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My daughter is 12 - she's in 7th grade now. We started homeschooling her a couple of months ago with the help of charter school within her school district. The charter school requires that she takes grade-appropriate level coursework. They have let us move her into the district's Alegbra book (unheard of for this district -- all 7th graders needs to take pre-alegbra no matter what. It's ridiculous). We've also talked them into letting us cover literary analysis with a more recent focus on irony, foreshadowing, and thematic elements (using short stories). These are not things 7th graders in this district cover - they are working on grammar (which she's doing on the side for puncuation - her only real weakness), vocabulary (she has much different vocabulary lists, but is still doing vocabulary), and literary elements like climax and plot. So they've been working with us quite a bit.

The problem is that my job has gotten a lot busier and I'm having a hard time giving her the attention she needs for homeschool. For 8th grade, I can see that it will pretty much be impossible.

I'm thinking of asking if she can skip 8th grade and move straight into 9th. The district around here has a "no geometry in 8th grade ever" mentality. The language arts (even in Gate) would be what we're doing now. She would miss US History in 8th grade and physcial science, but she would get those more in depth in high school anyway.

I do have some concerns about the social aspect (only because she was already bullied in middle school - not because I think kids need to learn with their peers). She was 4 when she went to kindergarten, so she would be starting highschool late into her 12th year. She turns 13 at the end of October.

Thoughts? Ideas?

Is this even a reasonable idea? What other options do you guys see that I'm missing? We can't really afford a private school right now. There is a good school that's 7th - 12th in another district, but it would take me 30 minutes of drive time each way ... too tight on my family (and my work!).

I have no idea how to advocate on her behalf for something this big. I have AS, so persuasive arguments are not my strongest skill.

Well the charter school was a lot more open to it than we thought they would be. He said that, academically, he thought there was no issue and that even 9th grade in the local high school wouldn't be much of a challenge.

Socially, was another concern because she's already usually younger than her classmates, quite a bit smaller than them, and can come off as immature. It's hard to say whether the immaturity is due to her classmates not "getting" her, due to her being closer to the spectrum, or just something that she will need to grow out of ... could be a combination of all three.

There is a charter school high school nearby, though, that is a performing arts school. My daughter is very into drama, choir, and music in general, so it could be a good fit. They require a self-portrait (of any kind) for entrance. He said if we could convince them to push back the date they required registration for next year, then he would be happy to fill out the form and move her to 9th grade starting in the 11-12 school year. If not, we need to look at other options, but it still doesn't exclude skipping her.

He thought the performing arts school would be a great fit for her both academically and creatively. Looking at their website, they do have much more advanced curriculum than the public school nearby.

Off to meet with the charter school next!

Hi Adhoc,
Sounds like you have a few options - whatever you choose, 2 things are true:
1) It HAS to work for your family
2) You won't know until you try

I wish I could offer more, but be ready to try a few things by the 'process of elimination.'

Love and More Love,
Grinity