Hi. I've just began homeschooling DS6 and feel like I'm not getting it. I'm reading The Well Trained Mind and not sure that the age interests correspond to my very bright son. If you're familiar with the Classical Curriculum thing, the idea is to teach the three r's first until fourth grade. Then, they get to go deep into other things. Well, my son is very interested in other things and I want to encourage those interests and preserve his natural curiosity. I'm concerned that this style isn't ideal for gifted/very bright kids.

DS likes math, reads naturally, has nice enough handwriting (I'm not big on penmanship) and is very interested in human biology, astronomy, religion, drawing, piano, puzzles/problem solving, trains and history. He is a good listener but prefers to touch things when possible. He hopes to eventually go back to montessori.

Can anyone point me in the right direction for a hs style that will work for him? Is it Charlotte Mason or un-schooling?

I'm currently homeschooling my DS7, we pulled him from K last spring (I also have a DS5 who is going to K in the fall and a DD2.5 who is just along for the ride). For us, none of the pre-packaged home school methods or curricula works. We pull a little from here, a little from there and use what works and makes sense for us. We're truly eclectic! I would say read up on the different styles and use what you think would work for your son and your family, and ignore what doesn't seem to fit. Most of the methods have some really good aspects and some parts that would never work in our family. One of the benefits of homeschooling is that you don't have to follow someone else's idea of how your kid *should* learn. You can tailor things to how he *actually* learns.

A wonderful book I got when we first started homeschooling was Creative Homeschooling by Lisa Rivero. It is written specifically for GT kids and she talks extensively about the different methods and what kind of kid they work for and what their drawbacks are.

http://www.amazon.com/Creative-Home...mp;s=books&qid=1241266998&sr=8-1

ETA: I should also say that the first year is really more about learning how to learn together than it is about achieving any particular academic knowledge. Take the time to really get to know how your DS learns and how you guys actually function as homeschoolers. Our first year was *rough* and I think it was because I assumed I knew how we would work together and made plans based on those (false) assumptions. The homeschooling we're doing now works wonderfully for us, but it looks absolutely nothing like I expected it to when we first started.

We use a little of this and a little of that too. I tend to get board pretty easy, so the idea of using just one curriculum all year just doesn't work for us. The bad part of that is that I'm a curriculum junkie.....can't get enough of it. Is there any curriculum fairs coming to your state soon? Our big one is in June, and I can't wait.

I would just browse the many many different curriculum sites. Look at their samples, and the try to buy used. If I do that, I don't feel as bad if it doesn't work out. Plus you can resell it.

http://www.homeschoolclassifieds.com/

http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=15

I agree w/ Mamaandmore - that first year is a learning year for you both....but not academics! What I would do is ask your DS what he wants to learn about then assist him. Show him how to use the computer at the library to research his topic, locate books, read the index etc to see if the book is what he wants, do google searches and go from there. Perhaps ask him for a science topic and a history topic.

I personally like Charlotte Mason crossed with a bit of WTM. I like narration and I know DS8 is really getting better at getting his thoughts together. This will help w/ public speaking, note taking, summarizing, listening skills etc. So I emphasize more narration and discussion and less "answer these questions about what you just read or saw" and less writing than public school. Where I mainly use a curriculum is math but I try to supplement that w/ math history and fun math books.

Then make a list of field trips - museums, living museums, national parks, zoos, science centers, etc. Then you can prepare ahead of time for each trip. For art museums, I like to prepare a treasure hunt list ... or I get a good art book of paintings and see how many they can find. Or we sit and sketch a painting of his choice.

I think what my son and I do is closer to unschooling than anything else, except for math, piano and handwriting.

My son always liked general knowledge trivia so I just bought books about whatever he was interested in at the time. Instead of using a reading textbook I let him read from the science encyclopedia that he liked so much at age 5 and 6. I let him play free online educational games a lot. He only used a spelling textbook for one year to learn basic spelling rules and I saw that he was pretty good at remembering the way a word was spelled, if he had seen the word a few times. I printed out the Sitton high frequency word list and asked him to spell words on it and had him write any words he missed. By the time he competed in a state spelling bee, he was good at noticing and remembering how difficult or unusual words were spelled. He was interested enough in words that he looked up words that he wasn't familiar with because using context clues wasn't good enough for him. He wanted to know the exact meaning and etymology so I let him take the time to do that. When we read together we often had the laptop with us so we could look up more info about words or history on dictionary sites and Wikipedia. He loved to discuss things. Reading anything with him was slow going sometimes, especially if it was something he was really interested in and he often had two or three books going at the same time. This was one of the reasons the library wouldn't work for us--we would have to pay library fines on top of having to pay $40 a year and the gas to get there to use the library in the city. Also, I like to write the comments, jokes and comical analogies that my son makes when we read. On the pages of the books, I underline the paragraph or phrase or whatever prompted his comments and write down what he says so I can remember the fun we had when he is grown. I think he might also enjoy looking at the books and reading the comments when he is older.

