Homeschool: Teaching Older Children About Business

One of the mental challenges of homeschooling is the process of taking complete and total ownership of your child's education. It can be quite a burden to break out of the molds that society would label "education". The beauty of homeschooling is that you as the parent/educator is that you can weave your child's passions, interests, and abilities into the subjects you bring to the table.

    Why wouldn't I take the time to teach my children something they want to learn, something they see value in, and sneak in a few "educational lessons" along the way.

I currently am teaching 3 of my children how to build an online business. I have their complete and total attention because they are very motivated by the fact that they believe they have something to offer people online. The bonus is that because they believe they can make a few dollars, I have their undivided attention.

    The same way that we might puree carrots and squash to add to a sauce and sneak in nutrition, I sneak my core goals into everything I teach my kids as we research and pursue their passions.

The Beginner's Guide to Homeschooling High School

All parents have some reservations about homeschooling high school when the concept first crosses their mind. The high school years are important to your child's future, and no parent wants to risk messing up their child's ability to go to college, start a career, or chase other dreams. Teenagers are also more rebellious and challenging than younger children, and if they have special learning needs homeschooling could be a full-time job.

Homeschooling high school is not for everyone, but virtually all parents who do a bit of research realize that it is not as difficult as they thought it was going to be in the beginning. If your child is struggling in public or private school and you believe they would learn better or would be safer at home, this guide to homeschooling will help you decide if this can work for you.

Homeschooling is like anything else in life: you will get out of it what you put into it. Your child will benefit more if you are active in their studies.

Homeschooling and Socialization

Homeschooling, in spite of its growing popularity and acceptance, is still facing some issues. Some of those issues are quite valid, while some are not, and there are also others that are quite debatable. One of those lingering issues is about the supposedly negative effects that homeschooling has on the social skills of children who are educated through this system.

The issue of socialization is a very serious one, considering the importance of proper development of social skills in any individual's life. And when a whole educational system is being questioned about its alleged or supposed negative effects about socializing, it has to be considered very seriously. It is also important to note that this belief has been made and supported by professional educators. However, if it is analyzed any further, it would be proven to be something that's entirely untrue.

What has served as the basis of the belief that homeschooling affects the development of social skills is that those who say so feel that school is the sole place where kids have any chance of learning and developing social skills. To a certain extent, school does help in the much needed development of social skills, but kids who are home-schooled also have opportunities that are not really available to kids who go to a regular school.

Important Preparations for Homeschooling High School

If you plan to homeschool high school soon, it's time to pay attention to your student's college preparations, and get them ready for college level work by the time they graduate. There's a lot of planning at this stage, including selecting courses, keeping good records, and paying attention to important testing dates.

One of the most important courses to pay attention to in high school is foreign language. Colleges like to see two or three years of a single language, so if your student doesn't start in their Freshman year, they'll need to start in their Sophomore year. Don't wait until Junior year to begin!

It's also very important to plan some rigorous classes. That doesn't mean that in Freshman year your student must do calculus. It means that you try to keep your child challenged. Make sure to give them classes that aren't easy. That doesn't mean they should be overwhelming, just not all easy. Keep it rigorous and keep them challenged. Plan your courses, so you'll know exactly what courses you'll cover over the four years of high school

3 Reasons to Choose Home Schooling Over Traditional Schooling

Reasons to choose home schooling over traditional schooling may vary from family to family. The three reasons presented in this article concern: (1) design of instruction, (2) small class size, and (3) utilization of resources.

Design of Instruction

"Curricula became as creative as parents chose to be, with choices ranging from printed materials to computer-generated programs, libraries/museums, field trips, resource facilities, networking opportunities, and public school resources (Hanna, 1996). Those who choose homeschooling today have many more choices available" (Hanna, 2012, 613). Parents administering a home school education are free to design the instruction of their students based on their preset objectives and budgets. The limitations of each home school project can be limited only by the time the planner spends on researching the state, its guidelines, its resources and other available resources in material and personnel.

Class size

Homeschooling class sizes can be limited to the students in one family or the class size can involve students from many families. In the latter case, the educational experiences that involve other families and larger sizes can be supplemented by individualized instruction from the educator inside the home. When researching material and instruction providers, also check on options for lesson credits to be recorded, transferred, and managed. Does the provider offer the option to purchase materials without the company's record keeping, instruction online or distant learning packages?

