Partner Involvement

[VisionaryMom]

For those of you who are the primary educators in your family, how much involvement does your partner have? My husband is very concerned about what we will be learning. We started doing some assessments yesterday and will continue very "homeschool-lite" for the next 2 weeks. The kids will have a week at Grandma & Grandpa's (), and I'll spend much of that week on preparations for August homeschooling.

Last night, DS gave DH a play-by-play of what we did, and he probably will show DH his work tonight. I assume that's a novelty that will wear off in time, but I'm wondering how much I should update DH. How do you handle it? (I suppose my question is more for people with spouses who are reluctant about homeschooling, but I'm happy to hear from everyone.)

[luv2homeschool]

At first my dh wanted to know what we were doing in "school.: But, that did wear off. After 3 years he has relaxed and is adamant we NEVER send our kids back to PS! I share with him major accomplishments, but for the most part he knows what we are doing by listening to the girls discuss different things.

[Momma Aimee]

DS1 loves to show dad his stuff at night, and when he does really good stuff -- like a clearly written letter he has never made clearly before, i make sure to save it out to show DH.

I blog a lot of what we do and DH reads that.

when i choose a new work book, i show it to DH and point out why i choose it -- but not everything or Dh's eyes glaze over.

I assume, or plan, that as we do more and more -- i will have a file each night of the "work done that day" and of course it will be checked off my master list. Dh will be free to shift though that at will, and I will keep noting "mastery" things to show him -- things one of the boys has done for the first time, or done a lot better ...

My freind just had her oldest grad homeschool high school in the spring of 09 and has 7 kids in school now. They all have their work area and their dad looks though it at night if he gets a chance and they younger are all anxious to show dad when they get home.

I think if you have an order to your stuff, whatever order that is, then the "coming home at night parent" can look though stuff with ease.

DH and I talk about plans (eg this fall we are going to do human body and magnets for basic science stuff, very inofrmally) and DH will suggest stuff (growing beans in glass jar). Dh has recently started saying stuff he wants to do.

One thing i personaly do not do -- is run every detail by him. I told him i vas thinking Human Body this fall with a tie in to eating healthy and good food ... when the times comes i'll hsow him a book or 2 and tell him why i chose them. IF he has a prob he will speak up .. but i do not drag him into every detail.

I told DH by the time both boys are in 1st and over -- i want to do a weekly sit down and fast copver their work and where we stand ...but nothing big.

[elus0814]

In an average week the only information my husband gets on what we're doing is what the kids show him. Sometimes we do work on the weekends or during the evening and he see that but doesn't participate and teach anything unless I ask him although he is a flight instructor and has done lessons with the kids on how airplanes fly and the parts of airplanes. He's never gone to a convention, but only because he has never been able to coordinate time off of work to be able to travel to one. I'm pretty sure he would go if he could.

When we first started homeschooling, a little over a year ago, he didn't seem to want to talk about it at all and just left it up to me. Now he likes discussions about curriculum and things much more, I think it just took some time for him to get used to the whole idea. We had never planned on homeschooling but it was our only reasonable option after we moved and our new state wouldn't allow our oldest into the appropriate grade because she missed their early (IMO) age cut off by a few weeks when she had been a few months older than the cutoff in our previous state (and there were no exceptions).

[VisionaryMom]

Originally Posted by Momma Aimee

I blog a lot of what we do and DH reads that.

I've started blogging what we're doing. DH has some bizarre opposition to reading blogs, but I may send him a link to the homeschool one to check out.

Originally Posted by Momma Aimee

when i choose a new work book, i show it to DH and point out why i choose it -- but not everything or Dh's eyes glaze over.

DH is like this about some subjects. When I was excited about the map skills book I got, he didn't get it. OTOH, he insists that we do spelling in K, which I find unnecessary, and he spent tons of time choosing an appropriate spelling book.

