We began homeschooling in June '09. Music Man had just finished 4th grade at public school and Farm Boy was preparing for kindergarten. As I got my feet wet, I began to realize that Music Man probably should have been homeschooled from the beginning. He is such a social bug and that was the very problem. He loved to socialize too much. He did not pay much attention to anything educational if something else was going on in the room. Music Man also needs a lot of extra help, to learn at a slower pace and tons of encouragement to excel. With homeschooling, he is able to get the one-on-one attention he needs to understand what was being taught. We can go at his pace rather than the one set by the school system.
Farm Boy went to kindergarten that fall and we felt like we were missing a part of our class. He fussed every day about going to "school-school." Many days he cried when we left him, not wanting to go. He also hated waking up to go to school and felt like he was missing out on what we were doing.
Around Farm Boy's birthday, we presented him with the choice to return to school-school after Christmas or stay home with us to homeschool. He very excitedly chose homeschool. We were thrilled to have all of us together again! Even though Farm Boy was only in school-school a few months, there was still a period of de-schooling and figuring out the homeschool way. He had been in some sort of program (Mother's Day Out and then Pre-K since he was three.) We loved having him with us again. It was a challenge, however, bringing him home mid-year as we attempted to help him understand the dynamic of homeschool versus school-school.
We are mostly classical with a lot of extras thrown in. Music Man thrives on hands-on listening while Farm Boy soaks up everything. 2011-2012 Curriculum
2010-2011 Curriculum
2009-2010