Checking Out the So-Called Disadvantages of Home Schooling

Home schooling is more acceptable today than ever before. You can even go on to say that it is now in vogue and that more and more parents are willing to try it on their children. And this trend will probably not change anytime soon and will only continue until it becomes at par with the more traditional methods of educating children.

There are several reasons for this increased acceptance of home schooling, not the least of which are the benefits that it brings. Evidence has shown that those who undergo it usually perform better when taking standardized tests than their counterparts who were not schooled at home. That alone is a very good reason to favor this right there, and yet there are also the other reasons such as a child getting the kind of education that fits his abilities and personality better, among others.

Enough about the benefits of this, as there have already been plenty of discussion about that. What about its opposite, how about the so-called disadvantages of this? It is probably also worth looking at it, so that people can compare the pros and cons of this, which would allow them to make better decisions about whether to home school their kids or not.

Advantages of Education Games Used in a Home School Environment

The operations manual for the most important piece of equipment imaginable - the brain. There are resources and materials which can assist a child to access and apply their brains' immense powers. Parents can learn with their children.how to assemble and paint their own planetarium model, highlight it to create the glow effect and charge it with any light source. Can you navigate a ball through a mind-bending obstacle course as quickly as you can? LET A CHILD SHOW YOU HOW!

*Teachers and Parents can easily access the Sentence Building and Farmyard Dominoes that teach spelling and counting. Cubes printed with numbers are an interactive and visual way to get to grips with mathematics. This hands-on manipulative kit can be used to teach a range of maths concepts to all ages. The Pizza Fraction Action Snap is a fantastic learning tool where teachers and parents can guide youngsters to experience learning with little formal teaching. These resources are invaluable as they are designed to encourage natural interaction, which gives the child a feeling of great satisfaction.

*Learning Physics with children can be quite exciting: The Sphere is an expanding and contracting ball. It cleverly combines mathematics and geometry to create a surprising motion that fascinates children and adults alike. Can you imagine how a toy such as this could lead to an interest in physics at University level?

*The British Isles jigsaw will test the memory of parents and teachers and enhance the visual and physical skills of young learners. Geography has never been easier. This jigsaw is multifaceted. Youngsters in a short time learn to connect shapes which are linked to counties, towns, rivers and other physical aspects of the United Kingdom. This style of learning lays down strong cognitive schemas which enlarges children's memory processes.

Emergency Course Descriptions for Anxious Homeschool Parents

Some homeschool parents are really organized; they keep up with their high school course descriptions each year, so that when senior year arrives, they're ready to pop their student's comprehensive records into the mail with all those college applications, and sit back and wait for the scholarships to roll in. Then there's the typical homeschool parent, who just never seemed to get around to starting on those course descriptions...

If you find yourself sliding into that second category, now is the time to get caught up! Set aside just one weekend and you can pull together a pretty good comprehensive record in time for college application deadlines. Although this marathon approach is not the recommended way, here are a few helpful tips when you find yourself in a pinch and need course descriptions right away.

During this marathon weekend, take your transcript and expand it with as many details as you can from your memory, using any records you have, and adding as many details as you can. Even if you haven't kept records, you have kept some things. Perhaps you have receipts from your purchases which you can go through, and come up with as many details as possible of what you purchased.

