This year's been rough. Midway through the year we switched gears to provide her with more rigor (at her request). We shifted from casual brick and mortar homeschool classes (really unschool classes, hence the rigor comment) to an online curriculum (between 1-2 years accelerated).
It worked well at first, but then she just started wilting because of the isolation. After a brief adjustment period her grades went way up (and she was put in the advanced level in science), but then started to sink as she struggled with being lonely every day. This slowed her progress to a crawl so that she had even less time to take outside classes and be with friends. I think we underestimated her extroversion (my husband is an introvert and I'm balanced -- needing periods of both) so sometimes we forget that she's not like us. I also think that being outside the house and away from all the distractions (I need to clean my room!) is a necessity for her.
This fall she'll be attending a very small private school that seems like it will be flexible on placement and a very good fit socially. I only just discovered it existed a week after their application deadline and we raced through the process. But her tour, shadow day, and interview went really well. It's an expense that we weren't planning on, but if it works, it will be worth it.
At least I hope it works for another couple of years (two years seems to be our benchmark for 'needs more').
