As a homeschooling family it is quite a task in and of itself….

BUT the thought of homeschooling high schoolers usually breaks into 2 camps.

1-

There are many parents who feel that after 8th grade it is time to put a child in private or public school….for academic, maturity, financial, and other reasons. Many feel ill-equipped to teach rigorous high school courses. Others simply feel its time to move on after giving their children several years of homeschooling in the early years. Some are looking for academic or athletic scholarship opportunities for their children’s college years. They feel opportunities are better if their teens are in a traditional high-school setting.

2-

There are those who try to continue homeschooling thru the high school years. They may feel the children will benefit emotionally or mentally depending on the child’s needs and learning style. If their children have intense extracurricular activities they may choose to homeschool for more time flexibility. Many families use traditional schools for sports, band and/or fine arts and do not choose to put them in full time.So far, we have opted to keep our high-schoolers home and use homeschool co-ops and online classes to teach the toughest courses. But we also have friends who have taken a different path…

The decision is a maze for parents to navigate through…and each family has to decide for themselves.

I found an excellent resource on thehomeschoolchannel.tv …in fact there are MANY wonderful resources on The Homeschool Channel. This particular video helped me for our high school kids.  .

 

The video gave me a good outline of the high school years:

Homeschooling and Highschooling from The Homeschool Channel on Vimeo.

UNSCHOOLING AND STATE LAWS

What I am wondering is what it would take to do an unschooling year in high school….

How is that done while meeting requirements for the state homeschool laws???

After searching the internet …..it seems that we would never be able to truly unschool given the state requirements to cover specific subjects, the need to keep track of credits and my childrens’ career goals.

Relaxed homeschooling is also attractive but also seems to be on the other end from the law as well.

I am sure there are families that make this work. In fact, several friends of our chose this route and placed their teens in community college in the students Junior/Senior years. They took 1 or 2 classes per semester and test the waters. Then they transitioned into college full time once they completed homeschool high school. 

Depending on the state a homeschool family lives in will determine if this method is feasible. Our state laws in PA do not allow this=(

I have done a brief search online on this concept but have come up with very little….

HIGH SCHOOL REQUIREMENTS

Logo from HSLDA

One GOOD resource item I tripped over was from Home School Legal Defense Association HSLDA. They put together pamphlets that explain the different goals for each high school student depending on their career track AND what to do when. I told my kids to pray ALOT, ask God to lead them and “pick SOMETHING to aim for”.

Developing A Plan Brochure: http://www.hslda.org/highschool/HTHS4YearPlan.pdf

Keeping On Track: http://www.hslda.org/highschool/HTHS_Keep_On_Track.pdf

They even have a newsletter JUST for homeschooling high school….I don’t NEED more email BUT….it seemed worth it.

GREATER FOCUS????

I think kids who learn to “hear God’s voice” can potentially have greater focus if the “tune in” to God’s leading. God can reveal the plans He has for them. They are human of course and would have to CHOOSE to listen of course!

There was a national statistic I was told years ago when I attended college that stated 67% of college graduates do NOT work in their field that earned their degree in. That does not mean they didn’t benefit from the diploma directly… however, I learned a great deal even though I fell into that category=) It is a whole other issue to have our students choose the best suited career. We will leave that for another day=)

WEEKLY WRAP-UP

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