How much involvement of the parent is required for homeschooling?

Question

I have only ONE reason not to homeschool.

I have 2 high school age children that have been requesting homeschool for the past two years. Now it has become a VERY serious request. (Morals are the main reason and boredom a close second plus a dozen or more legit minor reasons).

I have only 2-3 days off from work each month and I work 2nd shift. Needless to say, I do not see much of my kids. I sometimes have a 12-hour/day for weeks at a time, so I will not be able to devote much time into their education.

Both of my children are extremely intelligent, self-motivated, and already get straight A's in public high school. They are both sophmores. I have told them I would seriously look into this and would let them know by the end of the semester.

I talked with the guidance counselor at their school and she is against it. She explained that in her experience kids don't perform as well without supervision and it will affect qualifications for scholarships.

Answer 1

ABOUT TOTAL INTREST AS ITS GOING TO BE UR CHILDS STARTING ERA...

Answer 2

It depends on the age of the student. I'm in highschool and all my mom does is ask me what I'm working on now and then and sign forms for college and SAT/ACT/SAT II applications.

Answer 3

As long as they are able to supervise themselves, there is no reason they cannot homeschool.  If they are motivated and wanting to do it, I would say go for it.

This isn't something I would recommend for all kids; many high schoolers really need the accountability and supervision.  However, if your kids are willing to put in the work and do it right, I see no reason not to.

You have two choices:  

1) go with an online school - it pretty much does all the planning and teaching for you.  Your kids will be accountable to their teachers, but will be able to do their coursework at home.  The school would also take care of grading, and in most cases, transcript and diploma.

2) work with your kids to set up their own program.  This may take a bit of extra work on your part in helping your kids plan out their courses, but once the planning is done, you can pretty much step back and let them go.  Allow them access to the solutions manual or teachers' guide; let them do their work without it, and then let them check it and self-correct.  Many high schoolers are perfectly capable of this and learn/retain the information well.  (Keep their quizzes and exams closed-book, though.)  They can also keep track of their time, coursework, etc. to help you format their transcripts.

I know of homeschooled high schoolers that do this, and they are extremely bright and responsible.  They understand that their education is at stake and they want the best education possible - so they don't cheat.  You know if your kids are up for this or not.  It just requires making a contract with them and checking their work periodically to make sure that it's getting done.  (Require plenty of subjective work from them too - essays and such - even though it does mean you'll have to read and grade them.  This doesn't take long with two students, though.)

Please don't let your work schedule - or the absurd guidance counselor - keep you from doing what's best with your kids.  True, many kids can't function as well without supervision...but in a couple of years, they'll be graduated and unsupervised.  This is great training for college, and if you feel they're ready for it now, well, you know them best :-)

(My fifth grader is able to complete much of his own work unsupervised...the main reason he's still 100% supervised is because he's too young to stay home alone.  Otherwise, he does his work whether I'm there to make sure, or not.  Your 10th graders sound like they can handle it just fine.)

Good luck!

Answer 4

As high schoolers, there are so many options for homeschooling.  There are the public-school-based virtual charter schools, the online "private" schools, offline curriculum that's student directed, online courses with or without a teacher overseeing them (teachers cost more than having you as "teacher" obviously) - there really are several options you can do.

As others have said, if your children are intelligent and highly-motivated, they should pretty much be on their own with any way you choose to HS.  You may still have to be involved with helping when they don't understand something, or checking/grading work, etc.

The hardest part will be choosing the curriculum and/or school!  :-o!

Oh, and make sure they have plenty of chances to be with friends.  If you have a HS'ing co-op around, that's a great place to start!

Answer 5

my mom is not very involved with my home school all she does is check my work and thats about it but u say ur kids r in highschool they have online school for highschool

Answer 6

I'm 15 and home-educated, as are (or will be/have been) all my siblings aged from 7 mos to 24yrs. It works very well for us with just a little direct day-to-day involvement from our mum. Both our parents are at home 24/7 but together they run three businesses so we kids have to be pretty independent and self reliant in our education (as well as most other things in life! lol).

I have no idea what you mean by 'they are both sophmores', how old they are but I reckon they're at least my age. All these terms like 'sophomore' don't exist in my country; here, we just have Kindie through to year 12 or year 13. Tell you the truth, I don't even know what year I'd be in if I went to school or what year other kids my age are in so I'm definitely lost when people start talking in terms of being 'sophomores' etc, LOL! Anyway I reckon they sound plenty old enough to handle their own education (especially when you remember that, in some parts of the world, kids of 11 or 12 are successfully keeping house and bringing up their own younger siblings following the deaths of their parents etc). And you know your own kids and whether or not they can work without needing constant supervision. If they truly are extremely intelligent and self motivated, then I reckon they should do fine at educating themselves the vast majority of the time. In fact, they'll probably do heaps better (and feel more satisfied and fulfilled) than they're currently doing in school. If they always get A grades at school, at home they will be able to push themselves much harder and choose to study in far greater depth and give themselves much more of a challenging (and therefore fulfilling) education than the school is providing them with. After all, you yourself, say they're already complaining of boredom in school. I know if I was at school, the boredom factor alone would totally turn me off education and learning.