Because he liked history so much, the only fiction he would read for a while was historical fiction and he really liked books like Johnny Tremain when he was second and third grade age. At almost 11, he knows a lot more history than I do and can relate it to things that are happening now. But it isn't just history that he likes, its economics, law, philosophy, psychology, sociology, biology, all kinds of different subjects that a lot of teachers might not think are important for an almost 11 year old to know and would not be on their tests.

I think the way we are homeschooling has helped him develop a very good general knowledge. I finally played Buzz The Mega Quiz on his PS2 with him and he was answering questions faster than I could. If he didn't know the answer he could make an educated guess. He's very good at making educated guesses because he has read a lot and watched a lot of educational television and played educational computer and video games. He is fun to talk to because he can talk about just about anything and this adds to his self confidence. I really enjoy learning with him because he thinks of things I would never think of and asks questions that I would have never thought to ask. I refused to try to stifle his curiosity like my sister-in-law suggested before he started kindergarten and I refused to make him color in the lines and I think it is working well for us.

I have The Well Trained Mind somewhere. I read a few pages of it and I didn't think it would work for us at the time. I bought it when my son was six or seven and I don't remember much about it.

We're secular eclectic, which basically translates to reading whatever we feel like--mostly from library books rather than any set curriculum. We started out much more school-at-home-y than we are now. Now we're bordering on unschooling, though the choices I let him make are within certain boundaries and must be of the academic variety. (i.e., he's not out playing in the yard all day!) We have a school time, and during that time, he's expected to do some math, some fiction reading, some non-fiction reading, some writing...but what he chooses in those broad areas is pretty much up to him. I make sure he has plenty of options that are acceptable to me and intersting to him. That has worked pretty well for us.

FWIW, I often find that methods and curricula that sound good don't really work with an HG+ child. These kids often break the mold of even homeschooling methods, which are typically more flexible than bricks-and-mortar schools (though not always, depending upon the method of homeschooling and the B&M school in question...).

And that's not even discussing the money you'd have to spend as the kids race through the curricula that you buy!

I find that the mostly-library method gives us maximum flexibility for a minimal cost. Our library even has an "educator's card" that HSers qualify for. It allows me to check out books for 3 months without ever renewing, and anything late has no fine! It ROCKS!

I use E.D. Hisrch's "What Your Xth Grader Needs to Know" series and other such resources to make sure that we're not missing anything important.

I usually take a couple of weeks before spring testing to cover anything that someone in his grade is expected to know that we didn't yet hit on. So far, it hasn't taken us more than a couple of lazy weeks to fill in those minor gaps. If it's a subject he's not really interested in, I just cover it with him in the form of an at-grade-level book and discussion. I figure that's what he'd get if he were in a traditional school, so I see no reason to club him over the head with anything that he's not into. It seems to work pretty well.

YMMV, of course, but that's what suits us. And I agree that Lisa Rivero's book is a must-read! (And not just for homeschoolers!) It's fabulous!

So much about how you approach homeschooling is about personality--yours and your child's. As everyone has said, you almost certainly have to adapt as you go along because it's a learning experience. But there's no wrong way as long as what you're doing is working for you and your child.

I have the Well Trained Mind. That is about the most structured homeschooling book I've read. I think there are pieces you can pull from there, but certainly the age ranges can be totally skewed for GT kids. I do use Story of the World as a base for history (but usually we do considerably more from library books or internet research). Some of the hands on projects seem great for my PreK kid, but my 2nd grader would laugh in my face if I insisted he did some of this stuff.

I do think Creative Homeschooling by Lisa Rivero is a helpful book! Well worth a look.

What we do looks very eclectic and almost unschooling sometimes. We have a math curriculum that we use daily. Other than that, we do have a science and history curriculum, but we diverge from that a lot. We journal and using Writing without Tears. I require minimally piano, math, reading, and writing every day. My son has picked up some programming, some typing, had a lot more time to read on his own. He was in a chess club, built his own board game over several months, etc. I was really worried about his writing skills this year, but we have come quite a ways actually and he has written a few fiction stories that have given me hope (he'd be a 2nd grader this year).

