Monday, April 20, 2009

Homeschool Update


We're pushing through our school work pretty hard these days. The kids are not enjoying it much but come the first or second week of May when they are finished with everything early and get to go to the Rec Center or play Wii whenever, I think they will thank me. For the most part, we'll finish all but one or maybe two subjects by the end of April. and then the rest by the second week of May. Jakeb has already completed Algebra 2 and is taking Geometry. It might take him a bit longer to finish that. Tori will be finished with her college semester on May 5th!! Yippee!!! She, too, has done so well this semester, juggling 17 hours in her first semester and working at Kohl's. She's amazing!

Jakeb has already completed a few areas of his English and he takes his last Chemistry test today. WOW! Anna is only two weeks away from finishing History and Science and has also already finished a few areas of her Language course. We switched gears with Anna's Math in February starting over with a brand new curriculum and will finish a year's worth of Math by the first week of May. Double WOW!! There's light at the end of the tunnel.

I have absolutely no regrets about homeschooling this year but it has been a major undertaking with everything else we've had going on. It wouldn't have been easy anyway and anyone that thinks homeschooling is a breeze seriously needs to think again. Without having Tommy's support and help, I don't know if I could have survived. Tori also helped me a lot with Jakeb's curriculum planning and bouncing off ideas.

It's been worth it, though. My kids have learned well and we've had lots of time together. We have field tripped together, laughed together, cried together, thrown fits together, and then laughed some more, and just learned a lot about each other and ourselves together.

We wont' be homeschooling in Singapore. Homeschooling was definitely one of our options but we really felt like being a part of a school would give the kids the necessary social interaction and keep us from being so secluded. We wanted the kids to be able to make friends and being in a school will be a good outlet for me to use my gifts and talents in volunteering. They will be going to an International school and making friends from all over the world like I did when I was a kid in an International school in Brazil. I'm really pretty pumped about that. My best friend in Brazil was from Japan. Their world as they know it and the direction of their future is about to take a wonderfully drastic turn for the good.

So the next few weeks, we're busy with school. Finishing up. Catching up (lots of grading for me to do). Packing up. Closing up the Stunz School. All in all, it's bittersweet.

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