Mother of a high schooler. Almost. (Plus, a good movie.)
I can’t believe I’m old enough to have an almost-high schooler. Wow. The good news is that he really wants to continue homeschooling for high school. The bad news is that I feel a little intimidated by all the changes in record-keeping I’m sure to have to do. (Transcripts! Argh!) The good news is that it’s only February; I can learn what I need to in time, I’m sure.
Does anyone have a “homeschooling your high schooler” book to recommend? I just put three of them on my hold list at the library… It looks like most of them are along the lines of, “You can do it!” and I feel more of a need for practical advice, like, “Here’s what you need to do differently than you did with K-8.” We’ll see.
We — my 8th grader (Ethan), and my 6th grader (Grant) — are on the last week or two of Sonlight Core 4.* Looking at what Sonlight offers, I think we’ll start Ethan’s high school experience with Core 200. Up to now, I have rather avoided curricula that is overtly Christian**, but it looks like Core 200 would be interesting and informative for both of us. 🙂
So, that means Ethan will have only three months with Core 5, and not do 6-8 at all. That’s OK, I think, as Cores 6-8 study more in-depth what was studied in previous Cores. And, the reason we went so slowly through the Cores in the first place is because we studied them more in-depth than the assigned curriculum led us to — extra books on the era of study, both fiction and non-fiction, extra videos, etc.
This is off-topic, but, speaking of extra videos, our family watched Sergeant York last week, when it aired (commercial-free!) on TCM. It’s a biopic from 1942, telling the true story of a reluctant American World War I hero, played by Gary Cooper. What a wonderful movie! I cried. It’s about equal parts morality play, patriotic war movie, and romance: good for the whole family.
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*Yes, I have an 8th grader in Core 4. Yes, he is well-educated. He tested at a cumulative grade equivalency of 13+ (post high school) on the nationally normed ITBS. Last year.
**My own private, Christian K-12 education was HIGH on Bible and the history of the Jews and Christians… All very interesting and valuable, but it should not — in my opinion — be the sole study of history that a child undergoes. I received only a vague, cursory, incomplete education in history, and have felt the neglect ever since.
Posted on February 23, 2011, in Homeschooling, Movies. Bookmark the permalink. 3 Comments.
Only Sometimes Clever 
Totally nodding along with both your footnotes. [smile]
~Luke
You don’t have a homeschooling-for-high school book to recommend, Luke, other than Shelton’s? (I perused it, and got highly annoyed at all the irrelevant info and poor writing I’d have to sift through, to get to the meat.)
A friend commented on FB that she was intrigued by my “perspective of Christian curricula” and I thought, giving your nods, you might be interested in my (long) response: “That’s why I like the curriculum we use — Sonlight — which has a generally Christian worldview, but is not dogmatic, nor does it toe the “party platform” of one denomination or another, like many Christian curricula does…. Sonlight’s instructor’s guides have lots of opinion in it, or suggestions like, “As a Christian, you may want to consider that the author of this book is clearly coming from ‘x’ bias, as evidenced by this, that, and the other…” But, as a company, it has weathered a lot of criticism from the Christian “community” of not being Christian enough!
I mean, there is Christian handwriting, Christian math, Christian spelling, Christian literature… It really goes to overkill, IMO. The Christian school I attended for K-12 wouldn’t even let us study Greek myths, because they were too occult! :O I have found that, with my kids, studying other cultures and religions have given us a GREATER appreciation for our God, rather than steering us away from Him! (Especially those Greek myths, with their petty, soap-opera-y lives!!) There can be a fine line there, because some authors’ biases are too difficult for, say, an 8yo to overcome, and that 3rd grader would likely be better off with a “safer” book choice. But, even that gives good opportunity for discussion! There are several 20th c history overview books we’re going through right now, which are clearly not Christian, and it’s become a mini lesson in logic and discerning the authors’ unstated intentions….”
I totally agree with you on our history input from school. I am horrified at what we were never even able to cover. Remember the class with Mr. Mahmood and spending almost the ENTIRE time on the Revolutionary War, barley covered the Civil War and never even made it to WWI and WWII? That was absolutely tragic! I kept asking him when we were going to move on to the rest of history and he would say “soon”. And then there was that glorious semester spent on Arizona history that could have actually taken about a week and a half. Sheesh!!! So teach them as much history as you can!!! I LOVE history and am amazed at how much we need it now with all of the politics and misunderstanding of history that is taking place. Maddie is headed for DC this weekend and I am praying she comes home with a real hunger for it.