Homeschooling

I've mentioned on here before that my family had been considering homeschooling for a variety of reasons.  Even though Elliott is still in public school right now, we do quite a bit of additional school type stuff at home.  I've found that he tends to behave better at school if we are working on new stuff that he finds fun at home.  He picks up on new stuff very quickly, so public school tends to be boring to him when he understands the lesson the first day, but then has to spend another 2 weeks (or more) listening to his teacher talk about it.  My husband has voiced concern that maybe Elliott is getting TOO far ahead in some stuff at home, but I don't really see it that way, and neither does Elliott.  We just work on the stuff that he is interested in.  Like for instance, right now he is working on fully memorizing multiplication tables, and is also working on adding and subtracting fractions.  His class at school is no where near ready for those things, but they are both things that he wants to work on at home.  He's also already finished his cursive handwriting book at home, so we just ordered a new one for him that has more copy work, so he can get more practice with making sure that he has his letters connected properly.  We tried having him copy things that I had written down, but that was too much stress and work for me, since he uses a totally different style of writing than I do. :)

Recently Elliott came to me and told me that he wants to homeschool full time next year instead of going to public school.  I've been praying about this for a long time, because I have felt like that is what is the best fit for my family, but Elliott was opposed to it, because he likes seeing his friends everyday.   When I asked him why he changed his mind, he said it was because homeschooling is more fun, and he can learn about the stuff he wants to learn about.  I reminded him that he still has to do science (he pretty much only likes to learn about animals and weather, and has no interest in anything else science) and language arts.  I also pointed out that he still has to learn all the same things that his public school friends have to learn each year, but that we can add more stuff to it.

After having a family meeting, we decided that Elliott will finish up second grade in public school, but then start homeschooling in June or July.  We have been looking at curriculum for various subjects, and are just amazed at all the choices.  I've actually enjoyed reading reviews and narrowing down my choices to a few, and having Elliott look at stuff that is included in different ones.  We haven't settled on anything 100% for sure yet, but we have a pretty good idea on everything except science (we want to do a human anatomy study for the bulk of health, but our state standards require him to touch on lots of stuff, instead of allowing him to just study one area in depth each semester or year). I do feel a little overwhelmed by everything, but I feel at peace with it for the most part.  The biggest concern is just making everything fit in every day, including school work, cleaning, and the things that I enjoy (crafting and reading mostly).

When I first mentioned homeschooling, it seems like my whole family was against it, but now some of them are actually supportive. :)  My brother is my biggest supporter, which really isn't surprising, considering he is also the biggest supporter (aside from my husband and son) of me staying at home instead of working outside of the home anyway.  But even my mom has come around and is supportive.  That really means a lot to me.  My mom and I are pretty close (we talk on the phone for around 10 hours each week).  There are many things that I do different as a parent than she did (a lot of that probably has to do with the fact that I only have one child, and she had four of her own, plus two step children), and sometimes she isn't all that supportive of different, so it really means a lot to me when she IS.