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Tina P.
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| Posted: June 29 2009 at 10:16am | IP Logged
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How can I preserve the seamlessness between learning and life that happens in elementary so that it happens in the high school years as well?
I tried the packaged curriculum route due to babies, six children homeschooling at once, and desires for accreditation and that elusive diploma last year and was not thrilled with the result. I have difficulty paying others to try to squeeze us into their vision of home schooling OR allow me to do what I would have done all along after I tweak it until it's unrecognizable. But on the other hand, I can’t award my kids a diploma or call my school accredited.
I discovered poignantly this year how if my kids don’t WANT to learn something, I can’t force them to. Well, I can, but it won’t stick with them. And I really don’t have the strength or will or desire TO force them. They surface only to eat and then hide the rest of the day until I’m focused enough to remember I have school-aged kids. :o(
One of my goals in homeschooling was that our “school” would infiltrate our lives, that there wouldn’t be any visible seams between learning and living. It’s painfully obvious that we failed that ideal this past year.
I sometimes even wonder just how much *does* a kid have to learn before he or she goes to college? There were so many classes that I took in high school that I never used again.
The next question is how can I finaggle a diploma as we navigate through high school our own way?
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Tina, wife to one and mom to 9 + 3 in heaven
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Faithr
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| Posted: July 02 2009 at 8:04am | IP Logged
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Have you ever considered Clonlara? I have looked so extensively at their high school program, especially the 'walkabout' program. I tend toward unschoolishness but when it gets to high school, so far anyway, we wind up being pretty schoolish and taking classes, working through curriculum and earning credit. So we wound up not being able to have that seamless quality mostly because my two oldest teens didn't want it that way. They wanted to do high school as a prep for college and so focused on what colleges would look for in a high school transcript.
But I would recommend going to the clonlara website and reading through it. Once you join they give you lots of info on how to take real life stuff and turn it into something that colleges would like. Their walkabout program looks really cool!
I know a couple of people who have taken this route and are quite happy with it. It fits theirs and their children's learning styles and approach to life.
Also, you might be interested in the yahoogroup for unschooling Catholics. Most of the folks on that list have younger kids but there are others who have older ones who are successfully unschooling high school.
However,
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Lisa R
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| Posted: July 02 2009 at 11:25am | IP Logged
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Tina,
I have absolutely no advice as I'm in the same boat. I have an 8th and 9th grader this year and am stressing every day! We're considering NAHRS. 
We haven't done the package curriculum route yet but it's always a "click" away for me!  I could have written your post almost word for word.
I do hope someone with more experience chimes in here with what they did. Especially concerning diplomas, transcripts and college. I'm so afraid of messing up my dc's chances for a good college education at the college of their choice!
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Lisa, married to my best friend, Ray and loving my blessings Joshua (17)and Jacob(15), Hannah(7) and Rachel (5)!Holy Family Academy
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Willa
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| Posted: July 02 2009 at 11:26am | IP Logged
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Clonlara is expensive which is one reason why I never used it. I hate paying out of pocket unless I absolutely have to.
A good book to read is Alison McKee's From Homeschool to College and Work. Even if you aren't an unschooler, the book is helpful for ideas of how to track normal life learning experiences and hobbies into an academic record.
Another one I found useful was
Homeschool Highschool and Beyond -- actually by a Catholic author. It's meant to be written to the student and I usually had my highschoolers read through it, but it has tips for designing your own courses which are useful for the parent as well as the student. Also ideas for record-keeping and logging hours.
My principle with high school is to be fairly rigorous (in our relaxed way  ) with the core classes. In math and language arts and foreign language we try to do more than the average high school. ETA: that doesn't mean we do math up beyond calculus or anything like that, just that I expect mastery in say, algebra, rather than just scraping through the course with a very shallow understanding like you can do in conventional high schools. I think most homeschoolers approach math and language arts this way. (ETA rereading, it sounds like I think most homeschoolers scrape through shallowly but I mean the opposite -- that most expect mastery from their kids in every subject)
For the other subjects --history/literature, science, religion, -- we keep a loose log of everything that "counts" towards those subjects. I can and do assign some work but I look for a way to do it that's in accordance with their natural interests and abilities.
Movies can count.
Books read for fun can count.
Real life experiences can count.
These things are all used for credit in conventional public high schools, and would be used MORE if there weren't financial and logistical constraints. As homeschools we can do things less expensively and more naturally.
Does that make sense? For example, my second-born was passionately interested in trees. He read countless books on the subject and did lots of expeditions in our national forest. He became our "guide" in identifying different varieties. All this "counted" -- not as a whole course necessarily. I had him round it out with some more general biology reading.
My daughter read and wrote a LOT about religion and Catholic living. I really never planned a religion course for her past middle school because she did way more on her own than I would have assigned her.