Originally Posted by Momma Aimee

I assume, or plan, that as we do more and more -- i will have a file each night of the "work done that day" and of course it will be checked off my master list. Dh will be free to shift though that at will, and I will keep noting "mastery" things to show him -- things one of the boys has done for the first time, or done a lot better ...

DS wants to keep a notebook, so I'm putting together a binder for him. I suppose DH could go through that. I also am using a teacher's plan book with what I intend to do each day. I don't want to overwhelm DH, but I also want him to know we're doing academic work for when I have the inevitable discussion next year about not homeschooling again.

Originally Posted by Momma Aimee

DH and I talk about plans (eg this fall we are going to do human body and magnets for basic science stuff, very inofrmally) and DH will suggest stuff (growing beans in glass jar). Dh has recently started saying stuff he wants to do.

DH wanted to see the overall list I have. I showed him what I posted here w/ math, science, and social studies. We both feel that reading is the biggest skill DS needs to learn this year, but DH is much more concerned that it will get done than I am.

Originally Posted by Momma Aimee

I told DH by the time both boys are in 1st and over -- i want to do a weekly sit down and fast copver their work and where we stand ...but nothing big.

This is similar to what I'm thinking. We did talk about the kids doing a sort of "show and tell" presentation at the end of each month to talk about what they learned. I think that will help. I don't want to disregard his concerns, but I also don't think they're particularly realistic. He's worried we will miss some big subject area that ps are doing, but I'm not so concerned about that.

[laohaire]

So far DH has known about everything, but he's just superinvolved anyway. It's not checking in, it's just interest.

Also he does some stuff himself, and will do more as DD gets older. (His areas of expertise are computers and history, so those aren't really the primary things now).

Do any of your partners actually do much of the homeschooling?

[VisionaryMom]

Originally Posted by elus0814

We had never planned on homeschooling but it was our only reasonable option

Our situation is the same re: best option we have. Getting services for gifted children here is like pulling teeth. We talked to folks in our public district who said the prevailing belief is that children shouldn't be differentiated until 4th grade, which we felt would be a complete disaster (and disservice) for our children. The private choices weren't better. One is evangelical, so we wouldn't consider them. One said they'd do computer-based differentiation, which we could handle. They filled up quickly, though, so we couldn't both kids in. The other private school administrators seemed to believe that all of their kids are gifted, though DS is working well above where their kids are. So we just felt that to move DC along on a good trajectory, we needed to homeschool. All of that is to say that DH is concerned we will miss topics and harm our children's academic progress.

[ChinaDoll]

He listens to me discuss curriculum, helps me organize the room, pays for the curriculum, reads read-alouds and Bible at bedtime, and has occasionally taken them on a field trip or served as a guest speaker on a topic we're studying. Sometimes we save science experiments for his day off (Friday). Mostly he's not involved on a daily basis besides the evening read-alouds, but he's as involved as he can be with his job. He's supportive and interested, and that goes a long way. Oh, and he's sometimes an on-the-phone disciplinarian/principal

[Marimami]

I suppose we're probably unusual but we pretty much completely share our homeschooling responsibilities. I am the working parent; DH is a SAHD.

But, I do tons of research. DH does too. We keep a wiki page full of ideas. I tend to work on reading/spelling/art. DH does all her activities with her, field trips, outings. He does math and science, but I'll also do science with her. We both do a mix of social studies with her. We're pretty informal/eclectic though. We just both naturally have our own interests and strengths that we carry over with our homeschooling responsibilities.

If I had to slice it up, I'd say I do a lot more research and he spends a lot more day-to-day hours with her. But, in the end I'd say we are both contributing fairly evenly and we make decisions as a team, including DD.