There are also such options as part time schooling (going to school one or two days a week and studying independently at home the other days),signing up for TAFE courses, homeschooling co-ops, cyber-schools, getting a govie etc that you and your kids could investigate if you were interested.

And home educated kids are increasingly sought out by colleges and universities so neither you nor they have any reason to worry about the impact homeschooling might have on their FE/HE (post school) choices. Increasingly university tutors are catching on to the fact that kids who are homeschooled are better able to handle uni-style education because it is a style of education that homeschooling promotes and encourages...and most conventional schools don't.

PS Take no notice (not any serious notice anyway) of the school's own guidance counsellor - typically, they are either ill-informed or naive about home education or they're pressured into persuading parents to keep their kids at school for the sake of the school/their career/other people's careers/the school's financial position etc etc. Just remember that they (and anyone else employed by the school board) are hardly in a position to be independent/unbiased. They all have a vested interest in making sure you leave your children in school.

Answer 7

You can do this and do it well under these circumstances, but you will need help. A tutor once a month to help them might be all you need. The kids sound like they can do the rest with some moral support from you. I know a guy who said he was homeschooled in that his mom bought him books and left for work. That's how he went through middle school and high school. He's in college now and quite bright. But he and his brother admit to slacking off (X-Box) or feeling like they needed a hand on occasion. He thinks he'd have done much better with a little more attention.

     You sound like a bright hard working team. I have no doubt that you can find a way to tailor homeschool to fit your needs. Good luck to you and your boys!

Answer 8

parents need to be invovled as much as is needed

this includes brick school

some kids work well without supervision and only school system based scholarships are in jeapardy

Answer 9

My son is in 9th grade.  I mentioned as an aside in another answer that I have become more of a coach / guidance counselor now that he is in High School.

Like your children, he is bright and very self-motivated.   I am very blessed however to be able to stay at home and be here.  That said, very little of his education happens here at home.  He is usually in a coop class or club activity.

For your situation, an accredited online high school might be the best option.  But make sure they have plenty of opportunities to be out with other homeschool kids.

Your work schedule is grueling! I'm not so sure about just leaving kids on their own.  You may be asking for trouble.

Is there anyway you could cut back at work or have a family member pitch in to help with the homeschooling?

If it weren't for your hours, I'd say that homeschooling hours do not have to be 8 - 3.  You can schedule the learning in a way that works for you and your kids.

Finally, once again, agreeing with Glurpy.  The guidance counselor is full of bologny.

Answer 10

Well, without a teacher (ie. you) it's not going to be considered "home schooling".  You can take them out of school and let them do correspondance on their own as long as you think they have the "sticktoittiveness" to motivate themselves on a daily basis.  Many kids do well with this type of schooling and find it slightly easier than high school.  Since they read themselves and do the work, the lessons often take less time to finish.  Most correspondance courses also allow you the opportunity to still receive your diploma from your high school and participate in their graduation ceremonies, so this is a very viable option.  The plus side here is that no one need to know they finished by correspondance because that can have negative connotations (ie. people tend to think that they were troublemakers, etc.).

If you trust your kids to make the correct decisions during the day while they're supposed to be learning, let them try it out.  If it fails, you can always put them back in a conventional high school.  Just make sure you keep close watch on their progress so that if any problems crop up, you can nip them in the bud right away.

Good Luck!

Answer 11

Hey! I don't know much about home schooling. But I know that you can do it and do a great job at it! I am sure this will benefit your kids and you will make the right choice

Answer 12

I wouldn't listen to the guidance counsellor. Most school guidance counsellors will come up with any reason to not homeschool--usually opinion-based and exaggerated.

High school kids usually need very little to no supervision. ESPECIALLY if they are motivated. You could set up a contract with them with part of it indicating if they don't live up to their end of the bargain, they'll have to go back to school. You could have daily/weekly meetings to check in on progress, etc. The more THEY are involved in the planning,  decision-making and assessment of progress, the more motivated they will be to make homeschooling work. And the more involved they are, the less involved you need to be.

On your end of things, you should look into the homeschooling laws where you live and see what you need to do for a diploma (you might be the one issuing it) or looking into something like K12 or another online/correspondence program.