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Middle School, Oh My!
Middle School is truly my favorite age to teach! It always has been. Don’t get me wrong, it certainly comes with its own unique challenges and it is truly sanctifying work, but it can be so fun too! This is the age that our kids are coming into their own. You can really see their personalities start to develop and their specific interests & passions really begin to take off. They have a very real need for connection and relationship (both within and outside of the home), but at the same time they are becoming more & more independent. This is a perfect time to start allowing them to have…
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Homeschool. How do I even do this?
Second to questions about socialization, are questions about curriculum and how I teach my own kids. People often assume that because they aren’t trained (credentialed) teachers, they can’t teach their kids. Friends, that just isn’t true. How can I say that? I can say that because I am a trained (credentialed) teacher. Stay with me…I spent years & years and dollars & dollars to get more than one degree and multiple credentials that tell me that I am qualified to teach children. The funny thing is after all those years of training, I learned more in my first few months of being with actual students than I did sitting in…
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What’s Your Style?
To steal from the famous quote by Forest Gump, homeschoolers are kind of like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re going to get. There are so many different types of homeschoolers each with ideas and opinions that are completely right & true FOR THEIR FAMILIES. There are some that will swear by one method or curriculum and others that completely reject that one for whatever reason and embrace another approach and refuse to use any formal curriculum what-so-ever and what’s amazing about both is that each will produce amazing kids that turn out to be very productive members of society. The following is a very, very brief…
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The S-word of Homeschooling: Socialization
If you ask any homeschooler what topic they get asked about most often, I’m willing to bet it has something to do with socialization. I have been asked countless times by well-meaning & concerned friends, family, acquaintances and, yes, even strangers about my children’s socialization (or apparent lack there of). There are usually two concerns people have, one, if kids aren’t in school, how will they learn to behave appropriately around other people, and two, if kids aren’t in school, how will they ever make friends? If I’m honest, I never really gave it much thought UNTIL people started asking me about it. The more I thought about it though,…
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Getting Started
Now that you’ve decided to take the leap, where do you even begin? It can feel very overwhelming, especially if you’ve always had your kids in school where you are told what they’ll be learning, what books they need to read, and when tasks need to be completed. The first thing you need to do is take a deep breath, ask God for wisdom and direction and remind yourself that these are YOUR kids. You have been caring for them, raising them up, TEACHING them new things their whole lives! YOU CAN DO THIS!! If you are choosing to homeschool after having your kids in school, or if you are…
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Why We Homeschool
So, you’re thinking about homeschooling. That’s so great! No matter how you’ve ended up here or how long you decide to stay, you are about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime. Pre-COVID19, I would often get asked, sometimes in the most random places – grocery check-out for example (because why else would you take a bunch of kids out in public in the middle of a school day) – why I choose to homeschool. We have a whole slew of reasons – none include a global pandemic – and for the sake of this entry, I’m going to share why we love homeschooling. This will be more of…