My oldest wanted to follow a pretty standard TAC-prep course. So I bought him MODG syllabi and we modified them as we went according to what we both thought would work better for him.
I could give more examples-- hope this is helpful. I've mentioned it before but I like the Clarkson's concept of "discipline vs discovery" classes. Only I break it up into subjects. Each subject tends to have a "discipline" component -- things they wouldn't or couldn't do spontaneously but that I think they do need. Also a "discovery" or "delight" component -- the type of things they WOULD and DO do on their own. Some subjects end up being mostly or all "discipline". Some are mostly or all "delight" or "discovery".
This works well and would work even better if I weren't so scattered
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Willa
hsing boys ages 11, 14, almost 18 (+ 4 homeschool grads ages 20 to 27)
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Willa
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| Posted: July 02 2009 at 11:30am | IP Logged
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As for getting a diploma, so far I haven't seen any homeschooler have a huge problem, whether they unschool or get an accredited diploma or somewhere in between.
My two children that are going into TAC or did go (my oldest graduated from TAC this spring) had a fairly easy time getting accepted because they did well on the SATs and their writing skills are good.
My second-born does not test well and has always been a "different" learner. He is going to community college and then will either transfer to a university or go out into the work world depending upon what he decides. Community college is a useful choice for many homeschoolers, particularly if their learning experience was somewhat unconventional or alternative, whether for "dual" highschool/college credit or as a preliminary for university.
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Willa
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Lisa R
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| Posted: July 02 2009 at 11:34am | IP Logged
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Willa,
What is TAC? Also, what did you do for Language Arts?
Tina,
I hope you don't think I'm hi-jacking your post! 
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God Bless!
Lisa, married to my best friend, Ray and loving my blessings Joshua (17)and Jacob(15), Hannah(7) and Rachel (5)!Holy Family Academy
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Willa
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| Posted: July 02 2009 at 11:49am | IP Logged
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Lisa,
TAC = Thomas Aquinas College.
For language arts we divided up the work into different "strands". Vocabulary or word study, grammar, reading skills, composition skills, and study/research skills.
How we did it would depend on what the highschooler needed and what his interests were.
My second-born wrote a full-length novel over a period of 2 years. So this "counted" towards composition since he was learning how to express himself, how to revise, etc. He read several books on plot construction, etc.
He also did a vocabulary workbook that only took 5-10 minutes a day. This was easy and fun for him because he likes words and has a good vocabulary already, and there was little writing required.
We worked on grammar for "seasons". I'd usually have all three of the older kids do a grammar course for 1 term each year. They'd also do some SAT practice and prep for a few weeks each year. This gave me feedback on some areas they might need to work on in future.
I wanted him to be able to write highschool level essays so he did a few history or literature-type papers over the four years, as well. ANd we experimented a little with the classical "progymnasmata".
Reading and conversations about great books -- the Iliad, the Aeneid, Beowulf, Gawain and the Green Knight, some Norse sagas, to name a few.
That kind of thing.... I hope it gives you the idea. It would usually end up to be more hours than actually required by our state (California) but in a more free-flowing way.
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Willa
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teachingmyown
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| Posted: July 02 2009 at 12:49pm | IP Logged
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I am looking at NARHS too. They list of potential courses is huge. There seems to be many, many ways to put credits together.
I am not sure that I will register with them, but just reading the handbook gave me lots of food for thought. I am not sure that their diploma would give dd a substantial advantage over a homemade portfolio.
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Molly
wife to Court & mom to ds '91, dd '96, ds '97, dds '99, '01, '03, '06, and dss '07 and 01/20/11
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Faithr
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| Posted: July 02 2009 at 1:19pm | IP Logged
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I started using NARHS for my oldest child her first year in high school, (now 18 and headed for the University of Dallas), while I found the way they had her keep records helpful, that was about the only thing I did find helpful. Really NARHS is not as unschooly as Clonlara. You still are putting together classes, it is just that they have lists of every imaginable text you can use. At least that is what I recall. My brain is fuzzy today!
Clonlara is pricey, which is too bad. I know one lady here in my homeschool group who is using them because she wanted to let her daughter have control over her own education and keep life and learning 'seamless' but didn't have the confidence to do it solo. She showed me all the things she got from Clonlara and you get a lot for you money! It was really detailed and well organized and really helped her figure out how to do things as well as helped her daughter think in terms of what direction she wanted to go and how she could manage her own education. Her daughter is really taking her education in her own hands. It fosters independence in a very cool way. And you get a counselor to help you along. I was very impressed by the materials. I could see using this stuff for the oldest in a 'trail blazing' way to educate myself and then having that set the stage for the children coming after. So I think it would be an investment in a way.
I, like Willa, wound up just doing things my own way without enrolling anywhere. You don't need a diploma most places and you can just make up your own if you do! College seem to really just look at the outside classes and scores (like community college stuff and SAT scores) as well as the application and what kind of activities your student did.
