The High School Years - 11th Grade

I began working out of the home in the summer in between my daughters 10th and 11th grade years. The timing seemed right. My daughters no longer needed me in a homeschooling capacity and they were now driving. On a friend's advice, we had not traded in my husband's car when he purchased a new one a couple of years ago, so my daughters had a reliable car to drive, even if they did have to share it, so I wasn't shuttling them around anymore. It was an odd transition for me, but they seemed to embrace this new life of mom doing her own thing, while they embarked on their own lives.

In the fall of their 11th grade year, my daughters enrolled in 12 college units. Now, in California, a concurrently enrolled high school student is only allowed to take a maximum of 11 units, but my daughters took 7 units at our local community college and then they took a 5 unit on-line math class at a college in another county, so they got away with it. It seemed like a lot for them to take on, but they were successful and ended the semester with straight As, again. I guess they really are ready and comfortable in the college forum.

During the short winter inter-session that our local community college offers between the fall and spring semesters, my daughters took a history class that they were having difficulty enrolling in. You see, as a concurrently enrolled high school student, they must register after everyone else, so many of the popular and necessary general education classes fill up before they have a chance to enroll. Taking the history class in the inter-session gave them a better chance of getting in and it worked.

For the spring semester, my girls opted for a 9 unit semester. They needed to take another 5 unit math class and a 4 unit science/lab class; and because of the 11 unit limit for high school students, they couldn't take another 3 unit class (which most classes are) and there just are not any 2 unit classes available (at least, not any that they want to take). It was difficult getting into the math class, as it was another general education class that the masses need to take. They were waitlisted, but got in.

So, just like after their 9th grade year, we were beginning to realize that my daughters' educational needs had outgrown their educational situation. Registering was becoming more difficult and the 11 unit limit was getting in the way, too. After updating their high school transcript, (I have always kept a transcript at home to use when registering for college and to just keep an eye on) I realized that with the math and science that they had just enrolled in, they had hit all of the requirements for a high school education. I contacted our ISP and asked the director to look over their transcript and see if he saw it the same way I did and he agreed.

With the high school requirements fulfilled, there was the option to graduate. This created a situation to be weighed out. Do I keep my daughters in high school another year and continue to take advantage of our local college's policy where a concurrently enrolled high school student does not pay for their units? Or graduate, so that they can enroll as a college student and end our recent enrollment difficulties by having a registration date and an unlimited number of units? Another advantage to graduation is that future college classes would not be earned concurrently, which matters to some universities when transferring. We spoke with their college counselor and she agreed that there were pluses and minuses to both, but the decision was ours. We opted for graduation and my girls began applying for scholarships and financial aid to help pay for their next year of college. As I write this, one of my daughters has received a scholarship and both of my daughters have received a Federal Pell Grant and The Board of Governors Enrollment Fee Waiver.

My daughters graduated in June in a beautiful ceremony hosted by our ISP (EIE Academy). My girls were initially not interested in participating in a ceremony, but after discussing the ceremony with Martin Forte (Co-Director of EIE), and hearing that it was a special ceremony that was really a graduation for me as well as them, I asked my girls to participate and they agreed. I am so glad that we did. Thank you, EIE, for a day to remember.

What to 'do' for me?

Well, let's see. I need to get busy doing something. Now just what will that be? It's kind of intimidating. I've been out of the traditional workforce for a long time. Prior to my 15 years as a mom and homeschooler, I worked for 15 years in the television industry and I thoroughly enjoyed it. But it is so 'all consuming' that I don't think I'm ready to commit the time I know it will demand. I still have teenagers, you know! So, what else? They say 'If you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life'. So, what do I love doing?

I've had an at home business since 2000 as an independent consultant for Mary Kay and I've enjoyed it. I love the company and its philosophy and the people that I've worked with are all amazing women, but I haven't taken the business to it's next level. I seem to have peaked with it for now and am happy with my business were it is. But I need something else... so how do I figure out what that is?

I consider getting a simple job that I don't have to put much thought into, but would get me out of the house. I even interview with a car dealership for a position as a receptionist. I am so glad that they didn't call to hire me.

To narrow down 'what I love' doing I decide to think about what has brought me happiness. I have so loved my homeschooling experience so, that has to be at the top of the list. Of course, part of that love is because it directly affected the lives of my children, but I also enjoyed the part that was making a difference in another's life. The other activity I have enjoyed is web design. I just dabbled in it for non-profits and for friends, but I need to consider that I enjoyed the process of the design and also the opportunity to be in an environment that changes so quickly that you are always in the position of learning more. With that in mind, I enter the cyber world of Craigslist to see what employment opportunities out there are related to these interests.

