Homeschooling

[brushtrooper]

Been HS'ing for about 10 years with the oldest and the youngest knows nothing different.

Pros:

• Everything can be a educational outing (vacations, day trips, etc...) as a HS'er you tend to look at all trips as a way to do some history or educational outing. e.g. we did the colonial triangle (virgiana) for Christmas (williamsburg, yorktown, richmond) as well as a week in D.C. So the kids got to see the places they were studying or will study for American history
• You set the curriculum (cater to the kids pace and likes, but you still have to do things they don't like at times)
• There is an ENDLESS amount of resources on the internet
• Texas is very pro-homeschool, unlike some other states
• You don't have to do it alone. There are co-op organizations, which we are part of one. So this is a hybrid system where your kids go to a "school" one or two days a week and the rest of the week they are doing their work at home, etc...
• You don't have to be an expert in everything. There are resources for your kids to get classes in topics you are not good at or don't have experience in
• If you do things right, you'll see your kid become way more proficient at self-study and being able to think on their own.

Cons:

• it's a lot of work. there are parents that do homeschool and I feel sorry for their kids, as they aren't learning anything.
• You have to be diligent
• You have to be a hard*** with them at times
• There will be crying, both you and the kids
• There will be times you want to quit, but you have to stick it out
• Your kid will begin to think on their own and question everything..HAHA...get ready for debates, that's all I have to say

This^^^^^
We HS'd both of our boys. One is in College now and the other is in the Army. My Son that chose the Army, the main thing we had to produce was a diploma for them to verify. There are online options such as Connections Academy out of Houston ISD I believe and another one is Time For Learning, I believe that one is on line type of curriculum and not affiliated with any public school like Connections Academy. In our area, we have a group that has grown almost into a school type setting where parents teach classes to the kids. they do field trips, sports etc.

[gingib]

How do yall have time to homeschool a kid daily? Seems like a full time job lol

Personally, I would not have time. Plus already paying school taxes. And want my kids in sports and socialized so that is my only worry

[glen]

You will be told that there are competitive sports. If your child is an athlete and it is what they want they will not like the programs. We had a kid come out that he and his parents thought he was a top notch prospect. He could not make a good travel squad even though for years he had been praised. Again it may not be a factor as all kids have different wants and dreams - they can participate in a league but it’s not the same

[DRT]

If you have a child that is exceptional on either side of the curve the public school system will fail them. That said that doesn't make you qualified to help them succeed.

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[doppelganger]

Another thing about HS'ing is that you can teach topics that are not taught in public school anymore or only a select few.

for example, my oldest has had 4+ years of latin, which she fought us on the first couple of years, but we kept telling her, stick with it, it'll pay off. Now, she is a language nerd. She is always trying to teach herself new languages. She's really into Arabic right now, but she reads about french, german, spanish, etc... she's not proficient in them, but she has a real interest in linguistics, which probably couldn't happen in public school. Latin has paid off for her now because she understands that many languages she's into have a latin base and she gets the meaning even if she doesn't know the language. Yes, we always "told you so" ever so often when it comes to languages and studying latin.

She also had to take Logic classes, which she found very interesting.

So, there are some great things about HS'ing that open up a whole new world to you and your kids that public school at times cannot provide or just don't even provide.

[jefandaward]

We homeschool our two daughters and use Sonlight curriculum. When I travel for work, we all go together and we can take fishing or hunting or garden trips whenever is best.

[mexecodog]

If you homeschool, either you or your wife please don't forget to teach them how to call odd or even in three man coin toss!

