Support and Affirmation Please!

[cfiddlinmama]

My dh and I have decided to homeschool our dd for 1st grade and our ds1 for kindergarten this year. We are very happy with our choice - BUT.... In our town there is a small private Catholic school taught by Sisters, two of which happen to be MY Sisters. One of them is the vice-principle. I assumed we were going to send our children there because I really wanted them to have a good edu. and I figured they were going to get a better one there. As the enrollment deadline got closer and closer everything inside of me was screaming NOOOOO! So I did some research and decided that based on our AP mindset, sending our 6yr old away for 8 hours everyday was not acceptable. I informed the school we wouldn't be enrolling her and they started to pressure me but I stayed calm and told them my reasons and left.

Well, on Sunday, my sister Sister (the vice principle) came up to me and wanted to tell me that she had been doing placement tests on children who were homeschooled for 1st grade and that they were no where near where they should be. That there was NO WAY I could give her a complete first grade year, and that she had seen so many children's education RUINED by homeschooling etc. She said that if we decided to send her next year and she wasn't at 2nd grade level, than she and ds1 would be in the same grade and that would be horrible blah blah blah. She also said that if I wanted to treat this as another kindergarten year and have her start 1st grade as a 7yr old and have her graduate at 19 that was fine. (I don't really think I'm going to be sending them at all unless I really hate homeschooling.)

I'm really thinking that homeschooling/unschooling really fits in with our parenting philosophy and I know that it will be a lot of work and responsiblity, but so is all of parenting. I DON'T want to be coerced out of fear to do something that I'm uncomfortable with. I guess what I'm looking for is the affirmation that I won't ruin my child's edu. by keeping her at home and having fun learning! I'm a little insecure about this so please HELP!!!

(Thank you for being patient and reading this legnthy post.)
PS I was homeschooled myself and the real irony of it is so was my Sister!

[True Blue]

I think she was scaring you....if you have a good head on your shoulders there is no reason why you can't go above and beyond what the school does!! My kids aren't that old yet, but DS already knows more than his friends who went to preschool and is almost reading....more than I can say even for friends in pre-k. Unschooling may not put them exactly in grade-level year by year, but I would imagine they'd be ahead in some areas and behind in others due to the nature of the approach. You and your children will do just fine!

[Dar]

I am currently amazed that my daughter seems to have mastered math up to algebra, apparently through osmosis... we spent maybe a total of two hours going through stuff in the GED prep book, and I answered some questions for her, and showed her the addition algorithm when she was 6 or 7. So, after maybe 3 1/2 total lifetime hours of math "instruction", she's at or above grade level.

I'm pretty sure she wasn't at "grade level" in math a year ago, though.... unless she knew this stuff then and I didn't notice.

Ditto on writing. Now she's writing lovely essays that get her scholarships, but until she was 10 she rarely wrote at all, and when she tried she became frustrated and upset.

Keep them hooooome!

dar

[Eris]

(do they do placement testing of their own 1st graders going into 2nd?)

"where they should be" is all about where that school chooses for "should", and in my opinion is most likely nowhere around what i would think they should be! how are their 2nd graders at family relations, multi-age tolerance, imaginative play, love of daily life?

if you used their specific goals and curriculum, how could your sister, the sister, dare claim that you would be unable to cover the same 1st grade material being with your two children 24/7 than their teachers cover with 15-30 kids, 8/5? the fact that homeschoolers generally choose to emphasize different things in their kids' lives than a catholic school does does not somehow mean that those kids' heads are shut down and doing nothing, not moving along in life and knowledge, in the time spent not at catholic school.

listen to your heart and don't let your sister pressure or threaten you.

[moominmamma]

Oh pshaw!

First, if this is a "small private school" just how big a sample size of "children homeschooled for 1st grade and entering the school for 2nd grade is she basing her dire predictions on? Two or three kids? Hardly a statistically significant basis for making predictions, is it?

Second, maybe, just maybe, those kids were homeschooled through 1st grade because their parents knew they weren't ready for school at age 5 or 6, or because their parents wanted the chance to delay their exposure to structured academics or to explore alternative learning strategies and topics for another year. In which case, it's hardly surprising that they didn't master the first grade structured academic curriculum, is it?

Thirdly, as others have asked, how many of their own 1st graders would pass the same scrutiny? They may spend the year merrily teaching all sorts of academic stuff, testing on Friday if Monday's-through-Thursday's stuff has been retained, and discovering that, well, some of it has. But try testing in July what was sort-of-mastered in November ... and they'd probably be find just as many gaps in their own students' learning.

Fourthly, there are two little secrets that homeschooling parents know:

• when your children are 14 or 17 or 43 no one is ever going to care whether they mastered their addition and subtraction facts at age 5 or age 9, and
• learning done after full developmental readiness, life experience and internal motivation have kicked in is breathtakingly efficient (in other words, it might take 4 months to get a 6yo to master those math facts, but a similar kid who is busy doing other stuff at age 6 and digs into those math facts at age 9 may learn them in an afternoon)

I'm sure your sister Sister has only the best of intentions, but she is thinking totally inside the box and with so many schoolish assumptions in place ... assumptions that just don't apply at all in homeschooling.

