Teen Socialization Update

Our pizza trip was a success. We had about 6 teens show up, in addition to my daughter. She met some new friends including a pair of sisters, each within a year of her. We are in the planning stages for a rollerskating trip and anticipate monthly get-togethers. Works for me!

Teen Socialization in the Homeschool Community

Melanie, my oldest, recently turned 14. Always something of a social butterfly, the teen years have only magnified her desire to mingle with others in her age group. As readers with teenagers may know, this presents its own set of challenges for the homeschooling family. While the teen is in most need of homeschoolers to socialize with, teen homeschoolers are often the most difficult to find.

I have spoken to others in a similar position, and I believe I have at least a partial explanation for this absence of teen-dom in homeschooling circles - at least those circles with which I am associated. The first explanation is a simple one of statistics; fewer homeschooled children are age 14 and above. For either social or college related reasons, many kids choose to attend high school once they are of age to do so. Another factor leading to fewer teen homeschoolers at traditional homeschool get-togethers is that many teens already have established relationships. Whether through a church group, neighborhood, or childhood friendship, many kids this age are comfortable with their existing social network - thus less likely to be out looking to make new homeschooled friends. This third factor has a particularly great effect on teens not heavily involved in a local church or religion. In my area, nearly all established teen groups are religion-specific.

So what's a teen to do? Perhaps more to the point, what is a concerned parent of a teen to do? After several semi-successful (mostly not-so-much) attempts at introducing my daughter to others in her agegroup by attending traditional homeschool field-trips and gatherings, I have decided to take matters into my own hands. I have posted messages on every local homeschool oriented message board I could find. Simply explaining the situation and asking for ideas, these posts have generated a surprising (to me, anyway) level of commiserate interest. After only 12 hours, there are at least four other families - a total of six teenagers - who are interested in meeting for pizza sometime soon. Ultimately I would like to set up a weekly or biweekly teen gathering.

Will people actually show up? Will it provide sustainable social interaction and friendships for a community oriented 14 year old girl? While the answers remain to be seen, for the first time in this search, I am excited by the prospects. Report to follow!

One Semester Down

Well me have made it through our first half school year as a divorced, homeschooling family. Toward the end, the kids really seem to be feeling burnt out with school work, especially Melanie, my oldest. She really has accomplished a lot over the past four months, so her feelings are more than forgivable. This last week was actually quite a struggle between the two of us. She plain didn't want to do any more homework. This isn't exactly new, of course. She is generally less than thrilled with math, for example, but she was clearly even more done than usual by the time Christmas break finally came around.

We have found various ways of alleviating this homework fatigue. The floating holiday is one example. Once a month, and for absolutely any reason or no reason, the kids can take a random day off from school-work. They don't need to provide an explanation, and it makes no difference what day of the month it is.

Other times, their mother or I may give them the day off for any number of reasons. One problem with this is I'm often not sure when to give these extra days reprieve. Having had an incredibly difficult year, Melanie is sometimes a depressed teenager. She has every right to be. On days like this, it seems easier on all involved, to not require her to complete her homework. The problem arises when this becomes a weekly occurrence - or a twice-weekly occurrence... It has become a matter of teaching her to persevere with the things she needs to do, even when she doesn't feel like it.

Lack of communication between my ex-wife and myself can cause further problems with these random days off. There are times when Katie goes a week, or nearly so, without doing any homework at her mother's house. This means I either move her homework to the following week, or require her to do her homework while she is with me. Katie resents this quite a bit. While she is busy with her mom, she does not always have the self-control or foresight to stop what she is doing and get working on her homework. On the other hand, she is terribly upset when she comes back to my place and realizes she has to work on her homework in the evening or weekend. The reality is that this is not her responsibility. It should be up to her mother and I to encourage her to compete her work at appropriate times.

Anyway, I'm just rambling now. Any ideas out there?

"School Days"

When my wife and I were married, we were always very flexible in deciding what constituted a "school day." It was generally built around our work schedules, but even that was followed only occasionally. Now that we are divorced I find it easier on everyone to keep things more stable. We still have the opportunity to move things around at will - if we didn't, we would be passing on one of the great benefits of homeschooling. But in general, everyone knows what everyone is going to be doing on a given day. I have found that questions lead to unnecessary tension in our new situation.

