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.”  :o) 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? :o)

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.  :o) 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.  :o)

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. :o)

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. :o) 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. :o) 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! :o)

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.” :o)

So my 3rd grader did his first lessons in Science and Social Studies today. We were both shocked (in a good way) at how incredibly different the science and social studies programs are this year as opposed to the 2nd grade levels. We were so used to the small, animated lessons that when he first logged in and we saw the first lesson on Vikings…our jaws dropped, lol. I had seen the lesson plans, but honestly only briefly.

We were able to sit and read together and even involved daddy, who enjoyed being able to help. As my son read through all the information in the activities, my hubby and I just kept looking at one another going “wow! this is great!” Even though these lessons were not even remotely similar to the 2nd grade lessons he remembered, my son was totally enthralled in what he was doing. When he printed out the little Viking cards and got out his first “notebook,” I think it finally hit him that 3rd grade is not the “little kid’s school” (his words) anymore. :o)

By the time he moved on to Science, got his next notebook started and did all the measurements that the first lesson asked him to get, he truly felt like he accomplished something today. What a proud moment for us all. And we are totally looking forward to what the next lessons hold!! :o)

We have officially completed a year of Time4Learning! While it hasn’t been 12 months since we first signed up, my son has started and completed the 2nd grade with T4L. Yay!! He was so excited this morning when I told him that I had gotten the email confirming that he could officially start the 3rd grade. You’d think you just told him that he was going to Disneyland. Ok…maybe not Disneyland, but you get my point. :o)

I was SO proud of him today. He does NOT like math at all, but decided to just jump right into math today and that was the first subject he started! Having taken a little time off, he struggled initially but ended up doing well. The difference between 2nd and 3rd grades was very noticeable. The lessons were not (at least not today at any rate) quite as animated as we were used to, but he still seemed pleased. I know I was! We are keeping my 2 nieces for two weeks and they are also homeschooled. They use a different curriculum than we do and were very intrigued and watched my son quite a bit today. It will be interesting to see what the next couple of weeks hold for all of them! :o)