My homeschooling philosophy is as long as he is learning something, learning something incrementally (learning how to learn), and could be dropped back into the public school at grade level at least we're doing ok. We've gotten through almost 3 years of math this year and we really aren't trying. That's 20-30 minutes of math (sometimes less if it's an easy unit) usually 4 or 5 times a week (when we have co-op we skip it). He figures about 90% out on his own. I guess my point is that GT kids are pretty easy to teach. Especially if you can hone into their learning style and let them own it.

We're using Singapore for math. Which I really like for my son. I love that they throw in plenty of really challenging problems.

Good luck! I'm sure it will be great!

I agree, kimck. For the most part, I'd say that the hardest thing about homeschooling an HG+ kid is keeping up with him.

The other hard thing for me is getting him social time without my introverted self having to be too social...but that's another issue and my own problem. We're doing much better with that this year than we did last year, when I was worn to a frazzle!

We are doing an unschooling method and it is working very well for DS6. We started out with a more traditional method with some curriculum items and he HATED it - it was a fight to get him to sit and "complete" worksheets and workbooks. I got tired of the daily struggle and I saw him start to disappear so we began unschooling at the holiday break and what a difference....I let him set the pace for the day - one day might be exploring snap circuits, another day might be completing several activities on the National Park Webrangers online program, another might be cooking and doubling a recipe, the other day he printed out several county maps and came up with a route for us to take to several locations on the Indian River so we could go look for manatees, we sat on the river bank and saw several come right up next to the bank and he was in heaven - then we went to the library and checked out a ton of books on them....the list goes on and on....he is covering now more than when we were doing the traditional...but each kid will be different - you will figure out really quickly where your child fits in :-)

I love reading how everyone's HSing is done! I'm still trying to wrap my brain around unschooling. My impression was that if you require anything (even if it's choices w/ in that subject area) that's not unschooling. I think of unschooling as learning most things out in the real world. Now i did read that unschooling doesn't mean no textbooks, but that the child initiates it. I read of one unschooled girl who did NO writing until late highschool. She had some bad writing experiences while in public school so the mother didn't push it when she brought her home. She went to college and tested out of several writing courses. WOW! With no writing at all! I would be just too afraid to try that route.

I'd be chicken to go complete unschooling too. But the work I "require" that keeps us at grade level really rarely takes more than an hour or two altogether. That does leave a lot of time for field trips, creative free play, and independent learning of his choice.

I heard one unschooling mom speak at an unschooling event. Her philosophy was one that didn't necessarily lead her kids down a path towards college. She really let them take the lead entirely from day 1. I cannot do that. I strongly feel my kids are definitely going to college and I feel they need to be prepared to do that successfully. One of her kids did go on to college (I got the feeling he was quite GT, because he read spontaneously early). The other one did not go to college. I do think there is a lot of middle ground between doing say a very structured classical homeschool curriculum and completely unschooling. Like right now we are doing a chemistry curriculum. But my 8 year old chose chemistry as the next science he wanted to pursue.

You are right about the definition of unschooling - it can be different for different families - there is a even a term called radical unschooling where the whole family basically lives their entire lives with the whole unschooling term or a more traditional unschooling method of the parent leaving various items around the house to peek an interest in a child to do further exploring or you can just let the child set the pace and do what they are interested in or a combo of all of the above
:-) We do most of our learning experiences out and about - growing our own garden, raising butterflies, taking old computers apart, experimenting with rocket building... when he shows an interest in something I try to find everything possible in the community to explore concerning that area and what is cool to watch is that as he is exploring a topic he is interested in, he is reading to learn more about it, he is usually doing some kind of math, history usually gets involved while reading about the subject, art comes along if he wants to make something. So instead of forcing him to sit and do reading time (which was ALWAYS a fight), he will sit and spend an hour reading about computer programming to help him complete a project he is working on. Once you start you will quickly realize which method works best for you...I do want to share that before anyone goes and spends a lot of money purchasing curriculum materials, go pick up a few workbooks at a local bookstore or make some of your own lessons and see how your child handles the whole situation first because you may find that one method works better than another and then you can go order curriculum if you want once you see how it all falls together.

