Here is why my younger children are homeschooling now. I have seen the long term situation in our local schools. The middle school and high school are nasty with drugs being dealt and done on campus and in classrooms. The school is a top rated school in our state so the parents turn the other way, claiming that it is like this everywhere. But from what I am hearing from friends and from personal experience, most schools do not have kids doing ecstasy in the classrooms, in plain site of the teachers. Kids keep doing having sex on campus too. My sister, who lives in one district but teaches here, will not allow her children to attend here. She says most teachers who have the option will not allow her children to attend here. My daughter had serious and severe sexual harrassment/stalking happen to her at the middle school and staff would do nothing about it "boys will be boys" is what they said. I do not feel like the middle school or high school are safe.
A major problem at all levels is teachers on cell phones and internet all day long. As far as I can tell, this takes up most teacher time. ALL my children were in school last year and my older children told me that it was rare for a teacher to break from the internet or cell phone to teach the class. They often just got their assignments and worked on them on their own. But apparently, it was difficult to work because they kids were goofing off and having a good ole time all day long. This is when the sexual harassment and drug use was going on too. We are talking an exemplary school in what is supposed to be a great suburb. Plus, every single time I checked on my elementary aged kids in their classrooms, the teacher was off at her desk on her computer. She was never interacting with the class. I heard this from the other parents too, that they just never really saw the teachers teaching.
The kids all had their own computers at the school and could do stuff like kid pix all day long, which is pretty much all my children seemed to do. So when they would come home, they would expect to spend all their time playing on the computer because that was all they really did at school. While "delayed academics" does not really bother me, it did cause fights at home because they expected to get to play all day on the computer at home as a result. Plus, I get worried that they will get to minded toward those schools and friends there, and really get upset when I refuse to send them to that God awful middle school.
SO, while things are going very well for my 3rd grader, my 6 yr old wake sup every day and starts whining. He continues throughout the day. I do not expect a ton of him, and probably would even let him unschool if he just stopped whining. Seriously, it starts with "I want to play playstation" and ends with "I WANT to PLAY PLAYSTATION!!!!!" Then he tries to claim his friends from public school do not have homework (yes, they do, you have to do something at home after spending the whole day playing on the computer at school). He knows full well that he played computer all day at school last year and thinks that he should get to his year. I offer him educational computer games, but they are "boooorrrrrinnnnngggg."
I have some work for him. Like I said, last year, they just played on the computer all day. His homework was a list of 20 sight words to memorize. That was really the sum total of what they did. No handwriting, nothing. So I have the first handwriting without tears book which I ask him to do just 1 page from. He makes his words very scribley. He seems to be doing that on purpose, but I do not make a reaction out of it. I did upgrade his math book to one more at his level. He is a natural at math and doing Singapore Math 1B with ease. I am trying to teach him reading, but only spend maybe 5 minutes on it as he acts like I am trying to kill him during that time. I have made that as fun and easy as humanly possible. No workbooks, nothing. We have science kits and I have all sorts of guides to fun hands on activities. He will say "is this school work?" and if I say no, then he says "good, I want to play playstation." If I say yes, he screams and runs from the room throwing a huge tantrum or falls down throwing a huge tantrum. In fact, he loves tantrums now, especially if I am on the phone. I have learned to lock myself in my bedroom and sit in my closet on the phone if it is an important call. If it is not an important call, to just skip it. He even threw a huge tantrum last night when a friend of his mother called to set up a playdate. He just started screaming bloody murder "I want playstation! I want playstation!!! give me playstation now!!!!"
SO.....help!!!!! I need encouragement and for obvious reasons, do not want to return him to public school. We also go on field trips every week and he takes art classes at a neat place called Art House.
Thanks in advance for your help.
A major problem at all levels is teachers on cell phones and internet all day long. As far as I can tell, this takes up most teacher time. ALL my children were in school last year and my older children told me that it was rare for a teacher to break from the internet or cell phone to teach the class. They often just got their assignments and worked on them on their own. But apparently, it was difficult to work because they kids were goofing off and having a good ole time all day long. This is when the sexual harassment and drug use was going on too. We are talking an exemplary school in what is supposed to be a great suburb. Plus, every single time I checked on my elementary aged kids in their classrooms, the teacher was off at her desk on her computer. She was never interacting with the class. I heard this from the other parents too, that they just never really saw the teachers teaching.
The kids all had their own computers at the school and could do stuff like kid pix all day long, which is pretty much all my children seemed to do. So when they would come home, they would expect to spend all their time playing on the computer because that was all they really did at school. While "delayed academics" does not really bother me, it did cause fights at home because they expected to get to play all day on the computer at home as a result. Plus, I get worried that they will get to minded toward those schools and friends there, and really get upset when I refuse to send them to that God awful middle school.
SO, while things are going very well for my 3rd grader, my 6 yr old wake sup every day and starts whining. He continues throughout the day. I do not expect a ton of him, and probably would even let him unschool if he just stopped whining. Seriously, it starts with "I want to play playstation" and ends with "I WANT to PLAY PLAYSTATION!!!!!" Then he tries to claim his friends from public school do not have homework (yes, they do, you have to do something at home after spending the whole day playing on the computer at school). He knows full well that he played computer all day at school last year and thinks that he should get to his year. I offer him educational computer games, but they are "boooorrrrrinnnnngggg."
I have some work for him. Like I said, last year, they just played on the computer all day. His homework was a list of 20 sight words to memorize. That was really the sum total of what they did. No handwriting, nothing. So I have the first handwriting without tears book which I ask him to do just 1 page from. He makes his words very scribley. He seems to be doing that on purpose, but I do not make a reaction out of it. I did upgrade his math book to one more at his level. He is a natural at math and doing Singapore Math 1B with ease. I am trying to teach him reading, but only spend maybe 5 minutes on it as he acts like I am trying to kill him during that time. I have made that as fun and easy as humanly possible. No workbooks, nothing. We have science kits and I have all sorts of guides to fun hands on activities. He will say "is this school work?" and if I say no, then he says "good, I want to play playstation." If I say yes, he screams and runs from the room throwing a huge tantrum or falls down throwing a huge tantrum. In fact, he loves tantrums now, especially if I am on the phone. I have learned to lock myself in my bedroom and sit in my closet on the phone if it is an important call. If it is not an important call, to just skip it. He even threw a huge tantrum last night when a friend of his mother called to set up a playdate. He just started screaming bloody murder "I want playstation! I want playstation!!! give me playstation now!!!!"
SO.....help!!!!! I need encouragement and for obvious reasons, do not want to return him to public school. We also go on field trips every week and he takes art classes at a neat place called Art House.
Thanks in advance for your help.
I won't allow them to have a Wii or Nintendo DS. Grandparents have been warned that if they try to give those as gifts (MIL keeps wanting to) the kids will never get them.
- Lillian
