We all want a homeschool curriculum that helps our children learn. Each homeschooling family defines educational success in its own way. Most would say teaching to their child’s learning style is key. For my family, an excellent educational foundation in reading, writing,  and arithmetic is essential.

There are the visual learners (pictures, what they see), the auditory (listening, talking) learners, and the kinesthetic (physical, hands on) learners. Most of our kids don’t learn solely via one learning style. Many learn from a combination of two, or maybe even all three learning styles. Homeschool curriculum is expensive and most of us don’t have a ton of money to spend on it; buying a homeschool program like a “school in a box” curriculum for a certain grade level and finding out it doesn’t work is a major disappointment and a huge financial loss.

Interactive homeschool curriculum is one that many kids take to quickly, and it has elements in it that teach to all three learning styles; it fits in with the interactive games today’s kids play and is part of learning in the 21st century. My son, David, has benefited greatly from an online homeschool curriculum; it brought the visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learning methods under one umbrella which is perfect for him, since he learns all three ways.

Even better, you can usually get a trial period for these curricula; if it doesn’t work out for your child, you’re under no obligation. That’s good news during these economic times.

I never thought of myself as a particularly artsy and craftsy type of mom. Many moms are, and I admire them greatly. Despite my lack of art skills, my son loves to draw, is good at it, and has learned much from a how-to drawing book and an online art program.

Okay, when I first thought about it, online art sounded a bit strange to me; I thought, “Now that’s one subject you can’t learn online.” But then I thought about it a bit; I remember Microsoft Office WordArt and you actually could use it to draw online. My son tried it and liked it, along with learning some art basics. Now there are interactive programs that actually teach online art techniques, art history, and art theory.

When most kids think about art and drawing, it’s just a cool, fun thing for them to do. They usually aren’t concerned about art history and art theory; those interests are usually piqued later.

I wouldn’t say it’s time to throw the art books away, but I think learning art online, for some kids, might be an intro into the world of art and computers and actually lead to a career. For others, simply a fun break in the homeschooling day.

My son is only 10 but recently told me he wants to be homeschooled through high school. I often think, “Will I be able to rise to the challenge?” Do you have similar thoughts?

We attend a homeschool co-op, and there are several parents who are homeschooling their kids through high school. It seems to be a time of great concern for most of them. They’re concerned with keeping accurate records, making sure their children take the right classes (especially if the kids plan to go to college), applying to universities, and tons of other things on their to-do lists. Some have enlisted the aid of their local public schools, and their children have a part-time home school and part-time public school status. Other kids are homeschooled and take classes via community colleges and universities to ensure that they’ll learn those difficult subjects that their parents may not be able to teach them, i.e., Advanced English/Writing, Physics, Calculus, Chemistry, Foreign Language, and others.

There are parents who have decided to use online high school programs (both public and private) and others who are using high school writing programs. Writing is a subject I’ve heard parents say they don’t teach their high school children but serve more as a guide. High school online writing programs serve to give teens guidance and direct feedback on their writing. Some are geared toward essay writing, others toward standardized test writing, and still others toward research writing.

Lots of success stories are being shared via our homeschool co-op, i.e., school acceptances at Stanford, Oberlin, Wellesley, and Northwestern University, among others.

When the time comes, I’ll be praying that my son will be among those who are accepted at the university of his choice.

Please leave a comment sharing your experience with homeschooling through high school.

It didn’t take me long to get used to the idea of online homeschooling, because I began teaching my son at home via a home-based virtual public school that used online resources. They recommended that younger children do about fifteen to twenty percent of their work on the computer. I only used this home-based school for about six weeks, because I saw their curriculum wasn’t working for my son.

After this, I tried a labor intensive free curriculum that required me to print lots of books, keep lots of records, and spend lots of time preparing lessons. I did this for awhile, and for all my effort, I received an emphatic “boring” from my then 6-year-old son. So, I continued to search for an affordable curriculum. Homeschooling was becoming pure drudgery, and each day, I pieced together school work for my son, as I continued to search for excellent, affordable homeschool materials. I finally happened upon an online homeschooling curriculum that sounded too good to be true. I tried it out before I ever allowed my precocious 6-year-old to try it, and after reviewing a few Language Arts and Math lessons, I knew he would love it. I was right, and three and a half years later, he’s still loving it.

Online homeschooling resources can be helpful to your child and to you too. If your child is a visual, auditory, or kinesthetic learner, the online interactive lessons will keep her engaged. The online homeschool resources will help you too, because as your child matures, she will do her lessons independently, while you tend to your younger children or get things done around the house.

Once you begin using the online homeschooling materials, you won’t abandon your books, your unit studies, your hands-on projects, or your field trips; online resources will only be part of your home school, and your child will look forward to the lessons. You can even use those lessons to reward him for doing well with his other homeschool work.

You may have toyed with the idea of homeschool online but thought better of it, because you felt like the computer would be teaching your child instead of you. However, most homeschoolers use online homeschooling in combination with more traditional methods.

Homeschooling is all about freedom of educational choice and options. If online homeschooling materials work for your child, then don’t be afraid to use them. You may be a homeschooling mom who works from home and need some free time to check emails, answer phones, or search the internet. Online homeschooling materials will free you to do those things during the day and will also free your child to learn independent study and work skills.

Do you remember when you learned to type?  I think I started in 9th grade; I’m dating myself by telling you this, but when I began typing it was on a manual typewriter. For some reason, I could never get the knack of the long reaches, i.e., the “a” key to the “1″ key with the right pinky finger or the “;” key to the “-” key with the left pinky finger. I wasn’t a good typist on that dinosaur manual typewriter.

However, a few years after high school, I went to secretarial school. They had electric typewriters, and I practiced each day. By the time I graduated (in one year), I could type 60 words per minute–not bad for a student who couldn’t type 30 minutes in high school. From years of experience, I eventually reached close to 80 words per minute.

School students nowadays start learning to keyboard long before 9th grade; some start learning before they reach their teens. My 10-year-old son, David, started using the BBC’s Dance Mat typing; I thought it might help him with his homeschool work, because he likes writing stories and journaling. I thought learning to keyboard, as they call it nowadays, would help him to get some of his work done faster. He likes fun keyboard games a lot, because it makes learning to type exciting.

I’ve been searching for other sites that will help my son to become a better keyboardist. (I think typist sounds better). There are a lot of keyboarding games that will help your child learn to type. Typing games are a great way to get your child used to the feel of the keyboard and on her way to becoming an adequate typist–and maybe even a speed typist.

I’d love to know if your kids have any favorite, typing games. Leave a comment and let me know.