Holli

[elus0814]

Originally Posted by VisionaryMom

Our situation is the same re: best option we have. Getting services for gifted children here is like pulling teeth. We talked to folks in our public district who said the prevailing belief is that children shouldn't be differentiated until 4th grade, which we felt would be a complete disaster (and disservice) for our children. The private choices weren't better. One is evangelical, so we wouldn't consider them. One said they'd do computer-based differentiation, which we could handle. They filled up quickly, though, so we couldn't both kids in. The other private school administrators seemed to believe that all of their kids are gifted, though DS is working well above where their kids are. So we just felt that to move DC along on a good trajectory, we needed to homeschool. All of that is to say that DH is concerned we will miss topics and harm our children's academic progress.

We had the same sort of situation. Our daughter went to preschool (at a parochial school) in new york state then my husband received new orders (military) and we moved to florida. NY has a dec. 1st age cutoff so dd was fine but FL has a sept. 1st age cutoff and with her sept. birthday was not allowed into kindergarten (after being told she was going to be in kindergarten). Because this district FL does not offer public preschool we were told she would be a new student and not a transfer and was therefore subject to FL state age restrictions.

They went on to say that she was welcome to begin kindergarten the following year, which would be next month. We explained that she was already reading and doing addition/subtraction and to make her wait a year to begin a program where the first quarter is spent learning the alphabet and how to count to 20 would be a disservice to her and could cause behavior problems due to boredom (I went through the same thing as a child). So, after looking up the kindergarten curriculum we realized she already could do most of it so we spent the past year doing advanced k material and began first grade work a couple months ago (three months before the state claims she would have been ready to being learning her abc's).

Now we're getting ready to move again and are again going to a state with a no-exceptions 5 by sept. 1 for k and 6 by sept. 1 for first age policy. We're going to keep homeschooling this year but may attempt to get her into a gifted type second grade program next fall. I really enjoy homeschooling but am finding it very difficult to accomplish the work with a toddler around plus we're expecting another baby in a couple months. I know that with the addition of the baby keeping up with the work will be even more difficult. Compounding the problem is my husband's deployment schedule, he'll be away three months out of every year. I'll be lucky to get the laundry done and get to sleep by 3am let alone accomplish school lessons. We're moving to another rural area so taking time off to go to zoos and museums isn't an option and the kids really enjoy their 'school' time so I don't want to take it away. It seems like homeschooling is the only logical option.

sorry, that became long-winded.

[briansmama]

DH reads to our oldest ds every night, and the book selection is tied to what we're focusing on during the day.

Right now ds and dh are reading 100 Things You Should Know About Ancient Egypt and Cleopatra. During the day I tie in fun activities based on the reading (we made sugar cube pyramids, for example, and now we're working on a lapbook). Dh sees the results when he comes home.

I take the kids to the library 1 day each week and both ds will pick out books they've mentioned an interest in (usually science and/or history based) and we select books based on those areas of study. Dh knows about every single interest and area of study simply because oldest ds wants someone to read him the books (he can read, but he's not quite advanced enough for the level of the books he chooses).

So, dh is very active in thier learning process by following their lead and making time to read to them, but I do all the planning and book holds, ordering, field trip planning, activity research, etc. He will send us link throughout his work day if he comes across interesting tidbits in the news that tie in with what we're learning. It works out really well!

Bonus: Dh and I are both learning so much right alongside the kiddos, and that's pretty cool.

HTH

[mountainmama2]

It sounds like you DH is a bit uneasy with the homeschooling decision. That's totally understandable. It's a huge undertaking. My DH was exactly the same way at first and like one of the other posts, he now won't even consider sending them to PS and is generally hands off. Mainly because he's seen how well it's turned out. Every once in awhile, he'll come across something he is keenly interested in and he'll put together a "class". He reads to both kids every night and the kids freely share with him. That seems to be enough for now.
Good Luck!

[emski4379]

DS tells him a lot of what we do and what he learned. Otherwise, I'll discuss certain things with him, but he mostly leaves it up to me to make the decisions.

[greenmamapagan]

Originally Posted by Marimami

We keep a wiki page full of ideas. .

