This is how Kalina feels when the barista spells her name right!
Despite sending Apollo off to kindy, I’m not quite going to be alone this year. Tilly will begin her second year of community college. Enoch (10th grade) and Kalina (9th grade) will be homeschooling.
Yes, we did enroll Kalina in school for the second half of last year. I enrolled her specifically hoping she would get help with math. Her hearing loss that wasn’t diagnosed until age 12 means she has some holes in her education. Unfortunately, she wasn’t getting the help she needed at school. Despite talking with the school three weeks before she began, she didn’t get her FM device until 4 days before school was out. She was put in a math class and not supplied with a math book. She literally came home with random numbers written on a piece of paper and told me she needed to graph them. “Let me see your book” I said. “I don’t have one“. Nope, not enough books her in school, therefore only the kids in advanced math had math books. When I talked to her teacher and informed him she needed a math book so I could help her, I was told to just “look it up on YouTube“. By the way, I pointed out her 504 plan, and she was given a math book. I won’t go into it all, suffice it to say, she was not getting the help she needed.
For the 2015-2016 school year, I have both Enoch and Kalina enrolled in a math class. It is expensive, but worth it. We have tried Teaching Textbooks, Key to Algebra and Switched on Schoolhouse. None of these have worked well for my children; they need an actual teacher. Judah and Tilly both ended up taking their math classes at the college, which is fine, but even more expensive than the class I have Enoch and Kalina enrolled in.
I will be teaching Enoch, Kalina and a friend’s son English. I am coming up with a written plan and schedule where we will cover basic written grammar and writing skills (I’ll update with the actual plans later). I want to make sure these three are prepared for college. Enoch will continue with Switched-on-Schoolhouse for science and social studies. Kalina’s science and social studies will be supplemented with plenty of documentaries. I also plan to utilize iBooks Textbooks for iPad.
Mordecai and Jubilee are off to 7th grade. Hezekiah will be in 6th, Avi and Tucker in 4th and Apollo in kindy.
What are your plans for the upcoming school year?
Since last year was sketchy, I decided that detailed lesson plans were in order for this year. We are on week 3 and so far so good. The illness we have all had has not helped us out much but I anticipate good things this year! I do have my girls taking a science tutorial. I wasn’t going to but after hearing the teacher speak, I decided I’d be crazy not to join. It adds an extra hour of driving to my week but it will be worth it.
Sounds like you’re on track. Best of luck!
My kiddos are headed off to school on Tuesday. Michael is 6th, Casey is 5th, Peyton 3rd, Grace 1st and AJ will be at home with me
Grace is heading off to 1st grade? Wow!
I used some Khan Academy, online with my kids–it’s quite useful.
We have used it too, but found for my kids, nothing beats an old school math teacher.
We’re working three different plans – kind of like you, but on a smaller scale ;D
Wyatt (Grade 12) is doing Running Start at the community college.
Tate (Grade 10) is half-time homechool (civics, econ, English) and half-time public high school (maths and foreign language).
Gunnar (Grade 8) is my only FT homeschooler.
Lots of transition.
At least you have a plan(s). That’s always a good place to start!
An option for those who aren’t able to find a real teacher is a “virtual” one. My children have all done very well with http://www.derekowens.com He is an excellent teacher and the kids learn to take notes, too. Our 11th grader is breezing through pre-calculus at the local college. You don’t see him in the videos, but you hear him and see everything he would be writing on the blackboard if you were in an actual classroom with him. Well worth the $$
We’ve got a 2nd grader son and a 6th grade daughter- both unschooled. My second grader is autistic and is working through phonics. My 6th grader has decided to study pre-algebra and …… rodents!
Pre-algebra and rodents! What a mix…don’t you love motivated learners?
I am graduating one by December {wahoo I made it!}… then I have a junior, a 7th grader that wants to graduate by 16, and a 4th grader who still hates to read but I’ve still managed to teach her to do it. Nothing new on our list this year – oh except Visual Latin {11th grader wanted to learn latin}.
Congrats on graduating one! Visual Latin, that sounds interesting.
How are Tucker and school getting along? We just had to pull our 1st grader to homeschool her… She’s our ‘thinker’ and it just wasn’t working. Reading your update made me wonder about your thinker 🙂