On Craigslist I find an ad for a web-related position at Princess Cruise Lines that I apply for. And I find an ad for a Behavior Therapist for Autistc children that I also apply for. Now, these are two very different types of positions, but they each fit my criteria for 'doing what I love'. Obviously, though, I cannot supply each position with the same resume, so I create individual resumes for each one. Which brings up another intimadating part of all this... I haven't had a resume in a couple of decades. What do I put on it! I learned from my years in television that there is no need to put dates on your resume; just experience, education and volunteer work. I also remember to keep it simple. A single page will do and include an objective that fits with the position that is being applied for. Well, I must have done something right because I heard back about the Behavior Therapist position within the week, and after an interview and another week of waiting, I got the job and I'm happy to say, a year later, I still love it!

I am a spiritual person and so I feel that this whole path was divinely orchestrated because it has all turned out so perfectly. My previous experience with special-needs children was working with Special Olympics in my late teens and early twenties and then again when my daughters earned their Girl Scout Bronze Award with a service project at Special Olympics. The employer I work for has a wonderful philosophy of life and I feel appreciated and I appreciate them. And, funny enough, when I was presented with the opportunity to meet the owner of the company, I find out that he and his wife homeschool their children. Upon further conversation in this, I discover that I know his wife from a few years back. She and I had met and exchanged emails on a few occasions. What a small world.

~Debbie in So. Cal.

The High School Years - 10th Grade for them, an awakening for me

10th Grade was our first year out of the charter. After stretching the limits of the charter in my daughters' 9th grade year, we decided to go with a private ISP (independent study program). We looked at several ISPs and also considered filing our own affidavit, but ultimately went with EIE Academy in Monrovia, CA. I had known the Fortes for years via homeschool conferences and had spoken on a homeschooling panel with Martin. Their ISP seemed the right option for us.

In the fall of my daughters' 10th grade year, I taught an economics class to them and a couple of their friends. We used "What Ever Happened To Penny Candy". I highly recommend this book to anyone, adult or teen, to assist in understanding what 'economics' is. It was a great class, but what I didn't realize is that it was also the last homeschool class that I was to teach. My plan was to teach government in the spring, but with my daughters doing so well in college, when they decided to take a political science class in the spring, I opted not to teach government. As things worked out, my daughters decided to drop the political science class, but by that time, I had decided not to teach, so I didn't try to start it up again. I was sad to think that the economics class was the last class that I would ever teach to my homeschooled daughters... and I didn't know it, so I didn't know to 'savor' the moment. I'm sure that sounds funny... to savor a teaching moment in such a way, but when it was all over in hindsight, I just wish that I would have known. It's silly. I wouldn't have done anything different. I'm just being nostalgic.

As my daughters success in community college continued, I realized that I was done homeschooling. I was so pleased and proud of their abilities at the college level and with this realization, was my own awakening to the thought of 'what's next for me'. At this point, we are in the spring, or 2nd semester, of their 10th grade year. With the girls in college, I found myself wandering around my house with more alone time than I had known in years. It was a restless and thought provoking time. Although, I was still in 'shuttle' mode. ie: I still needed to get them to their classes and social activities. But, with their 16th birthday looming near, it was obvious that not only were my homeschooling days over, but soon, so was my responsibility of being chauffeur. With that thought in mind, I decided to look for work outside the home.

~Debbie in So. Cal.

The High School Years - 9th Grade

Homeschooling high school. It's at this point when many homeschooled teens return to the public school system. In talking to the parents of these teens, it appears that the teens are not looking to learn so much more in a public setting or that they are not confident in their parents ability to provide learning opportunities to them in their high school years. It seems to be all about the 'experience'. Now contrast this to the fact that many public high school parents find the most worrisome thing about high school is the 'experience' and what they are being exposed to on campus. It's a confusing and frustrating time for all.

In California, students of high school age are allowed to attend community college. We had observed other families in our homeschool group take advantage of this option and that is what we decided to pursue.

For my daughters' 9th grade year, we stayed with the public charter and at 14 years old, my daughters took their first college class. At home, I taught two different year long classes to my daughters and their friends: English and World History. I also did a mini-study in physics and my girls took several classes through our homeschool support group. The class that they chose to begin with at community college was a counseling course. It was described as an extended orientation to what college has to offer. It was a great first class to take for a few reasons. It was taught by a counselor, who is still my daughters' college counselor to this day. It was also a hybrid class, which meant that it was taught in class and on-line, so my girls were able to familiarize themselves with how to take a class using the college's on-line classroom program. The class also had them visit several places on campus, so they had the opportunity to get aquainted with the college and on top of everything else, it was transferable to university level. The class was only 1 college unit and was only once a week for 6 weeks, but it was a perfect introduction into college classes. The experience gave them confidence and it gave me solace about my young daughters being on the college campus.