I think people think unschooling means kids either playing video games all day or doing nothing but cooking and gardening. Maybe that's okay for some families, but I'm not into that. But I can actually see how unschooling could work for DD because she is so interested in learning about everything around her. And I am interested in teaching--but unschooling doesn't mean that I wouldn't be able to share my ideas and suggestions and tips with DD. It just means I wouldn't tell her what to do and force her to learn things she's not into. I do think the theory of unschooling--that kids who aren't forced or drilled love learning and teach themselves at their own pace--is pretty great.

That's not to say that we'll necessarily go that route. I go back and forth about the value of learning to do something you don't want to do and when/how/why that should be taught.

I like that we don't have to do all-or-nothing of any one approach. We're much more "unschool-y" than we were when we started, though the full-on unschoolers that I know probably wouldn't see us as unschooling. But I know a few people who call themselves unschoolers who do very much what we do: something along the lines of "Math time! What do you choose to work on today of the possibilities I have here for you? Or would you prefer to come up with a project of your own?"

With kids who crave learning and love a challenge, this really seems to me to be a good approach. It's certainly not for all kids, but if you have a child who wants to learn about everything and doesn't run away from hard work, I think it's a pretty good plan.

It's also nice because if the child *stops* wanting to lead the way, it's always possible for the parent to become more directive without it being a big deal. Something along the lines of "If you don't care, I can choose something for you."

YMMV, of course...

We also tend to unschooling, though not completely. DS7 is very self-motivated in most areas and if he has something he wants to learn, it always trumps whatever I had planned. But, I do usually have something lined up for those times that he's not working on his own thing. Usually what happens is that I'll introduce a new topic and something about it will spark his interest and he'll run with it (which is part of the reason we're still not quite done with Story of the World Vol. 1 after over a year, lol). We tend to meander through topics and get lost on tangents.

But, there are some subjects that he just doesn't choose on his own with enough regularity for me to believe that he's really challenging himself- mainly math and writing. Those subjects I will schedule things for him to learn and work on. I try to keep them palatable, I try to incorporate them in ways that make them relevant to what he's interested in, but whether he enjoys them or not, they have to be done because working on things we don't enjoy or maybe aren't very good at is just as important as doing what we love.

We do very little or no workbook or textbook work. We tend to use "living books" (I really do love the Charlotte Mason description of books) and do unit studies. DS7 is very good at trivia-type knowledge, my goal is to give him context and deep understanding of the things he already knows. I don't want to drive *what* he learns, I want to help guide him in how he thinks about it and the connections he makes using what he already knows.

But, this is just what works for us and it has taken us some time to get here. We had a lot of mis-steps before I figured out that for the most part, DS just needs me to get out of his way and for DS to realize that if he wants me to give him space to learn what he wants, then he's going to have to appease me and learn the few things I think are important for him.

Yes, that's my issue w/ 100% unschooling. DS is not motivated enough to do things that aren't *fun*. I've read of kids not learning algebra until they decide they want to go to college, then they are motivated to learn all the math at once that they need but it may mean they don't go to college until 22, for instance.

I think if I only had one, I would do more unschooling but with a very busy 2yr old and a 5yr old, it's easier for me to open the math book (we use Rightstart which is less workbooky than others I've seen) and do the next lesson. I do use living books to go along w/ math to make it interesting as well as learning math history etc which he loves, but I don't know about totally giving up the workbooks lol.

One painful lesson I learned was DS expressed interest in lapbooking. He chose the lapbook he wanted to do. He hates cutting etc so I agreed to print it and cut it all out. Well, after it was all done, he decided he didn't want to do it. Lesson learned lol! He has since picked a new one he really wants to do but I've left it up to him to print it out, cut it out etc and it has yet to happen.

So I would definitely caution against buying a bunch of stuff...try one or two things and see if it goes over well.

I don't think I could give up my history textbook either lol. We use SOTW - we do lots of go-alongs (historical fiction, beautiful picture books (The boys still ask for Gilgamesh) but I like going chronologically. DS does to so it's something he enjoys. On his own, her pursues his interest in WWII through documentaries and books. But we do things like DS will be on a dig w/ an archaeologist all week studying Ancient Greece. We spent the day w/ the archaeologist at a museum studying ancient Greece exhibit. As part of the dig he has been playing Parthenon game and we'll buy it for home. So I like delving into these things but use textbooks like SOTW as a spine.

I do lean more toward Charlotte Mason. Get the core stuff done in the AM with the afternoons free to explore interests. DS likes to spread things out throughout the day with frequent breaks in between.

What an interesting journey it is!!!!! And it's so different for everyone!

