I suppose this question should be directed at Terie, hope that’s ok. )

Terie,  if you don’t mind, I would love to hear how you feel Time4Learning compares to the curriculum that is being used for Natalie in public school.  I rarely have an opportunity to talk to many public schoolers about the curriculum they use, and never to public schoolers that use Time4Learning. )

Do you feel like Time4Learning covers everything that her teachers are covering?  Do you have an opinion of whether or not T4L excels in the core subjects, or do you feel like areas are lacking?  Do you think that T4L meets the same standards that are set forth on the school system? Just so you know…I am not looking for vindication in my decision to homeschool, nor am I looking to “down” public schools.  I am not a general public school basher. )  Unfortunately I do have very strong, negative opinions regarding my own very rural school system, but I realize that there are excellent school districts in this country and for some kids, public school could really be the best option.

Again, I hope that you don’t mind me asking you these things directly.  I am truly interested in hearing from you, as a mom that has a child in public school.  As a homeschooler, I generally only talk about “school” with other homeschoolers.  I think it’s wonderful to hear how Natalie is progressing both in school and at home with you and Time4Learning. )

Thanks!  )

Oh – I am not yet familiar with everyone posting on this blog…if there are other parents who have children in public school and are using Time4Learning, it would be fantastic to hear from you as well!  )

Since those of us on this blog use Time4Learning in one way or another, we are all using the internet for education.  But how else does everyone use the Internet at home?

Our homeschooling experience would not be the same if it weren’t for Time4Learning.  Our family is a computer family.  Serious techies. )  My husband and I each have a laptop, which we take everywhere with us.  My 8 yr old has a desktop of his own and my 3 year old is going to get one as soon as we have a place to put another PC.

Education is done primarily online.  And not just with Time4Learning.  We have areas where Bailey does spelling and math drills online, and we are considering starting him in a online art program…we’re waiting a little while on that though.  My 3yr old, Braeden, also does some preschool work online.  Not yet with Time4Learning, but with an excellent program called Starfall (www.starfall.com).  One day we may even sign the boys up for music appreciation online.

While we still like to have the boys look up information in books, Bailey has discovered Google.  This opens up avenues for him to explore and learn, in a way that he just simply would not have if he ONLY had books.  At least in my opinion.  When he searches, depending on what he is looking for, he is parentally guided.  As much as we are Internet junkies, I still struggle with him having access to some areas online. He has seen a few (very few at this point) videos on You Tube that we have let him watch, things like a homeschool student’s speech and a couple of music videos.  He also watches videos on United Streaming (www.unitedstreaming.com) which is run by Discovery Education.  This is a remarkable service provided by Discovery!  I think they have something like 20 or 30,000 educational videos in pretty much any catagory you can think of.  In my state, Georgia, I went through Georgia Public Broadcasting to gain free access to this site.

Other ways that the Internet has changed us…not just how we educate, but honestly our day to day lives…is how we communicate with others.  Is letter writing an important skill to possess?  I think that everyone should know how to write a letter if the need arises.  However, with email, Bailey (all of us really) is able to talk with family and friends in a way that he wouldn’t have if he had to wait on regular mail.  And email is cheaper than the phone…Bailey’s grandmother lives in California.  So besides the cost of the call, we have to work on a 3 hour time difference.  Email is just easier on a daily basis.  Through forums and groups, I am able to get and give advice to and from other moms.  And Bailey likes knowing that he can email and chat with friends that use Time4Learning just like he does.

Just to make things clear…our family is a family of AVID readers.  What my husband and I consider “quality time” together, is each of us curled up in a recliner with our own good book.  ) Our boys have the same love of reading (right now they love it conditionally…it can’t be too educational, lol)  We have weekly trips to the library and Bailey knows how to look up information in the Dictionary and in the Encyclopedias.  We also do crafts, activities, cub scouts, field trips and more together, so we don’t JUST sit in front our computers all day.  Well, most days we don’t anyway. )

I would like to know how other families use the Internet.  Not just homeschooling families, although since I am a homeschooler, I would probably compare my family most to those that do homeschool. )  Are there any websites that you use for education, besides Time4Learning?  Any places that your kids like to go online that you feel helps them learn?

