You know, I have always thought about home
schooling, but never pursued it. I didn’t know how to go about it. I thought it
was terribly complicated. Well, it’s not. Having Valley enter into Whole Grade
Sharing turned out to be the push we needed to look into home schooling seriously. Now that I’m
home schooling Karen, I want to home school all three of the children that live with me. It’s not
that hard. It doesn’t take as much time as I thought it would.
I don’t have a traditional day
with Karen. I home school her a few hours here, a few hours there. She doesn’t
have to spend that 90 minutes per day on the bus. She can school in her
pajamas. She can eat lunch while learning. If she gets tired, she can take a
nap. Karen loves being home schooled. KinDee had to go to the school the other
day to get Jenna out early for an eye appointment and Karen went along. Karen
got to go in the school again and a few of her old friends waved at her. When
Karen came home, I asked her if she missed school and she said that she did
not. KinDee said that Karen was afraid that that she’d try to leave her there
at the school and that Karen kept asking for reassurance that KinDee was going
to be going home with her.
God as my witness, I haven’t
pumped anything into Karen’s head. She wanted to go to school in pre-school.
She went for two full years. But, as she went to kindergarten, she said the
kids got mean. I know she was picked on while riding the bus and she would come
home crying a lot. That ended her desire to want to go to school anymore. She
loves being home and being left alone. She’s not a recluse, but she doesn’t like
being messed with either. She loves going to the library and going to church.
She loves shopping and visiting family. She just hates how kids are at school.
Yes, the world is full of bullies, but Karen doesn’t need to put up with it at
this point in her life. I feel confident that she’ll be able to handle assholes
when she’s older. I’ll see to it that she’s ready.
Next is Jenna’s turn. I want her
to be home schooled now, but she has asked to go at least through Christmas.
Even though I don’t want to, I have told her that I will allow her that, but if
the school pisses me off between now and then, I’m yanking her.
Sean is a special case. He has an
IEP and is special-ed. We fought like hell to get him that IEP last year and it’s
good through this coming spring. I can pull him and home school him now, but if
I read the law correctly, I have to get permission from the Iowa Department of
Education. I may just let him finish this year out and just ask that his IEP
not be renewed. They don’t seem to be doing a damned thing with it this year
anyhow. Sean was home from school today and I was giving Karen a math lesson and
Sean didn’t even know where to place commas in numbers, or how to even say
numbers in the thousands. Take the number 1,348. He said it was one hundred
thirty four thousand and eight. He put the comma between the 4 and the 8. The
kid is in the 4th grade!!!
I have taught Karen to put a
comma every third spot and that the commas have names. The first one is
thousand. She can identify numbers up to 999, and by knowing the comma’s name,
she can identify her numbers up to 999,999. Once I teach her the next comma,
Million, she’ll be able to identify numbers up to 999,999,999.
Whole Grade Sharing has turned out to be a
blessing in disguise. Valley is gone. It only exists on a tax statement anymore. It’s North Fayette Valley now and while I
will eventually have to pay my property taxes to that mess of an organization, I don’t
have to send my kids to it. I am sad though that my children will never
graduate from the same school that my father and so many other family members
graduated from. I was really looking forward to that. This will be better
though. In the end, all we leave on this earth for the most part is our family.
I will be my children’s teacher. Not many parents today can say that. I will be
one of the lucky few who will be able to. For that, I’m very thankful.
