Spin off on Homeschooling #2 - Fulton,CA

no, but i had friends who encountered this. i THINK that because of my attitude about homeschooling, which is that learning can and should be interesting and child-led, that i would have overcome it by declining the battle. very, very few kids are really uninterested in learning new things. many have been conditioned to hate learning because of the way institutional learning is necessarily structured.
i like to think that when allowed to de-school, then go down a path strewn with opportunities, that most kids are going to decide that being competent, literate and informed is a Very Good Thing.
but some kids always stump you. that's why i'm also glad that we do have public schools. kids come in an endless array of flavors, and even the virtually unlimited potential approaches of homeschooling may not fit all.
the 'togetherness' was not really an issue, as we never fit the stereotypical family-cooped-up-together scenario. in fact, days when we were all home together focused on academics were rare, and therefore kinda cool.
:) khairete
S.

Yes, there are days when it is WAY too much togetherness and unpleasant-ness. Every now and then I will lay down the threat "I am going to drop you off at Boca High tomorrow and let them deal with all this."

But those times are forgotten when we can pick up and go to Europe in the fall, or to Orlando during the off-season. Or when I see my sons thrive in very different ways from one another, but thrive nonetheless.

It really is a lifestyle. My husband works from home, too, and that probably drives me more crazy than the kids LOL. But I wouldn't trade this life for anything. We call ourselves the modern day family "farm." :P We work here, school here, eat here, pray here, love here. It's worth it.

ETA: I agree very much with Suz T.'s philosophy. And if one of my sons really wanted to be in traditional school, or if that was what was best for him, I wouldn't have any problem with that either.

LOL i just wrote a long response to this and then my LO hit the keyboard and deleted it all! Talk about too much togetherness!

The long and short of it is this: because I homeschool, I can adjust to each child's unique needs. My oldest is a handful, very spirit, very smart, and very strong-willed. If I tried to get her to sit down and do "school," it would be a disaster. But luckily I don't have to do that. Instead, we unschool, and she takes math and science books to bed with her. It's all just stuff to her, different things to learn and do. My Little Pony is just as interesting as Jupiter (her favorite planet). But she started reading at 4, and now, at 6, is at a 4th grade level. I literally just take her to the library and buy her books. She does the rest. There is no battle then ;-)

All this togetherness has actually been really productive for me. I lived alone for many years before meeting hubby, and adjusting to him was hard-work. Now with kids I've had to truly learn patience, compassion and empathy. I'm thankful for having this opportunity.

My kids all seem to want to stay home. My oldest is adamant about not going to school. Her brother asked once to go, but then decided he'd rather stay home and play rescue bots. He is going to be my storyteller, so I'm happy to let him imagine all day long. He is already doing subtraction and some multiplications, and he can sound out words, so I think he's good to go.

I think most HS families get a rhythm down that works for them. My friends know that around 1:30-2, they can find me drinking tea while the baby sleeps and the other kids watch videos. This is precious downtime for all of us, and it helps us to recharge and be together happily. If one kid is frustrated by another, they just go off, to read or to sleep, as the case may be. And you can always tell anyone else that you just want to be alone. We choose to be together, and if and when it isn't pleasant, we find alone time.

I honestly don't foresee any big issues. My kids seem to be thriving in this environment, and I would assume it will only get better as they get older.

We do need a bigger house, though, but that will happen soon enough ;-)

I know some moms who put their kids back in school because they couldn't deal with their behavior. Those same kids are not doing well behavior-wise in school either. Other moms in our homeschool network have special needs kids who benefit from not having to be in school, and still others are put back in school better served with IEPs and such than being taught at home.

If you have a very difficult child, it can be difficult to homeschool, certainly. But the moms I know with NORMAL (not diagnosed with disorders making them incapable of behaving) kids are able to maintain the regime even though it's harder with some kids than others. It takes discipline. My 2nd is harder than my first was. My third loves learning so that helps.

I started discipline at a very young age: 2. My kids were used to being "forced" (for lack of better way to say it) to sit still and listen at times. I did not know I would homeschool then, I only knew I had to take them everywhere with me, and like their well-behaved homeschool cousins, they COULD behave with hard work on my part. So we would regularly do library events and various things where they would be disciplined after a warning if they would act out. Therefore, they were ready to sit in piano lessons by age 4, and attend concerts and church services etc. So by the time we started homeschooling, behaving was nothing new to them. It is a struggle at times and if they had not had that discipline background, I would probably have gone nuts and thrown them in school. Actually, I did recently throw my two older ones in school for a separate reason, and they both got raves and compliments for behavior from teachers. The oldest got student of the month, her brother got a special mention certificate..they get those types of acknowledgements from TKD and music teachers as well. Compliments from various people at restaurants and events for how well-behaved they are. It's hard work, but it helped with homeschooling for sure. We attended lots of classes and lectures and tours of various places with homeschool network and my kids could listen and behave. Actually the majority of the kids could, and the squirrely ones would probably have been squirrely in school too. I have to say there are WAY MORE behavior issues in my kids classes in school than there were with our homeschool network. Probably because moms need to batten down if they're going to survive it, so they do.

But sure. If kids are very difficult for whatever reason, and a mom is not necessarily keen on the concept of homeschooling to begin with: It's probably not the best option. It IS difficult to get kids to cooperate. It's difficult for teachers too.

If our local public school was jam packed with enthusiastic experts in their fields teaching advanced curriculums to moderately sized classes I would certainly rather relax all day by myself or work and make money than homeschool.

I was the "queen" of early intervention for one of my children. All my energy was put into preparing both of my spirited children for school. My older son is gifted and was such a sponge for learning. I taught him so much before he entered kinder and he loved the kinder atmosphere. His learning with me at home increased like crazy once he took off in reading.

However, I knew that I would never homeschool. My kids needed someone other than me to teach them and I needed someone else. I wanted to be a driving force behind their learning as a MOTHER, and not as a teacher. It has worked well for our family.