The second semester of 9th grade my daughters took three classes at the community college for a total of 5 college units. They took two computer classes and a P.E. class.

The tricky part about my girls' 9th grade year was sticking with the charter. State and federal education laws were making it more and more restrictive to homeschool high school through the public charter. It seems that there was much room for interpretation in elementary and middle school with the charter, but high school was much more controlled. The charter we were with worked with me in my girls' 9th grade year. I had to submit detailed class descriptions of the classes I taught so that the charter could approve them and feel confident about granting high school credit for what I was teaching. There was give and take to the process, but in the end, my classes were approved and went on their high school transcript. At the end of their 9th grade year, the charter informed it's high school students that they would no longer approve 'created' curriculum beginning next year. Instead, they designed several curriculum options that high school students could choose from for the various subjects. It was also decided that as a high school student, there were specific classes that had to be taught in specific years that you could not deviate from. And it remained a policy that high school students could take a maximum of 6 college units per semester. With my daughters already taking a 5 unit semester, I could see that they would be ready to take more units in a semester next year and I didn't want the charter to limit their choices. All of this led to a 'parting of the ways' for us from our charter. No hard feelings. It's just that the charter could no longer work with our eclectic lifestyle.

~Debbie in So. Cal.

Elementary & Middle School

My daughters' elementary school years, as well as their middle school years, continued to progress following our eclectic style. I practiced child-led learning. We would look at the fall as a time to begin new things. In late summer, we would make our annual trek to a local teacher supply store that I mentioned in the last post. I also listened to my daughters and investigated different ways to accomplish their learning desires. I was so fortunate to work with an E.S. from our charter who could see the progress of our ways and always seemed to approve our purchases. It was a fun, interactive lifestyle. An experience that I wouldn't alter in any way, even if I was given the opportunity to do it all over again.

That's not to say we didn't have our struggles in the beginning. We actually had a great first year. Because I pulled my daughters out of school one week into 2nd grade, we didn't have much to begin with, so homeschooling was relaxed and easy. Our next year was a different story. Me... in my 'planning' mode went overboard and created an atmosphere of "school at home". It didn't go well and after a couple of months of all of us crying over the schedule that I had created, I knew we had to alter things. I think that it's at this point that many homeschoolers give up. I've heard that the failure rate in the first year of homeschooling is 1 out of 2 give up during the first year. I didn't look at our struggles as a time to give up, I looked at them as an indicator that something had to change.

We made it through that second year and for our third year I decided to go way relaxed. I began in the fall with an attitude of just laying around on the living room floor with our projects and books all around us. It was okay, but after a couple of weeks, my daughters asked if they could go back to working at their desks in our 'school room'. My girls were happy with some structure, as long as they had input into the structure. So, through it all, we found our way. Our school life evolved into what worked for us.

And that's how the rest of our elementary and middle school years progressed. As the girls got older, I could see them taking control of their own education. For instance, (as I mentioned previously) we used a math program called Math-U-See and at the age of 10 or 11, my daughters began watching the video math lessons on their own and each girl, individually, progressed at their own pace.

These years of home education also brought me into the world of teaching classes through our homeschool support group. Being 'child-led', I'd usually extract from my girls what they were interested in and we would, together, decide if the subject would be fun to do on our own or with a group of friends. I'd then research the subject and offer it up to my homeschool group. It was a blast! I taught so many classes during those early years! It was a great way to be social and educational at the same time. My daughters also took classes that other homeschooling parents offered. A homeschooling support group is an invaluable resource.

Of course, as well as all this was working, as we headed into the high school years, I was concerned about providing what my daughters needed to have in their future. I wanted to keep as many options open for them that I could. Would they want to go to higher education or straight into the working world? I needed to be sure that I could give them the base from which they could make those decisions.

~Debbie in So. Cal.

Homeschooling: The Early Years

Okay. So now I've pulled my kids out one week after second grade has started. What that means is that I didn't have the previous couple of months to research how I was going to do this! I am such a planner, but I hadn't planned for this. I had practiced and played with the idea of homeschooling, but when my husband wanted to wait another year, that put me into the position of not to 'plan'.

So, how to start. Well, the library became a good place for us to be. And I had the used curriculum that I had bought over the summer to 'play' with. And I joined a support group. In hindsight, it was a beautiful way to begin. Since I am a planner, I would have probably over planned... which I eventually did! But these first few months, sans curriculum, were wonderful. As I look back, our limited curriculum actually allowed us to de-school. The formula for de-schooling is one month per years of institutional schooling. My daughters had attended pre-k, kindergarten and first grade, so three months of de-schooling was appropriate and we had that and more.