My oldest lives with me full time, so she is basically on my schedule. She does her school work Monday through Friday and goofs off over the weekend. My younger daughter's schedule is somewhat more complex. Monday through Friday while I'm at school, Katie and my 4 year old son are at their mother's home. They spend Wednesday and Thursday nights there, and I pick them up Monday, Tuesday, and Friday afternoons. They are with me over the weekend (Confused yet? No worries, me too). I have arranged things so Katie has one day off from school during each parent's two full-time days. In other words, Katie has Wednesdays off from school with her mom, and Saturdays off with me. While this breaks up her weekend, it seems to work for everyone, most importantly, her.

The only real problem we are having with our current schedule is that Katie doesn't know how much homework to do at each parent's home on her split days. As a result of this confusion, when I pick her up at 5:00 on Monday for example, she may have all her homework done or she may have only just begun. The issue is that she spends more time at my home even on those days, but much of it is eaten up by sleeping, eating, and getting ready for either her day or bed.

Anyway, that's how we do it (or at least try to do it...) Any comments? What have you found helpful?

Post-Thanksgiving Post

Thanksgiving went well. We all got along and ate too much. For some reason I don't feel like it's a holiday without making far too much food. Plenty of leftovers.

I miss living near more extended family. Holidays make me want to surround myself and my children with as many relatives as possible. I think that has something to do with my subconscious drive to make too much food... In any case, I'm considering some ways to make this happen on future holidays. Last week my aunt invited the kids and I to spend Thanksgiving with her and her kids (my cousins). She is our closest extended fam, about three hours away. That would have been fun, but we had already arranged to have dinner with Stacy and the kids at my place. When I told my aunt this, she invited Stacy along as well. Obviously this didn't happen this time, but it got me thinking. What are relationships with ex-in-laws like? It would be really nice if we could all still spend holidays with extended family, but it's a little hard to imagine that being a comfortable situation. When I brought up the idea to Stacy, she seemed pretty uninterested.

What do you all think? Any experience with ex-in-laws? I supposed it could get easier as time goes by. We shall see.

Kevan

Thanksgiving

Well tomorrow's the big day. Stacy, my ex, is coming over for Thanksgiving dinner. This will be our first set of holidays since the divorce. Katie, my ten year old, is pretty stressed about it all. I was worried we weren't going to be able to do any of the holidays all together, but in the end, we were able to work things out in a way Stacy was comfortable with. I really think it's best this way, especially for this first set. There are so many first times involved with divorce. At least this way, some of the trauma is minimized I think.

Hanging out with Stacy is an interesting experience. When the kids are with us, it's almost like we are friends. Other times we can't seem to fathom how we ever got along well enough to get married.

Well happy Thanksgiving to all. I hope everyone reading this has someone they love they are spending the day with. 

Kevan

I'm hoping to see Ron Paul at UNR tomorrow!

Ron Paul's Views On Home Schooling

Washington D.C. 9/18/2007 07:13 AM GMT (FINDITT)

Many parents of home schooled children are likely wondering how the 2008 Presidential Candidates are feeling about the issue of home schooling. Many of the candidates have not made a formal statement regarding home schooling, perhaps because many of them think the issue is not as pertinent as other issues.

However, Ron Paul has voiced his opinion on home schooling. He calls it a “practical alternative” for families. He strongly supports the issue and option of home schooling in America and puts such a strong emphasis on it, one wonders why the other candidates haven’t mentioned their takes on this interesting educational issue. According to USAElectionPolls.com and their reports of the ARG polls, Ron Paul is still only coming in with 1% of supporters at this point. One could guess that 1% are home school supporters, no doubt.

The reason Ron Paul agrees home schooling is an important part of American education is because he believes parents should have more control over the education of their children. He wants to take home schooling incentives even further by advancing tax credits via the Family Education Freedom Act. This would allow parents to use more of their own income for their home schooling efforts. He vows to protect home schooling parents by promising “federal monies must never be used to undermine the rights of homeschooling parents”.

http://www.transworldnews.com/NewsStory.aspx?storyid=23092&ret=Default.aspx