Homeschoolers and College Dual Enrollment Dual enrollment (attending community college while still in high school) has become a very popular trend among many homeschool students. After all, the chance to reduce college costs is pretty attractive! There are some great benefits to this choice, but I've found that many parents are unaware of the potential pitfalls when their 16 or 17 year-old student participates in classes designed for older adults. Our sons attended community college when they were 16 and 17, and one of the most surprising things we experienced was the abundance of pornography. There was pornographic material for sale in the student bookstore right next to the engineering books (because presumably engineers are males). One parent told me that her daughter signed up for an English class, and one of the pieces required for reading was pornographic in nature. During one of our son's foreign language classes, they showed movies of unclothed people, in order to "experience the French culture". In their speech class, the class and the teacher were great, but another student in class gave a speech that was pornographic in nature. My children were trying hard to act cool, but as a parent, I was pretty mortified that I put them into that situation. At a college fair I went to, a representative from one community college took me aside and told me to give a message to homeschoolers, that their children are sitting next to adjudicated adults - people who have just been released from prison and registered sex offenders. Community college is an adult environment. There is no way that adjudicated adults can be refused admission. We were also astounded by the vulgar language. One of the calculus teachers would drop the F-bomb when he spoke all the time. I think he was trying to be cool and trying to fit in with the group. It's important to note that not all teachers do all of these things; we just found these to be true. Community college is similar to a public high school atmosphere without the moderation that comes from being with other children. At community college you will see people smoking without being concerned that they're smoking, people swearing, etc. They bring this content into the classroom because they're all primarily grown adults; it's not a children's environment. Students who are perfectionists tend to have more difficulty in community college. This is not an academic problem, because they can get an A with little effort. The problem comes when students transition from community college to a university. When they go on to university, all of the sudden much more effort is required to earn an A. When they realize they didn't get A's because they were a genius, depression can be the result. Carefully weigh the pros and cons before you enroll your student in this environment; the costs just may not be worth it. Navigating community college is just another one of those challenging things that homeschool parents experience. But armed with good information and advice, you can succeed! Take a look at my free mini course, "The 5 Biggest Mistakes Parents Make When Homeschooling High School " to avoid other pitfalls common in homeschooling! If you would like some help putting together your child's transcripts from homeschooling and community college, my Total Transcript Solution will show you how to create an AMAZING homeschool transcript that will impress the colleges! Lee Binz, The HomeScholar, is a homeschool high school expert. Both her two boys earned full-tuition scholarships at their first choice university. Learn how she did it on TheHomeScholar.com. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Lee_Binz

Dual enrollment (attending community college while still in high school) has become a very popular trend among many homeschool students. After all, the chance to reduce college costs is pretty attractive! There are some great benefits to this choice, but I've found that many parents are unaware of the potential pitfalls when their 16 or 17 year-old student participates in classes designed for older adults.

Our sons attended community college when they were 16 and 17, and one of the most surprising things we experienced was the abundance of pornography. There was pornographic material for sale in the student bookstore right next to the engineering books (because presumably engineers are males). One parent told me that her daughter signed up for an English class, and one of the pieces required for reading was pornographic in nature.

During one of our son's foreign language classes, they showed movies of unclothed people, in order to "experience the French culture". In their speech class, the class and the teacher were great, but another student in class gave a speech that was pornographic in nature. My children were trying hard to act cool, but as a parent, I was pretty mortified that I put them into that situation.

How to Plan Successful Homeschool Field Trips

Field trips allow children of all grade levels to get away from the classroom to learn in more exciting environments. Public and private schools plan a few trips throughout the year to supplement classroom lessons, but you have an advantage as a homeschooling family. You can plan more field trips throughout the year and tailor them to the interests and struggles of your child.

If your child struggles to understand a lesson, a field trip may provide a fresh perspective that helps them understand certain concepts. If your child has a passion for a particular subject, regular field trips will help them explore that subject in new ways. These trips allow children to escape the daily routine and venture out into the world, but they also give you fresh ideas for lesson plans, experiments, and classroom projects.

These trips are essential to the learning process, but they are also a lot of fun. It is one thing to read a book or do a project on a small scale at home. It is another thing entirely to see what those books are talking about in the real world and see those projects at work on a larger scale.

Trip Selection and Planning

Every trip you take should correlate to a lesson you are currently teaching. Research all cities within a reasonable distance from your home and make a list of all museums, state and national parks, aquariums, and galleries that may apply to your child's studies now or in the future. As you develop new lesson plans for your child, add to this list.

Once you find a field trip idea that you want to pursue, the planning process begins:

1. Plan lessons to be covered prior to the trip. This will introduce your child to basic information they need to fully comprehend what they see on the field trip.

2. Plan an activity to be completed during the field trip or generate a list of questions for your child to answer during the trip. This keeps your child focused on what you want them to learn.

3. Plan follow-up lessons to recap everything your child has learned in the classroom and on the trip.