I did begin to research curriculum, but was greatly influenced by our success at just living the homeschooling lifestyle as we leaped in. I became an eclectic homeschooler; picking and choosing what seemed fun and interesting. Child led learning was my philosophy, as that's where my daughters led me. Their love of life and learning really chose our path. I used to begin a day asking my daughters "What do you want school to be today?" and they would verbalize a list that was so long, well there wasn't enough hours in a day! How wonderful is that? Can you tell that I LOVED this homeschooling journey?!

I was mostly concerned about teaching math and after much research I chose the Math-u-See program. The program is manipulative based and has videos to teach the concepts. The videos are intended to be watched by the parent and then taught by the parent, but we ended up watching the videos together. This worked well for us through about fifth grade and then, as my daughters began to take over their education, they started to watch the videos on their own and progress at their own individual levels with one more interested in moving through the program than the other. By 9th grade, they were about a year apart in math. You might think that would be significant, but it was the right place for them and I wasn't worried about it. Now that they are in college, it's obvious that those details were not significant. Education is not a race. We all get to where we need to be in our own time.

For other subjects, as I said, I was very eclectic. For reading, writing and english based curriculums, I mostly just read. I read aloud to my girls until there were about 12 years old. I think the last book that I read aloud was the fifth Harry Potter book (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix). I was soooo lucky to have the Harry Potter book series out during our homeschooling life. What fun that was, to anxiously await each new book. Anyway, since we all enjoyed reading the series, when the fifth book came out in 2004, my daughters were 12. We bought the books at midnight, rushed home and I read the first chapter aloud. Then we all rushed to our respective bedrooms to continue reading on our own. What fun memories! Now, I don't want you to think that the only reading we did was aloud. My daughters are voracious readers, so they devoured books on their own, as well as the books we shared aloud.

Our eclectic style brought me to the Charlotte Mason method of educating. My daughters had copy books, nature books, and a book of centuries. I practiced narration and read living books for history and applied short lessons when it seemed necessary. This is a good explanation of Charlotte Mason's methods: Charlotte Mason Methodology

Although I would say that we homeschooled year-round, our life was different according to the seasons. In the fall, we would make an annual trek to our local, large teacher supply store. I would have my daughters wander around and pick out things that interested them, while I looked around for ways to apply what my daughters had led me to teach. It was always a fun trip that we all looked forward to. Did we always use everything we bought? No way! But it was a great start to the fall season.

We tended to stop our routine schooling between Thanksgiving and Christmas, because there were always so many other things to keep us busy during that month: making holiday gifts, cooking and baking, service projects and social gatherings with family and friends.

We started back with our winter routine of schooling in January and kept with that into spring. We didn't just school at home, though. We belonged to an active support group which had many opportunities available, from classes to one-day projects. My daughters are Girl Scouts, and we often incorporated scouting activities into our homeschool life. We also took advantage of our city's parks and recreation department. And we are avid campers, so we usually began camping in the spring, as well.

Summer was more for outside activities, trips, crafts and art, sports, and more camping, of course! I believe that with math and music, if you don't do it, you lose it, so those subjects were pretty much kept up year-round. And of course reading!

Now, if you read my earlier post, you might wonder how we could live such an eclectic lifestyle while working with a charter. I have to say it was because of our E.S. She was true to wanting the most for her students and through our monthly meetings she could see that my girls were always progressing and learning. And I was good at the 'educationese' needed to turn our educational style into the language that the charter needed to record our progress, so it worked for us. I kept a journal next to my bed and I would write in it at night, right before I went to sleep. I would put in it everything we did that day. When it was time for me to fill out my report for the charter, I would refer back to my journal and I always had so much to put in the report! Our life was full of learning in a myriad of ways.

~Debbie in So. Cal.

My Journey into Homeschooling

I heard about homeschooling when my daughters were 4 years old. I had always stayed home with them, so the thought of preschool was not what I was leaning towards, but I had another friend with twins who had her older daughter in a co-op style preschool and just raved about it. I checked it out and found out that because I would have twins in the program, I would be working every-other day of the 2 day a week preschool! That seemed like enough of a parent-involved program for me, so I enrolled my daughters. It ended up being a very nurturing experience, which had everything to do with the preschool teacher, who is still a friend of mine to this day. During my time at the preschool, I met mom who was a friend of another mom in the preschool. She was very creative and hosted a wonderful dress-up Valentine's Day party for all of our 4-yr-old girls. She was eclectic and different and had a heart of gold. She was the first homeschool mom I had ever met.

