Homeschool update

A lot of you asked for me to let you know how home school was going. Let me first say that I am not, by any means, a home school expert. What I am about to say is what is working for us, but it may not work for other families. Let me also say that I love public school. I love the school my kids go to, I love their teachers and the principal and how the school is run. I feel like they learn so much at school and that their teachers do an amazing job with my kids. I did not take Trevor out of school because I didn't like the school or his teacher. I took him out because he was struggling, he was not focused, he was not improving. I took him out because I felt prompted to. I felt inspired to. I felt like he needed to be home so that he could grow and learn to love learning. I took him out because he was feeling defeated and I needed to do what I could to lift him up, to put him in a place where he could succeed and feel good about himself and the things he did. I needed to work with him on learning from mistakes and realizing that it's okay to fail sometimes because it teaches us what we need to do better the next time. I will send him back to school for 5th grade, but never again will I hesitate to bring my child home if I feel prompted.

I have a very structured home school schedule. I know some people like to be more relaxed, but for us, we needed something that mirrored a public school schedule and kept us on task every day. Mondays and Wednesdays we do scripture reading, math, spelling, fiction reading and comprehension, essay writing. Wednesdays we also do science. Tuesdays and Thursdays are: scripture reading, computer math games, cursive, grammar lesson, non-fiction reading and comprehension, social studies and Thursdays we also do science. Fridays are for math and spelling tests, final draft essay writing, and Nevada history. We read from a novel every day at the end of the school day and then he writes about what he read, what he thinks will happen next. I grade his work and I put it in a grade book and right now he's on the A/B "honor roll" and he is so excited about that. When he gets something wrong we talk about WHY and we figure out where the mistake was made. Last week I typed up a story he wrote in school and he drew pictures to go along with it. Now he is working on part 2 of his story, on his own, not even as a part of school. He did a research project on Mars and tonight he'll present it to our family. I used to fight with Trevor over homework almost every day but since he's been home we rarely fight over home school. Sometimes he gets discouraged or upset when he gets something wrong, but I'm trying to teach him that it's okay, it's not the end of the world, he can try and do better the next time. I can tell that he's happier, that he feels better about himself. I can tell that he is becoming a little more independent. Our relationship is better. His relationship with Logan is better. So far it seems to be working for us. It's not easy and my days are very different now, but I would not change this for anything. When I look at him now I see his potential, I see who he will become someday. Maybe this whole home school thing was more for me and less for him. Maybe I was the one who needed to learn the lesson. I needed to learn to love my son more and see him the way his Heavenly Father sees him.