "gifted" in ps, one was average in ps, and the other one was absolutely lost. By the end of second grade, he could barely read (coming from a family of readers who indulge in very little TV), had a speech impediment, and was doing very poorly in math. We decided to hs all three children.

Although the teachers were stymied regarding how to approach our ds's needs, I began getting him therapy. I took him for testing by a neurodevelopmental opthamologist and found out he had some global processing issues, including having missing visual fields because he had not learned to use his eye muscles (I never noticed he was like an owl, he didn't move his eyes to track, he moved his head). After some intensive therapy, his eyes and processing were corrected, now he is in speech therapy to clean up his enunciation of letters and blends. The change in his attitude toward school work was amazing because now he has the physical skills to accomplish his goals. He has gone from below average on his Iowa scores to 2-3 grades ahead in every subject. He was languishing in school, but because DH and I wanted the very best for him, he is now excelling.

BTW, this was not at the expense of our other children, my ds, who finished 8th grade this year tested at the "13th plus" grade level in nearly every subject on the Iowa tests, and my dd who finished 6th grade this year tested 4-5 grades ahead.

Although I talked about academics because that is what you were concerned about, I think the real advantage with hs is character development. You get a real handle for each child's strengths and weaknesses like never before, enabling you to teach to his heart and to pray for him in a very specific way.

[bookworm1711]

Dear Ali Kat,

May the Lord richly bless you as you seek the best for your children.

You state at Post 1,

Lately I feel like the Lord has put on my heart to homeschool my children. However, I am not the most organized person and though I have a degree in education, I am afraid I am not smart enough to teach my kids as they get older.

I wish more parents would respond to the Lord's call to home school their children!

As for organization, you'll be able to work out a system or follow a system, as required, with most likely the minimum of difficulty.

The fact that you have a degree in education may help fend off criticism from the powers that be when it comes to home schooling.

I was very concerned about the legality and repercussions of home schooling when we started many years ago. I attended a home schooling conference, and posed the question of what legal opposition might I get. Because I have an extensive college education myself, and a very large personal library of suitable materials, the attorneys at the conference told me no judge would ever attempt to confront me, not even with a twenty foot pole. Turns out they were right.

I am now a retired public school teacher, having served as a reading specialist for many years, a writing consultant, an English teacher, history teacher, and briefly a mathematics teacher. I helped set the standards for my state assessment in writing.

As for being smart enough, don't worry about it. If you already have earned a college degree, there is even less reason to worry about it. You can always learn a bit faster than your children. And when you get to the point of not being able to keep up with them, that's just fine. Let them forge ahead on their own. There is no limit, in home school, to what children can learn. Don't hold them back!

When I taught in public school (from 1962 until 2001) my philosophy was that I was eager to help every student learn as much as they possibly could. Then administrators who do not know as much about education as I do started to insist that I formulate lesson plans according to their requirements, and teach according to a mandatory pacing chart, with all students on the same page. Utter nonsense!

My youngest son did not start reading fluently until after age 10. My oldest son knew how to read as well as my high school students by the time he was three, and could read well at age two, and knew his alphabet and could say it by heart at age 16 months. Local educators were concerned about my youngest son because his speech was not clear; they said he was "retarded" and would never amount to anything (what an awful thing to say in front of a child to his parents!). I think because of my extensive college background in graduate school in the field of linguistics that I knew more about speech pathology and correction than they did, not to mention reading instruction. My son's speech is now perfect, his writing skills are perfect, he taught himself how to write computer software and wrote the program now used nationwide in funeral homes to create living memorials on CD, and is now writing a program for another industry which will shortly be used nationwide. Meanwhile he is vice president of the company he works for. As I predicted when he was little, he will do just fine.

No two children are alike, and it is unrealistic to suggest they should be. The current emphasis with the No Child Left Behind program is utter nonsense, and a disservice to our schools and students.

If no one seriously objects to my rambling comments, perhaps I'll write another post in answer to the other questions raised in the Opening Post later.

[DebJo]

Ali Kat you have found one of your greatest resources.:thumb These Lady's know there stuff. I have gained so much from them. :thankyou
I am very disorganized. If I can do it anyone can. I have to say I think I have gotten school pretty organized in the past 4 years. Hasn't rubbed off on other areas of my life yet.:ohno Hoping it will.
Praying for you. If you have a clear desire to HS you can do it. Soak up all you can here. These people are great.

[Ali Kat]

Thanks so much, you all are such an inspiration and a wealth of information. Hopefully, we will figure this all out. We are going to go to the next hs convention that is near our hometown. Then maybe dh will be a bit more on board. Thanks again!!