The 2nd semester started with my senior back home. We homeschooled Jake from K- thru the 1st semester of 9th grade. He attended public high school in Florida and again in Colorado. I had no idea how difficult it would be for him completing his senior year on Zoom classes. Required to sit at the laptop for all 50 minutes of each class 3 days/week. I spoke to the counselors to remove the unnecessary electives (he only needed 3 classes to graduate) however to be a “registered public school student” 5 classes were required. 50 minutes per class in order to be marked present. When I heard his English teacher reading The Kite Runner to the class I had enough and pulled him from public school. He gladly came home to finish English IV, American Government, and Aquatic Biology. Who ever thought I’d be creating Final Exams, yet I was having a blast missing teaching in a big way!
Classical Conversations
I was called upon to start substitute teaching for Classical Conversations Challenge A for a few weeks and then again for Challenge 3. I greatly enjoyed my time teaching and for the first time understood the vision of CC. I understood the concepts of Rhetoric, Debate, Critical Thinking, 5 Common Topics, etc. when we signed up last year. However seeing it taught in ChA (7th grade) and then the students doing it in Ch3 (11th grade) really won me over. However my 7th grader had a different opinion.
After the Science Fair, Henry’s assignments only consisted of writing, sketching, and speaking. He missed building. Even though we receive the monthly Tinker Crate – his engineer loving heart was starting to grow “bored” (his words not mine) of writing, sketching, and speaking every single assignment. Maybe I tainted the waters when I brought hands-on projects for anatomy and geography the weeks I subbed. After some passive aggressive attitude we finally had a very long discussion about his lack of interest to stay in CC.
Everyone is aware of my dislike for Henle Latin and that we use Compass Classroom in our home. We’ve done our share of promoting and recommending it over the years!
I still believe every middle schooler (public, private, homeschool, wherever) should do WordUp 1-3 learning Greek & Latin roots. Henry’s decision to find something other than CC went far more beyond the fact that he didn’t want to do their Latin strand.
After discussion, prayer, and more discussions we agreed to add his name to the local Stem School (charter school) lottery. Although he did not get picked, we were going to wait and see if the waitlist popped up his name this summer. We didn’t have to wait long. The boy will be attending the Stem School next year! He is beyond thrilled and I’m excited for him. We’ll give it a try for 8th grade and if it’s a total bust we’ll head back to Classical Conversations. Having Jake home this semester I’m seeing many gaps in his education. He is great at filling in the required blanks, but he is no longer as strong in discussion, vocabulary, and problem solving. Things CC is great at doing.
Hubs
It has not been an easy year for golf course architecture in the States. Hubs has spent 6 weeks last fall and again this spring living & working in Uruguay. Covid has closed borders so we did not get to visit as a family. Still only Europe & Asia stamps in our passports. It’s changed the dynamics in the house a bit as well with Dad being gone so long. I may or may not have gotten a few more tattoos and taken over someone’s office (I’m still working for Compass Classroom as their affiliate manager). It seems I’m the one who runs a bit more wild than the boys. They have been awesome and truly helpful.
That’s when you know you’ve raised your boys right. They might not win a Jeopardy tournament or get a scholarship to college, but they know how to step up and help their mama without complaint! They beat you outside to help shovel snow when you get 2ft of a blizzard dropped in your driveway. They offer to take you out for lunch … every once in awhile. They flip your laundry while you’re on a Zoom marketing call. They even stop by the grocery store because we’re out of OJ.
For too many years I put so much into how others viewed our family. If we were smart enough. Talented enough. Christian enough. And that all sounds nice, but really it all comes down to character. Rather than pride myself on raising a homeschool genius. I can proudly say I raised some decent human beings who help others.