our dozen beautiful feet

Just a few weeks ago, I posted about how I really do believe in the mentor model of education and that's convicted me to keep going through high school with home educating my kids. But we are in the midst of one of the most intense social and medical global crises of the past century.   Our whole lives are shut down and everything is turned on its head, including education. I've seen lots of posts and articles on how families are reacting to this downtime, and it's mostly been positive. Kids are behaving better. Parents are less stressed. People are eating together. There is no rushing from one activity to the next. Kids are actually less bored and more happy. I really hope all of this makes all of us take stock of how our lives had run away from us, like an out-of-control horse with us just hanging on for dear life, not sure how to stop it. I hope this experience gives us permission and confidence to say "no" in days to come so as to preserve a little bit of

I don't know about *most* kids, but I know for my kids for most things, they need a guide that's an actual person, not just a book. They need accountability. They need someone that's going to inspire them, model for them not only a good grasp and love of the subject at hand, but also what kind of a person they ought to be becoming. They need to engage in conversation around the ideas they're encountering and be sharpened and challenged, shown how to engage ideas without accepting them.  I want them to be interacting with and inspired by adults in their teenage years in real life (or virtually).  I want them to have great tutors that love their subject for all their classes.  That can be me and their dad for most things, but not for all things. I realize that about myself. High school credits/subjects/courses seem to fall into three categories for me as a homeschool mom: 1. Things I know well enough to help my kids learn 2. Things I *want* learn with them or ahead

It's a good problem to have. All the options. The last ten years have seen an explosion in curricular options for homeschooling. The homeschool conferences are like going to the cereal aisle at the grocery store: SO MANY CHOICES. It's so tempting to think that there must be something better out there than what you currently have, that your kids are missing out on some magical experience in spelling, that *that* program would be so much easier for you to use, more colorful, more fun, more....  I want you to hear: most of the time, switching programs will not fix a problem if you haven't been consistently and diligently working the program you have. When you're beginning to homeschool for the first time, especially if you're jumping in with multiple kids in different grades, I've got three pieces of advice to get started. 1.  Do some basic reading on the different philosophies of education.   There are four or five major prevailing theories or philosophies