How does home schooling work?

How does home schooling work?

• I have three kids in 7th,4th,3rd grade and was thinking of home schooling them anybody that has experience give me some information on the subject. Thanks

• Answer:

  YA doesn't allow answers long enough to cover the basics for all your questions. Therefore I will point you to helpful websites as I address some of the basics: The best website IMHO is A to Z. Start with the Beginning to homeschool page then look at page for your state (I am assuming you live in n the US): http://homeschooling.gomilpitas.com/directory/Beginning.htm Pay close attention to the laws for where you live. The laws in the US vary greatly from state to state. In some states it is high regulated whereas a handful of states has no regulations. Curricula: I wish I could say that there was some method to find the perfect fit for both the student and the parents. However I have found it isn't that simple. What might seem to be the perfect curricula to you might go horribly wrong for you child. I've found that most parents who give up in the first yr or 2 think that they were a failure at homeschooling when it is more likely that the curricula didn't fit the learning style and interests of the student. Time spent homeschooling depends on several factors from the students age to the laws where you live. Some state set the minimum hours per day and/or days per year. We used to homeschool a lot during the summer and take our vacations/breaks in the off season. However as the kids got older we found that most of their activities revolved around the typical public school calendar. Now we stick to the local calendar for summer and Christmas break, but we work the rest of our beaks around our schedule. Finally here are few curricula suggestion that I have first hand experience with. I have not included courses we were not happy with unless I have an explanations included. Links are not provided with each individual item and some links are separated by a space due to YA's restrictions on number of links allowed in a single answer. Science: Great Science Adventures- http://www.commonsensepress.com/greatscience/default.htm Power Basics Chemistry (order from rainbow resource center linked below). The textbook is a bit more rigorous than described. It is a good course but was a bit advanced by my 6th grader. Connect the Thoughts Upper Level Science Basics and Biology & Human Health Language Arts: Easy Grammar & Easy Writing- http://www.easygrammar.com/index2.html Writing Strands: http://www.writing-strands.com/home.asp Handwriting Without Tears- http://www.hwtears.com/ Megawords- http://www.learningthings.com/searchresult.asp Math Singapore Math- http://www.singaporemath.com/ Teaching Textbooks: http://teachingtextbooks.com/ Foreign Language Lively Latin: http://livelylatin.com/site/index.php History: Story of the World: http: //www.welltrainedmind.com/store/history-... (I would recommend using in with History Odyssey level I instead of buying the SOTW activity pages) History Odyssey: http://www.pandiapress.com/history_odyssey.htm (also has science but I did not find out about them until my daughter was too old for the courses they currently offer in science) Power Basics World History II (order from rainbow resource center linked below) We order most of ours from: Learning Things: http:// www.learningthings.com/index.asp Rainbow Resource Center: http:// rainbowresource.com/index.php Connect The Thoughts: http:// www.connectthethoughts.net/ Here is a list of free and inexpensive resources I have gathered over the years.. We have not used all of them as of yet: http:// homeschooling.gomilpitas.com/materials/F... http:// www.freelyeducate.com/ http:// homeschoolbuyersco-op.org/ http:// charlottemasoneducation.com/ http:// amblesideonline.org/ http:// www.k-12freehomeschool.org/ http:// www.help-4-your-homeschool.com/free_home... http:// www.msnucleus.org/curriculum/curriculum....