Willa, how did you do labs with science? That is the thing that always tripped me up and made us decide to take actual science classes outside our home for high school. My kids wanted to do the basic Biology and Chemistry requirements and I just couldn't handle high school level lab stuff at home. I knew we'd never actually do it!
We are thinking community college for my oldest son. I want him to take a course or two in his 12th grade. He has LDs and ADHD (or something, different professionals have come to different conclusions) and I just don't think he's really college material even though he is certainly smart enough! I think he needs a stronger motivation to pursue academics at the college level. Right now he's very into music and so is looking into conservatories as opposed to getting a BA. We'll see.
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Willa
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Faithr wrote:
| Willa, how did you do labs with science? That is the thing that always tripped me up and made us decide to take actual science classes outside our home for high school. My kids wanted to do the basic Biology and Chemistry requirements and I just couldn't handle high school level lab stuff at home. I knew we'd never actually do it! |
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Living way out of town we do not have access to outside support for this subject. Our JC is 50 miles away and there are no co-ops in our area. On the other hand, we live in a spectacular national forest, so science is everywhere.... just not always conventional "school science".
We just did Apologia with its lab component and the kids pretty much worked on their own. Different colleges have different science requirements. The ones my kids were interested in only called for one year of lab science.
They read books from MacBeth's High School Science site. Great resource.
I have gotten rid of our Apologia books so I will have to find some type of replacement for my present 8th grader --sigh ---
I am an enthusiastic amateur with science but do not have a strong background in the subject so I always felt that was a weakness in our homeschool -- still think so, but on the other hand it's a subject where intensive training in the early years is not really necessary -- at least, from what I've read. Conventional high school science is handicapped by lack of math understanding, for example -- so it has to be dumbed down to a point where it's almost false unless it's simple nature study.
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Willa
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teachingmyown
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| Posted: July 03 2009 at 10:29am | IP Logged
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Willa wrote:
Faithr wrote:
| Willa, how did you do labs with science? That is the thing that always tripped me up and made us decide to take actual science classes outside our home for high school. My kids wanted to do the basic Biology and Chemistry requirements and I just couldn't handle high school level lab stuff at home. I knew we'd never actually do it! |
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We just did Apologia with its lab component and the kids pretty much worked on their own. Different colleges have different science requirements. The ones my kids were interested in only called for one year of lab science.
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I am wondering about the lab science requirement. Reading through the Narhs handbook, they list many "creative" lab sciences such as cooking or working on cars or working with horses. These sound great, I am not particularly interested in dissecting frogs on my kitchen counter. However, how do these "classes" look to a college?
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Molly
wife to Court & mom to ds '91, dd '96, ds '97, dds '99, '01, '03, '06, and dss '07 and 01/20/11
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Willa
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| Posted: July 03 2009 at 11:05am | IP Logged
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teachingmyown wrote:
| Reading through the Narhs handbook, they list many "creative" lab sciences such as cooking or working on cars or working with horses. These sound great, I am not particularly interested in dissecting frogs on my kitchen counter. However, how do these "classes" look to a college? |
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Colleges seem to want outside verification, as Faith said. Often if the child is very strong in science and/or wants to make it his major, he or she will need to take AP exams or SAT II Subject tests or some sort of outside class to back up or corroborate the homeschool grade. Or that's what I've heard. If anyone else has heard differently, I'd love to hear it! My children did not need much verification for the science classes they took. I simply wrote out a transcript and their GPA was verified by the SAT -I. But this is for Thomas Aquinas College and junior college, respectively.
I wrote a bit more about this in a blog post School Science
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Willa
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Angie Mc
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More on lab science requirements at ASU.
Love,
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Angie Mc
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mooreboyz
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| Posted: July 06 2009 at 9:34am | IP Logged
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This may be of interest to you:
blessed is the man
I ordered it in advance for next year so I could organize it best for my son. It offers lots of options for kids to choose from areas like simply reading/reporting to real life work and then awards credits appropriately to help you figure out how much is necessary for a high school degree. I truly want my kids to follow their interests and learn through doing and so I plan to offer them an education like this. I also plan on having my then 13 year old do an apprenticeship depending on his interests next summer (this year he's interested in learning carpentry skills for example) and I plan to continue this throughout their high school years so they can explore their interests, learn skills, develop work ethic, and meet and deal with a variety of people.
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Jackie
7 boys - 1, 4, 7, 10, 13, 15, 17 years
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Elena
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| Posted: July 06 2009 at 3:56pm | IP Logged
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I hve been investigating Beach High School and even had some e-mail correspondence with the director. it seems pretty no-nonsense as far as getting what you need and then getting out!
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Elena
Wife to Peter, mom of many!
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4Real Forums : High School Years and Beyond
Topic: Seamlessness
