dealing with unwanted requirements

[karengayle]

I belong to a homeschool assistance program that is funded through the public school system. The office has textbooks/teacher's manuals that can be checked out and the woman who heads the program is wonderfully helpful. The group does gym activities, field trips, art and science classes, etc.

I love belonging to the group, but here's the problem: we're actually unschooling, so when I have to have the required 4x-a-year conferences with the group's leader I'm not sure what to show her. We mostly learn through reading, going to museums, playing games and surfing the 'net. That's not easily documented, but I feel I need to do something to show her we're learning together.

Any suggestions? I've already showed her that unschooling plan (this is how we plan to learn, etc.) but she says she wants to see some tangible things that show ds is progressing.

[Linda in Arizona]

You could keep a list of the books you read, write down the field trips you take (the date, what you saw, etc.) May be if you thought of it more as a diary or scrap book than school records it would help.

[sagewinna]

Most of the unschoolers I know keep a calender or journal of learning...

I use a Charter school, but unschool, and they are satisfied with me using discussions I have with DS, samples of his artwork, and digital photos of him at museums and such for his portfolio.

[anythingelse]

[Leslie in MD]

journalling

I definitely think you should make it a habit to write down what you are doing with/for your kids. This way you have a fun way to keep track, PLUS you avoid any unpleasantness in the future from nosy people who want to get in your business and act like your kids aren't learning anything. I just keep a small notebook for each of my boys and I write in it everyday what we're doing. I write the titles and authors of the books we read and how many chapters we read. I write an "L" beside the book if I am reading it aloud, and I put the boys initials beside the book if they are reading it themselves. This has worked well for me. It has been really fun to look back on all the things we have done too. I think it also made me conscious to DO SOMETHING PRODUCTIVE with each child every day. I was finding myself too busy to sit down with them sometimes. This way I made sure to make time because I wanted "something" to be written in their notebook, and it has really kept me motivated. Hope this helps!
Leslie in MD

[karengayle]

record-keeping

Great ideas...thank you! I guess I'll start this in January. It seems that this whole "semester" has been spent trying to figure out how to organize our home learning.