Hi everyone!
I'm new here, just thought that I would say hi!
I have 3 GT girls (4yo,6yo,8yo). They are all gifted, some more so than others.

I am pretty good at GT-denial (I love that term). Most of the time, my girls seem pretty normal. However, every year, during the summer, when I am trying to pick out new homeschool curriculum, I get hit with the fact that they are not normal. I try to find materials that fit them emotionally, as well as academically. I try to find materials that require age appropiate handwriting, but advanced math or english. I look for books that are not all review of what they have had before.
Well, for this year I am done. I have all of the books, I am ready! And, after much begging on the girls part, we have started school. Life is so much easier when we are doing school! Now I can go back into GT-denial for another year.

Tracy

Welcome Tracy!

Your girls are at such a great age for the homeschool environment. I did summer homeschooling, just an hour or so a day and I was glad I didn't have a baby or small toddler!
I find if they have something intellectually invigorating to focus on each day, even for a short time, they are much happier!

I haven't committed to total homeschool yet, but I'd love to hear ideas that have been successful for your family.

Neato

Welcome Tracy,

How nice to have another experience homeschooler on this board. Next year will be our first year of homeschooling (DS 6 by then)

Have you always homeschooled?

From another HSer of a DS7 (and I have a DS4, too in a pre-K program), welcome!

Hi Tracey!

I have a 8yo, 5yo, and 1.5yo. I have one more month to decide if I'll be HSing the 8yo. I am an afterschooler though.

How do you manage to HS 3 kids? The other night I had to laugh at the absurdity of it all. The 8yo is answering questions on noble gases. the 5yo is doing a worksheet from Rightstart (addition 68+7 using the 2-fives strategy 60+5+5+3+1 - not your typical rising Ker math) and begging me to give him time to finish it before taking his bath and the 1.5yo is climbing on a chair, walking across the dining room table, grabs her brothers pizza, climbs onto her highchair, and climbs right in and sits down and proceeds to eat his pizza. I thought to myself - I must be insane to consider Hsing 3 kids.

Dazey

Insane, maybe - but think of what fun you'll have!

But then, I only have 2.

Hi, Tracy,

Welcome. We're still in GT denial. However, and more importantly for DS8, we're finally in "schools around here don't fit (at the moment)" acceptance, and will be HSing for the first time.

Welcome Tracy! I am relatively new here too - homeschooling three of my five. The other two are 2 and 1. It can be done! The insaneness just keeps it from being boring!

C~

Yes, it can be insane, but it can be done. It can even be done by unorganized, housekeeping challenged mothers. (Thats me!)

We have homeschooled from the beginning. At first it was easy. My dd loved to learn (still does) and so we just kept on doing what we had done in the preschool years. As we have added in the younger girls, we have had good years and bad years. I think of last year as a bad year. We were never able to get into a routine, but all of the girls learned a lot. They all did well on the standardized test that I gave them. (Like off the charts good, but I wouldn't want to brag or anything.) My oldest is proving to be more independent this year, so that helps. I find that having a routine is very important for us. It really helps to make the day flow.

I have a blog if anyone is interested. (Am I allowed to post a link?)

Tracy

OH I'd love to look at your blog. What standardized test did you use?

I don't see why you couldn't. Others have. You could also edit your profile and list it under your homepage there.

The great thing about homeschool is you CAN admister the exact same standardized test the school uses to measure progress if you have a college degree.

Interestingly, DD8 was able to correctly choose the multiple choice answer for both multiple digit multiplication and long division on an achievement test awhile back.
Later, when asked to work out similar problems with no answer choices, she couldn't get the correct answer because she hadn't been shown the process yet.
She must have been able to estimate the correct answser and use process of elimination.

Yes, that's a strategy I discussed w/ DS. For ex: 34x12 ... look for an answer that as 8 in the ones place. I told him that later, the kids who know strategies will finish in time b/c they are not bogged down in doing the full calculation. So w/ a strong sense of place value, a kid could answer 34x12 in multiple choice unless the question is written such that all the answers have 8 in the ones place lol. But then you could estimate as well perhaps 30x10 and get in the ballpark.

My blog is here. I am not a great blogger, but I have written a little about how school works here.

I have used the California Achievement test. I like it because homeschooling moms are authorized by the test to give it. (So I can give it at home and it still meets the requirements of my state.) My sister has used it, and told me about it. I don't think that it is the best test out there, but it works for us. I used an out of level test for my oldest this year, and at least she didn't get a perfect score on any of the subtests. (She did score 99% on several of them though.)

We have not had a formal assesment done on any of our dds yet. Since we are planning to continue to homeschool, there doesn't seem to be any benefit. Maybe when they gets older it will be necessary, but for now we will just keep on trying to keep them learning. (Not as easy as it sounds. They knows so much, that it is easy for everything to just be review instead of real learning.)

Tracy