Stand firm! Thank her for her concern. Tell her you've looked at all sides of the issue and are comfortable with your decision for now. And then ask her how her dog is, or what antiVirus program she's using, or whether she's talked to your dad lately.

Miranda

[~*SugarMama*~]

Plain and simple, I think that every child learns at their own pace. True, your DD might not be at a second grade level for everything but what about those subjects that really capture her heart? She could very well be years beyond where she *should* be in one subject but behind in another.

Right now, I know that my son is above average in math and science. But at 6, he still has no interest in reading and very little in writing. After sending him to school for one year, I am finding it hard not to feel like I should be pressuring him into reading already. But the mother part of me knows that he is just plain not ready yet and by forcing him or allowing a school to tell him that he isn't *grade appropriate* would really crush his spirit.

If you want to homeschool and you feel that it fits in with your life style better than schooling, don't allow anyone to pressure you otherwise. No one knows your children better than you do and no one can give them the care that you can!

[SRHS]

First off, just want to second everything every other poster has said, and add....that maybe being the vice principal, your sister sister is taking this personally and may feel like it will look badly on her personally in her society...not that sisters (the cloistered type) should think in those terms, but it may be a totally human reaction....

My ds 9 would not test grade level for MOST Things...but the kid can make a souffle!!! How many 9 year olds get the chance to do that? I didn't make one until he did!!! There are so many other worthwhile things to learn besides your math facts and ABC's....and like another poster said, it is amazing how fast they learn after the are developmentally ready and motivated to do so!!!

HUGS, Sus

[AuntLavender]

OK your first mistake was informing them you wouldn't be enrolling your daughter! (I realize since they are family they're harder to avoid?)

In my state children graduate high school not knowing how to read (FL is like 47th in the nation or something like that). We are annually sent letters telling us we can take the FCAT (FL Comprehensive Achievement Test) in lieu of getting our annual portfolio evaluations because everyone knows homeschoolers help public schools keep their scores HIGH!

Sure there are some children who are homeschooled who aren't merit scholars just like there are private and public and parochial and whatever else kind of schoolers that aren't merit scholars as well!

Best wishes to you, your children will thrive! My 3 oldest learned how to read on their own without a certified teacher!?! My oldest also must have learned math by osmosis because he's a mental math whiz!

Sincerely,
Debra

[cfiddlinmama]

Thank you so much! :)

Thank you, thank you, thank you! You have made my morning! I can't tell you how much I appreciate you all taking the time to write such thoughtful responses! I know that my Sister probably feels like it is a personal criticism or something. There are basically two waring factions in our community: those who send their children to school and those who don't. They spend tons of time insulting each other and talking bad about each other. I don't participate in either camp because I think it's harmful and foolish. Parents should do what they think is best for their children and then get over themselves and move on. So that said, the Sisters have definately been hurt and based on the politics I can see where they are coming from. However, I'm not going to compromise my childrens' well being because of politics.

Thank you for reminding me that my children need time to develop at their own pace and not when some "official" says that they should. It would definately be interesting to see placement tests done on their students.....Thanks again and ciao!

[mandib50]

grade 1 doesn't make or break a childs school career ... and we all know kids who failed miserably in school only to go onto do something wonderful with their lives and some of these same failures attended post-secondary schooling as adults and excelled (gasp).

yep kids do learn at their own pace and i really believe that by the time my kids hit 18, they're gonna know just as much as the next 18 year old and be independent, critical thinkers and learners.

you're doing the right thing

[Brisen]

I agree with everything everyone else said.

Good luck with this, sounds like it might turn into an ugly situation. I hope things go smoothly.

[onlyzombiecat]

Are homeschooled children being placed in a public school really the best ruler to measure all homeschooled children? Obviously homeschooling wasn't working out for those families for some reason. Are we supposed to judge ALL public/private school students on the test scores of one struggling class at one school? I bet the schools wouldn't stand for that.

There are many curriculums and homeschool options. The idea that if your child doesn't know everything on one school's placement test by the end of first grade then they will have their whole education messed up is kind of laughable to me. There is very little research to back up the notion that homeschool children are behind.

Thus, it is still impossible to say whether, on the whole, home-schooling students are doing much better than their public and private school counterparts. However, it is also totally unwarranted to argue that home schoolers are doing badly. The available evidence certainly seems to indicate otherwise.

from http://www.hooverdigest.org/002/hill.html

Over 150 students have enrolled at IUPUI with home school backgrounds and as a group these students have academically excelled and out-performed the general student population.

from http://enroll.iupui.edu/homeschool.shtml

an interesting read on the perception of school counselors on homeschool students entering public school- http://www.shsu.edu/~piic/summer2002/Hail.htm

Sorry your sister is not more supportive.

[momofjoshnkylie]

Ditto to everything everyone else said.

YOU are their mom. YOU care about your kids more than anyone and YOU know what is best for them and your family. Go with your heart with this one!

[Charles Baudelaire]

Three words for ya, mama:

Standardized test results.

Three more words:

Harvard likes homeschoolers.

If you google the info -- or maybe someone on this board has it at her fingertips -- the standardized test results for HSers consistently place them in the 80% average (vs. the fifty percent average for non-HSers). This fact has not gone unnoticed by the Ivy Leagues.

Oh, three more words:

National Spelling Bee.

In short, I think your Sister should do penance for being a fearmongering educrat.