Holli

Ah, good idea. DH and I started a google wave a while ago & I can see it being quite useful

[kittie313]

Well, last school year he just would look over my shoulder once in a while when I logged our hours at the OLS for the kids, and would ask me sometimes if I needed help with something (he sometimes would do a math lesson with the girls if I needed the extra help). He didn't care WHAT we did, as long as they were learning (that's his whole view on it, he doesn't care as long as they are learning and developing at their paces). However, this school year he's taking on science and history with the kids since I'll be also carrying a FT college courseload, so he's had a lot more involvement with getting things set up to start the school year. He's helped with picking up the stuff we need for projects and experiments, has spent time with me so he can learn how our OLS works for his lessons, and feels overall pretty prepared to take this on after doing some math lessons last school year with the girls.

[VisionaryMom]

Originally Posted by mountainmama2

It sounds like you DH is a bit uneasy with the homeschooling decision.

He's definitely still on the fence. He's not an un-involved father, which some posts seem to be suggesting. He's just not sure about homeschooling. We believe education & civic-mindedness are the two most important things we can give our children, so this decision has been difficult for us.

[Callimom]

Originally Posted by VisionaryMom

I've started blogging what we're doing. DH has some bizarre opposition to reading blogs, but I may send him a link to the homeschool one to check out.

DH was supportive but not ecstatic about homeschooling initially. We started in response to a poor fit in school for my eldest. I started blogging about what we did and it sold not only him but my MIL/FIL as well who are now hsing advocates.

He's involved now as much as being the WOH partner allows. Bedtimes stories, weekend field trips, science experiments/games/puzzles after dinner. He coached my oldest DS's robotics club last year and helps me run our soccer league which is mostly homeschooling friends. Previously he's helped with hsing hockey/skating and he will take the day off work for big field trips, events like the science fair etc.

He has no interest in deciding what we do or how, what materials we use etc but he passes on links/dvds/books he comes across that would be of interest. He helps where he can and helps me make decisions if I need input but doesn't overstep and trusts me to do what I need.

[Momma Aimee]

Originally Posted by kittie313

Well, last school year he just would look over my shoulder once in a while when I logged our hours at the OLS for the kids, and would ask me sometimes if I needed help with something (he sometimes would do a math lesson with the girls if I needed the extra help). He didn't care WHAT we did, as long as they were learning (that's his whole view on it, he doesn't care as long as they are learning and developing at their paces). However, this school year he's taking on science and history with the kids since I'll be also carrying a FT college courseload, so he's had a lot more involvement with getting things set up to start the school year. He's helped with picking up the stuff we need for projects and experiments, has spent time with me so he can learn how our OLS works for his lessons, and feels overall pretty prepared to take this on after doing some math lessons last school year with the girls.

i see my DH getting there once the boys are older. for now we do little formal and he does do a ton of math and science with them. but i think he will do more as they get older

[AAK]

I sit down with my dh about twice a year and do a "conference" with him. He isn't requesting it anymore, but I think he needs to know what they are working on and their strengths & weaknesses. But, we do share special achievements, etc. with him more regularly. Just as the kids would if they came home from ps with something they are proud of, I guess.

Also, often, I will have dh help the kids in areas that I am not strong. Most the time these aren't the "academics" so to speak, but they are equally important to me so that the kids have a balanced education. My dh is mechanically inclined where I am def. not.

Amy

[zeldamomma]

I guess I don't officially "inform" dh of our kids' progress in homeschooling. If they say/do anything especially neat I will show him or tell him about it. If I'm having trouble making a decision about whether to buy or sign-up for something, I'll talk to him about it, and he'll give me input. We do test every year, largely because for dh's sake, although I like getting the results too.

Dh is not a reluctant homeschool parent. Sometimes he's a bigger advocate of it than I am. When I am dealing with a family-member who is uncomfortable with homeschooling, I try to avoid having my kids be the ones who are showing "proof" that homeschooling is good, because I don't want them to bear the brunt of whatever anti-homeschool feelings the adult in question may have.

FWIW, I think voting with one's feet is one of the most effective ways to advocate for better public schools.