I just had an opportunity to read the most recent newsletter, about Accidental Homeschoolers.  John’s definition and description of an Accidental Homeschooling family could not be any closer to my family’s situation!  Reading that, made me want to share my story.  I apologize in advance for the length…

When it came time for my oldest, Bailey, to start school, there was never any doubt about putting him in the public school system.  We had no reason to feel like that was not the best thing for him.  He had a fantastic Kindergarten year.  We loved his teacher and the experience that year brought all of us.  When First grade was about to start, we thought that year would be just as good as the year before.

We were so wrong.  We started experiencing problems with the teacher, I kid you not, BEFORE school even started!  Ugh!  Anyway, the year continued to have problems.  My son, who is very social and wanted to go every single day in Kindergarten, was starting to ask if he could stay home.   We began looking into other options, trying first to get him changed to another class within the same school.  That was not on option that was going to pan out.  We then started discussing private school but the cost… Holy Cow!!  That option also quickly fell apart.

Then someone suggested homeschool.  My first thought?  NO WAY, NO HOW, NUH UH!  Why you might ask?  Well, there were a couple of reasons for that.  One being my own sense of self ability.  I didn’t think I could do it.

The biggest reason though is quite tragic.  You see, when I was pregnant with Bailey, I lost my 16 1/2 year old sister-in-law to suicide.  Going through the shock, I blamed everyone including myself for her loss.  Once the shock gave way to anger, I latched on to the one reason I could blame that wasn’t someone.  Homeschooling.  Yep, she was homeschooled.  In my mind THIS is why she gave up.  She had no friends her age, no peer group.  All of her friends were 7 or 8 years older than her, or more.  A 16 year old who thought she was fat, needed another 16 year old to tell her she wasn’t.  A 16 year old who had a crush on a boy, needed another 16 year old to talk to about that.  She didn’t have that, and I blamed homeschooling.  Homeschooling secluded kids and kept them apart from the socializing and the peer groups that they so desperately need at that critical age.

For years, I maintained that I would never, NEVER, do that my kids.  Then my husband and I met a new friend.  He was in his 2nd year of college at the time, worked 40 a hours a week and still managed to keep himself on the Dean’s List at school.  He was intelligent, responsible, grounded and had a nice group of friends.  Imagine my shock when he informed me that he was homeschooled.  For nearly his entire life!  Well, I was floored.  I questioned him endlessly, it seemed like hours.

I found out that not only did he thrive being homeschooled, he knew of many people just like him that were homeschooled and were then succeeding in life as a young adult. Even though, I had a hard time letting go of my idea of homeschooling and what it could do to a child.

After a couple months of  misery (unfortunately that is not an exaggeration) on both my part and Bailey’s, something happened at school that made me pull him out, in basically what amounted to a fit of rage.  That Friday, anger became my catalyst to homeschool.  That following Monday, I thought I should commit myself to the “special home.”  ) I was a nervous wreck.  Completely lost with no idea where to turn.  I have to tell you that I stayed lost for exactly 16 months.  For 16 months we hit every bump in the homeschool road.  We tried everything from complete boxed curricula to pieces of several different ones.  We had days where both my son and myself were in tears.  Why couldn’t I do this?  Why couldn’t he?  At least every other day, I asked myself (and anyone else who would listen) if I had made the right decision.

Then in March of this year, I stumbled upon Time4Learning.  When I say stumbled…I mean that quite literally.  I was on review site looking for yet another curriculum and thought I was clicking on one link, as it turns out I mis-clicked and landed at time4learning.com. Seriously.  Fate, you say? )

Over time, and with the help of my own family and families that I met that also homeschool, I was able to see that homeschooling in general could not be solely responsible for the loss of my sister-in-law.  However, I still believe to this day that her situation fuels me to make sure I do better for my own children.

Since March our lives have been so different.  We no longer have the struggles we used to.  Everything is just…good.  ) So… yes, I feel like we initially started out as Accidental Homeschoolers.   Will we be homeschooling right through high school?  No one knows the answer to that.  Right now however, I can say that we cannot imagine our family being anything other than a homeschooling family.  )

In response to John’s newsletter title, “Do our Children Learn Differently,” I had a couple of comments to make. 