[rjtkdplus]

We've home schooled for over 20 years. My Daughter's first public school experience was and is Texas A&M University where she is a Junior majoring in Biological Sciences.(Scholarships and grants have paid for all tuition and books so far).Our Home school Co-op has a College Fair every year with reps from more than 80 colleges present. My son is a high school junior and his math, science, music and social skills are way beyond mine when I was his age.(probably beyond mine now). The most rewarding Pro for us is getting to spend more time with our kids(they still grow up too fast). The "Socialization" concern is non existent in our kids and never has been an issue. Between Church, football, baseball, soccer, 4-H, Boy scouts, Music lessons I guess they had no choice. On that same subject, I teach other people's public, private and home schooled kids 4 days per week and there are some who are awkward, loners, aggressive, nice, mean, loud, unruly, quiet, reserved etc. from all of these types of schools. As someone said earlier we all have different personalities. Another major pro is that you can tailor how you teach to your child's learning style (mine were totally opposite). As for events, prom, graduation etc. our co-op has done an extremely good job of organizing these.

The only con I have seen is the workload for the parents, it's a full time job especially in high school.

I don't consider having to be the "bad guy" a con because that's something we have to do no matter how we choose to school them.

[lovemylegacy]

How do yall have time to homeschool a kid daily? Seems like a full time job lol

Personally, I would not have time. Plus already paying school taxes. And want my kids in sports and socialized so that is my only worry

It is a full time job. Then there is the extra-curricular activities that we still have to pay for. Paying school taxes...well that's the price homeschool parents pay, but there are people that pay school taxes that have no children.


I will throw this in the ring. My oldest wanted us to homeschool him the last 2 years of high school, but my wife was very insecure about it and did not do it, but this woke her up. When we had our 4th, we started planning on homeschool.

[lovemylegacy]

We homeschool our two daughters and use Sonlight curriculum. When I travel for work, we all go together and we can take fishing or hunting or garden trips whenever is best.

Another plus....we have taken hunting trips and homeschool goes with us.

[lovemylegacy]

If you have a child that is exceptional on either side of the curve the public school system will fail them. That said that doesn't make you qualified to help them succeed.

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Of course it does, the parent is the most denominator of a childs success, homeschool or not.

[bigdawg]

My wife homeschooled all 4 of our children, we now have 3 daughters with college degrees and the oldest and youngest daughters are going for their masters. My middle girl has a career and is doing well for herself. We stopped homeschooling my son his sophomore year to put him in private school so he could play sports because he was very good at them and he is a straight A honor roll student and the most popular kid in school. My kids stayed busy with sports and church activities and all have excellent social skills and are productive members of society. My wife took the girls to test into college and the Dean told her that they love homeschool students because they do well and bring up the schools GPA. My goal was to have 4 kids with college degrees and I have 3 out of 4 there so far and my son graduates this year and will be the last one to get his degree. I was very happy that my wife did this and it worked out well for us. I'm proud of what all my kids accomplished in school and in life. The bad thing is that I had to pay school taxes the whole time my kids were homeschooled even though they didn't go to public school along with all the homeschool supplies and I pay them and Private school tuition for my son now.

[savin yours]

We HS our two boys, well my wife does 99% of it(I’m a shift worker). We are very blessed because she works full time from home and is still able to HS them. This is our second year and it seems to be going pretty well. Our neighbor is a PS teacher and she is giving them a placement test, just for us to know where they are, very soon. Like stated above, there are pros and cons. But the pros are pretty outstanding.....History lesson by the pond
Hunting with me during the week
Vocational training in the shop



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[sierracharlie338]

We HS our two boys, well my wife does 99% of it(I’m a shift worker). We are very blessed because she works full time from home and is still able to HS them. This is our second year and it seems to be going pretty well. Our neighbor is a PS teacher and she is giving them a placement test, just for us to know where they are, very soon. Like stated above, there are pros and cons. But the pros are pretty outstanding.....History lesson by the pond
Hunting with me during the week
Vocational training in the shop



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Nicely done!


Sierracharlie out…

[ferrellv]

I'm homeschooled and I love it. Being homeschooled has allowed Me to work full time take college classes at night and also start my own welding business. All while maintaining a B average. I would recommend homeschooling to anyone.