by Ms.Tirtza Koren Gal

As homeschooling parents, we focus most of our attention on keeping our homeschool curricula interesting and engaging for our homeschool students. Many of us, however, forget that we are also a critical element, and that our enjoyment and engagement in the process directly affects the learning experience of our young charges.

by Ms.Tirtza Koren Gal

As a homeschooling parent, you are probably more often than not struggling to find a balance between structure and flexibility. A homeschooling parent needs to maintain structure and cover the necessary fundamentals within traditional curricula (like reading), but, at the same time, many of us like to play up one of the great virtues of homeschooling – the ability to focus on the individual child’s interests and strengths.

As a homeschooler, the world is your classroom. Field trips are a great way to make a lesson come to life. People in the community are available to enrich your learning. Planned events can become part of your curriculum—you just need to know where to look.

Identifying Community Educational Resources

by Kathleen Sabo

At a time when budgets are tight and expenses are skimmed, recreation is one of the first items to be cutback or discontinued. What is the purpose of recreation? Is it just an extra-curricular activity for the wealthy? Or is it a vital resource worth preserving?  Should enrichment activities be optional or do we require them?

THE “EXPERTS” SAY MY KID IS “BEHIND!”
by Steven David Horwich

This is the fourth article in a series answering hard questions dealing with homeschooling. In article one, we made a brief list of major concerns and objections one might encounter to homeschooling.  Let’s take up the fourth point on that list now.

- Some children may be seriously “behind”, as adjudicated by “experts”.

In part one of “How to Set Your Homeschool Goals,” we talked about the purpose of goals as well as how state laws, homeschool methods and educational style all contribute to determining your goals. Resources for setting goals were also given. In part two, we will address scheduling and managing your homeschool so you can better meet your goals.

by Barbara Frank
 
Got your attention, didn’t I? We moms are certainly susceptible to fearing that our children might be behind in something.

It starts when we’re pregnant. Your book for expectant moms says you should feel kicking by 20 weeks. If you don’t feel kicking yet, you need an ultrasound to see what’s going on.

I’M MOM!  I’M NOT QUALIFIED TO TEACH!
by Steven David Horwich

This is the second article in a series, answering hard questions dealing with homeschooling.  In the first article, I discussed how a person might overcome the problems of no money and no time. 

In article one, we made a brief list of major concerns and objections one might encounter to homeschooling.  Let’s take up the second point on that list now.

by Barbara Frank
 
Our economy is in shambles, with millions of people out of work and even more overcome by debt they can’t repay. But don’t worry; over at the White House, the president and his cabinet are working hard to find a way out of this economic mess by creating jobs somehow. But they’re having trouble, maybe because only 20% of them ever had a job in the private sector. All they’ve got to work with is the theories they’ve learned from books and professors.

by Steven David Horwich

Albert Einstein is universally thought to have been not only the greatest physicist of the 20th century, but its greatest scientists, and one of the three or so most important scientists of all time.  He homeschooled, by the way, until college, but that’s not what I’d like to write about today.

Today, I want to write about persistence.