Although I agree that the children of today learn differently than of children past, I don’t completely agree with it. I honestly believe that some children would have been much better off in the 70′s and 80′s had there been more technology.  My brother is a prime example of this and I know that he is not the only one out there.  I learn by repetition, I learn by “doing” rather than by reading how to do, I learn by someone teaching me. My brother learns in much the same way that my youngest son does and that is by simply “watching” something being done and then going off and doing it himself and “figuring it out”.  My brother would have never attended one day of public school if T4L had been around when he was young. 

I believe that with technology comes more options, I believe technology helps kids grasp things differently but the concepts are still the same only now instead of my mom saying to me and my brother “Go look it up in the encyclopedia”, I find myself saying “Go google that”….. While I believe that children do process things a bit differently, bottom line is learning styles are learning styles and just because my children have the wonderful opportunity that they have does not mean that they learn any different that we did; they just have more options.

My next point is about technology taking place of sports and outside.  I totally agree that my children do not head outside as soon as they are done with their school work the way that we did growing up.  We live on 70 acres and my kids should be outside exploring ALL the time with what they have available to them.  I do agree that on occasion I have to “force them” outside or have to join them when they do go outside so we can hike or what ever.  With that being said, my family spends very little time watching tv.  We are a computer family and we sit in the same room, each with our computers and enjoy each other’s company whether it be in an online game or doing our own thing “chatting”.  We spend the summers swimming in our pool and when company is here spend most of the time outside.  Yes, we do own (collectively in our family) every video game system available (with the exception of the ps3) but that also is (for the most part) done together.  So I guess that even though my kids don’t always “volunteer” to go outside, that is the way it is now and even though I dislike it, sometimes it is easier to accept it.  As a side note, my boys play soccer, roller blade, do karate and are cub scouts.  They are very active kids and even though I think they spend to much time on line, there are far worse things that they can be doing……  What would I change?  Probably them “wanting” to go out and play…   Is that going to happen?  We are working on it. :)

The last comment I have is about “putting the gameboys down in the car”.  Each of my boys have a game boy (you shocked?) and they will probably get a better hand held system this year for Christmas.  (shocked again?)  I don’t always agree that children should have game boys and when I see children at family functions, family activities or something like that it makes me angry.  I do think that there is nothing wrong with my kids playing their game in the car and because we are home schoolers we cram learning into every bit of their lives…..  Even in the car I am throwing something “educational” at them…  I would rather them spend a little bit of time zoning while driving down the road than sitting in their rooms playing!  Of course, my kids don’t abuse their game boys and can really “take them or leave them” so it is really not an issue for us but honestly everything we do revolves around their education and something being learned, discussed or shared so giving them some time in the car to just zone is not such a bad thing for our family……

Thanks for the newsletters John, I enjoy them!

After reading Tracy’s post about other “stuff” they are using, it made me think that it would be nice to hear more about this from other parents. )

In our home, Time4Learning is definitely our core curriculum. I have not found an area (other than maybe spelling, which I believe is improved upon in the 3rd grade) where we NEED any supplementing. However, for some reason, my son LOVES the “The Complete Book Of…” workbooks. ) We have Handwriting, Spanish, Science, Our Solar System, US History, Maps and Geography, Travel Games, Arts and Crafts and finally, Bible Activities. Geez…there are a bunch. ) We also have a sign language program that we are hoping to start this year!

Since we follow a more “relaxed” homeschool plan, he doesn’t have a set amount of work that he needs to do. I have went through the lesson plans from Time4Learning, so I know how many lessons need to be done each day, but that was for my own peace of mind. It’s also helpful when we might miss a day, so I know how many he needs to do to “catch up.” We honestly have yet to have a day where he did not want to do the number of lessons I had planned. Yay! )

Many of the workbooks that he has, span more than one grade so there is no pressure for him to finish them. He just kinda sees where his interests are that day, and picks out a workbook. We try to do some in Handwriting every day, but he really does need the practice in that area.

So…that is our “plan” for this year. It will be great to hear from the other parents to see how Time4Learning works into their “plans.” )