Well, we did it. I took my daughter for her orientation to an online school yesterday and she has been diligently pecking away since. I am not a huge fan typically of the online schools, but for us at this point in time, it was the best decision. I just hope the experience is good for her.
My son is still wishing to homeschool traditionally and I am all for that. I am actually excited to see if it changes the dynamics of his learning much with it being totally one on one now. I feel sort of lost as to how and what I am supposed to do right now, so I will be sort of flying blind for a little while as we all get into the new groove of things.
One thing that I am considering doing with the schedule is to make it a little lighter. I know that may seem off, but I found yesterday that we probably do too much. When I turned over the transcripts for my daughter, they were a little taken aback, I think by what she has accomplished. I think it is great and she did it and did well, but I think if I had taken it a little slower, maybe she would not have gotten so burned out and would have had a slightly higher GPA (not that I personally care about that, but a college may later on).
So, as it is now down to one child in my care educationally (officially), I think what I am going to do is this: Math everyday. That is a must. As is reading. Then, we will have one day that is 'fun day'. That is not a mess around day, but the day that we will focus on the 'electives' type classes and if and when we finish, we will do something together that he enjoys like start the evening meal or play a game (games are actually very valuable educationally, so I have no problem with that). The other four days of the week, we will do our math and reading 'musts' and then focus on one of the core. English, History, Science. I am doing this because I find that we get carried away with whichever of these subjects that we start first and then are rushed or delete the others, so I think if we do a focus on one of them and do not stress about getting carried away, but rather allow it, we will actually accomplish more in the end. That accounts for four days of the week. We have a day that we go to an outside gym/swim class and that interrupts the day pretty significantly, but it is a must for my son as he needs the outside contacts. So, the fourth day is going to be morning on the 'musts' and afternoon on the outside activities. He can then use the evening or later afternoon for catching up on anything that he may need to spend a little extra time on for that week.
I am not sure that we will stick to this plan, but I am always trying to make it more enjoyable and to enhance the learning, so while Anna is embarking on her new journey, we will embark on our new journey as well with Nate.
Blessings to all in the new year and best wishes to you on all your own personal journeys.
No comments:
Post a Comment