I am also new to homeschooling; this was our first year with the older kids. I have found that no one approach and no one way works for my children, depending on the child and the subject. Makes for a lot of work for mom, but works really well for us.

I have materials from 8-10 different publishers, again child/subject dependent. I also always have my library card maxed out, we are limited to 50 books here. I do have an actual curriculum for math for all the kids, we just move forward based on each child. I have many other curriculum materials, I have found that many traditional publishers offer online versions of many of their textbooks at a much smaller cost in most cases. I use this as a great resource as well. (It can be hard to find secualr materials for homeschoolers, my choice.) I visited my state website and pulled grade level curriculum expectations for each grade to help guide my core curriculum, or use inexpensive materials like studies weekly to guide me. We just checked in with the Barrons, Making the Grade series to see where we were grade wise there as well.

My kids tend to want more than a base curriculum alone would offer, both in content and variety. They are also very interested in science, so TWTM wouldn't work so well here. My DD9 chose an online science course for high school credit to use for this coming year and decided which area of history she wants to study next. I don't think I am as unschooling as many here by any means, but I am learning. I found it very hard at first to leave the way I was taught behind and be more open to my child, still working on that. I find it easier with the littler kids because they never had "traditional school" like my oldest DD does. I do my best to be flexible, not to plan to far ahead, because things always change, they become more fluid with time.

Yes, Melmichigan...I wouldn't plan too far ahead! I had to b/c my district wants a detailed plan for the entire year but I do see how I can make it a bit more vague to give us more leeway. It's not that big a deal...if you don't meet your goals, you have to state a reason why which I did and it was OK'd as usual...I wonder if they even read the quarterly reports.

Dazey,

A good friend of mine has to submit lesson plans for the year as well. She went to the Time4Learning site, pulled up the lesson plan for the grade level her son was supposed to be in. It's very comprehensive. With a GT of course. everthing that is grade appropriate is already known material! So you are free to learn as you wish and the requirements are fulfilled!

I use their lesson plans to make sure that my kidlets are missing anything vital. Don't want to leave holes! You can access the lesson plans free on their site.

Oh that's good to know BWBShari! I'll take a look!

Thanks!
Dazey

I wonder if something that goes with their state GLCE's would suffice as well? Many publishers list state correlations on their sites that you can print. I don't know anything about your requirements so I'm just guessing here...but they are also listed free.

There's also this:

http://www.worldbook.com/wb/Students?curriculum

It's free and presumably national rather than reflecting local priorities or individual curriculum editors' priorities which can sometimes be a bit...eccentric.

I do like to see a number of lists like these so that what I wind up teaching is more comprehensive and transportable. I like to be sure we have covered our bases!

This has been great. I think I've files the affadavit and all of that correctly. The issue that I'm having is understanding state "standards" (snicker) and testing. I would like to have measurable proof of his progress.

I had my first official day today and it went so well. I love it already. I'm starting small.

25 minutes of math and 20 minutes on a physical science/art combination project. I can't help it if the boy is fast. LOL! I'd like to get throught first grade math in the next two months so that he can slide into second grade next year.

I don't know what state you are in, here in Michigan you can go to the mi.gov/mde, which is the department of education website and in GLCE's, which are our "standards", also you can print the parent guide that goes along with it.

I would read your homeschool law carefully. Here you are allowed to take MEAP testing with whatever public school you would have been assigned. But, the schools don't necessarily know that, and in our case had to be directed to the state website information.

If there isn't a state mandate for testing and they don't allow you to participate in any testing you can also have yearly testing done privately. We have MEAP here but it really doesn't tell you much so we are having our DD9 take the ITBS through a testing company.

It's amazing how fast they can be sometimes. Really makes you think about all that time they spend in a public classroom...

Melmichigan...I had my DS take the ITBS. One thing I would recommend, is to look over the test once DC is finished. A friend did that and it was so helpful. In my case, a teacher-friend proctored the test and had to leave as soon as he was done so I didn't get a chance to look at it. Fortunately she did so I have an idea of what he missed and why but otherwise the scores don't tell you much of anything. FOr ex: for spelling, you can miss one and you're at 97th%, miss another one and you're at 92nd% (those numbers are close but going from memory) whereas science, you miss 1 and you're at 99th and miss 2 and you're at 98th%. I know this b/c my son took it w/ another boy and his mom and I compared results lol. So for ex: if DC scores 90% in computation, you don't know if problem is add, sub, multi, or div. And from what i saw in the test prep book, there are some STUPID questions that even 3 adults weren't sure of the answer lol.