I love reading about other homeschool families. It's interesting how vastly different each home can be. That's the great thing about homeschooling, each family can work in a way that will cater to their individual children instead of trying to fit their child into the mold of everyone else. I am not anti-public school, we just feel like homeschool is what's best for our child.
My son is in the 11th grade for the most part, that means that in some subjects he might work slower on it or in some cases has been on a different level for a class. Being an only child, he really needs the outside community for social activities. We have always been a part of a homeschool co-op. We've done the huge ones and now we are in a small group with maybe 60 kids. I love the group we are in. We meet once a week and have not only academic classes, but also focus on the social part and allowing the kids to be creative and form lasting friendships.
This year my son is taking classes in a variety of ways. He is taking Chinese through a virtual school here in Florida. I'm thankful because there's no way I could help him with this! (and he'll tell you this too!) He has Computer Technology which we are using great online videos and activities. Then we have the regular book work classes also.
We are pretty relaxed in our day. I see this as both good and bad. We sometimes get busy with life and forget to do something or put it off and all of a sudden it's bedtime:) For the most part though it works great for us. I babysit full time so I get up earlier, but my son (being a normal teen) usually gets up by 11am, gets something to eat and starts on his work for the day. Some classes are daily, some are a few times a week. He works pretty much independently except for certain parts of classes. He works on getting stuff done throughout the afternoon. He knows there are no video games and limited phone usage until he's done. We started doing this to give him the responsibility of how long school takes him. Some days he's done in less than 2 hrs, some days it will take all afternoon into the evening.
For me, I can't imagine sending him off for 8+ hours a day. I love having him home and seeing first hand what he is learning, what interests him and having the extra time when schools done to hang out, relax, see him dive into a good book, spend time with friends or head to the theme parks.
I'd love to hear about your day in the comments!