Kindergarten in our neighborhood was 1/2 day and we got afternoons, which was perfect for our laid back lifestyle. I decided to put my girls into different classes and they were each fortunate to get wonderful teachers. I was room-mom for one, but the doors to the two classrooms were connected, so I was very involved with both classes. Again, we had a nurturing, hands-on experience with no forced reading or pressure. Then, on the first day of the last week of kindergarten, the school had a bomb threat called in on it. I arrived in the afternoon, only to be turned away because of the bomb threat. It was shocking and frightening. I didn't want to send my daughters to school the next day, but there were so many fun things planned for the last week, that I did return the next day and asked the teachers if I could just stay at school the rest of the final week with my daughters. They were fine with that and said that there was lots to do to close up the school year, if I wanted to help, which I did. But the experience put a thorn in my heart about school.

I had been talking to another mom about homeschooling during the year and thought that it might be something that I would do for Junior High and High School, because the look of the kids attending at that age worried me, but I thought elementary school would be harmless. After learning about the "Jonesboro Massacre" in March of '98 and our own very real bomb threat, I was now completely disillusioned about school and very stressed about sending my dear daughters into this mess of institutionalized schooling in our country.

But I decided to hang in there for another year and in first grade, my daughters were, again, in separate classes. One had a wonderful and experienced teacher, but the other got a new teacher that seemed very sweet, but was simultaneously planning her wedding while teaching her fist year. She was nice, but a little distracted. Luckily, my daughter who was in her class was a very independent worker, so she fared well. That was my first experience with a teacher that I was less than happy with, but I wasn't so unhappy or worried that I felt

that I should pull her out. I thought that we'll just get through this year. Then, in April 1999,

the Columbine School Tragedy occurred in Colorado. The town seemed so much like the one I live in. It just felt too close. And I still had memories of our previous year's bomb threat and how helpless I felt with that. My husband was out of town when it occurred and I was on the phone with him, in tears, telling him that I didn't want to send our girls to school the next day. It frightened me to my core, that something like that was possible.

The summer after first grade I attended a local curriculum faire and purchased some used curriculum to 'play' with over the summer. I also purchased a book called "Homeschooling: A Patchwork of Days: Share a Day With 30 Homeschooling Families" and read to my daughters chapters out of that book. It described a day in the life of several different homeschooling families. We had also got to know three homeschooling families. The one I met when my daughters were in pre-school; another girl from Girl Scouts; and another girl whom my daughters were in gymnastics with (who also attended our church). As the school year approached I was feeling confident about homeschooling, but my husband, who is slow to make changes, wanted to try one more year in school. I considered this decision to homeschool a family choice and without his support to give it a try at this point, I went along with his idea to put the girls in for one more year.

Our second grade school year began with another bomb threat on the second day. I was not there for this one, but you can be sure that I was at school the next day talking to the vice-principal. I wanted to know what was the procedure for this type of incident and how this particular incident was handled. After school, I went to the sheriff's department to find out what their procedures were for a bomb threat on a school. None of the answers I received were encouraging.

My daughters attended school on that day, while I stayed on campus discussing the situation with school officials and other parents. The other parents were upset, but just shrugged about what they could do about it. I, on the other hand, was prepared to take my girls out of this school. I decided to find out about inter-district transfers, homeschooling through the local school district, homeschool charters that were available in our area, as well as private independent study programs (ISP) which allowed you to homeschool. While I was investigating our options and waiting to see if my inter-district transfer would go through, my daughters went on independent study from their current school. We basically began homeschooling through our school. In the end, we were offered an inter-district transfer. So, wanting to include my daughters in this decision, I ask them separately, (explaining that their decision wasn't going to be the final decision, but we wanted to know what they thought) if they would want to attend the transfer school or homeschool. One didn't mind which way we went, the other wanted to homeschool. At this point, my husband was allowing my decision to reign. He hadn't investigated the practice of homeschooling enough to be confident about it, but he could tell that I was not going to send our daughters back into that school.

So, our homeschooling journey began on the second week of second grade. I pulled them out and, after interviewing with representatives from several of our options, went with a local charter school. We were blessed with a wonderful ES (Education Specialist, as the charter refers to the teacher that we were to meet with every 20 school days.) She was our ES throughout our charter experience. We followed her through three different charters during our time homeschooling. We left the charter after ninth grade and joined a private ISP. (More about that decision later.) I know that some don't consider belonging to a charter true homeschooling, but it was our path and it worked for us.

~Debbie in So. Cal.