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Author: Debra Bell

  • Homeschool Survival

    Homeschool Survival

    Some day you and your kids will tell your grandchildren how your family survived Covid-19. Start writing your unique story together now.

    Under quarantine and conditions of uncertainty, homeschooling has different goals from those during normal times. Here’s how to lean into that . . .

    Prioritize relationships.

    When stressful conditions abound, focus on your family’s well being, safety, and health. Academics can wait. Kids will catch up later. The lesson right now is showing your children how to manage uncertainty, how to be there for one another, how to be good neighbors, and how to stay safe and healthy. This is a teachable moment like no other! Seize the day.

    Attend to your own well being first.

    Your kids are looking to you to set the tone and reaction to world events outside of our control. Attend to your emotional and spiritual needs first so you can support others. What does that look like for you? A quiet time of Scripture reading or meditation first thing in the morning? A consistent routine of exercise or morning walk? A chance to catch up with girlfriends in a casual Zoom meetup once a week?

    It’s not heroic to deny yourself in these trying time. You may have a few superpowers (most home school moms do), but you aren’t super human–stress is depleting. Your family’s well being depends on your well being first.

    Empathy is everything.

    Empathy is the ability to understand and feel what another is experiencing, even if it is not how we are responding. It is stepping into the other’s shoes and coming alongside them in a way that validates their experiences.

    When your children are afraid or angry about how the restrictions affect them, do you tell them they shouldn’t feel that way? Or do you say you understand? Do you admit you sometimes have those emotions too? Empathy is the latter, and it is empowering. Real change is more likely when our feelings are validated than when they are judged or dismissed. A lack of empathy from those who matter to us compound our negative emotions with shame and guilt. Now we are in an even deeper hole with no one to help us dig ourselves out.

    Empathy is not a natural response when we’re all under stress and dependent on one another. We have to choose to be empathetic. Consider adding a regular time to the routine when family members can talk about how they are doing and each person can experience the affirmation and validation of others. Showing your kids how to express empathy toward parents and siblings is also part of this unprecedented teachable moment.

    Once-in-a-lifetime memories.

    Finally, what lasting memories can you make with your children right now? What will your unique pandemic family story be?

    • Sewing face masks for neighbors?
    • Creative social distancing events?
    • Making a scrapbook?
    • Completing a 1000 piece puzzle then framed for posterity?
    • Binge-watching a series together?
    • Learning a new game or hobby?
    • Applauding local health care workers?

    It doesn’t have to be grand. It just has to be memorable, and then retold over and over again (just like your grandparents mined the Great Depression and WWII for all it was worth.) This is our moment, let’s make the most of it with our families.

    Stay safe. Stay healthy.

  • 3 Reasons to Take an Online Math Class

    3 Reasons to Take an Online Math Class

    Aim Academy offers both full year and seven week long math courses. You can find them all here.

    Kathryn (Bell) Gomes was homeschooled herself and found that she was grossly unprepared for college-level mathematics. She now teaches homeschooled students math online so that they can avoid her mistakes. This fall she is teaching a live section of her SAT Math Prep course. Kathryn is the author of Apologia’s Exploring Creation with Mathematics elementary curriculum.

  • Practice Brief on Homeschooling for American Psychological Association (APA)

    Practice Brief on Homeschooling for American Psychological Association (APA)

    I was honored to be invited to co-author with a former advisor at Temple a practice brief for Division 15 (Educational Psychology) of the APA recently. Considering the APA once advised against homeschooling, it is yet one more indicator that homeschooling as a legitimate educational context has arrived. The briefs summarize research-based “best practices.”

    Education Practice Briefs
  • What I Wish I’d Known about Homeschooling (Part 1)

    What I Wish I’d Known about Homeschooling (Part 1)

    My son Michael wasn’t all that thrilled to be homeschooled the first year we started. He gave me a month, and then took matters into his own hands. He said we needed to set a schedule. We were doing something different every day! He wanted to have math at the same time, followed by spelling (which I should be teaching, by the way) and then he wanted to go outside at 10:15 AM. I said “sure,” and did my best to accommodate his desires, because I was that kind of child-centered homeschooler. At the end of the first week I asked him why he was swinging so furiously on the swing set when he took his morning break. He hadn’t been interested in that for quite some time.

    Turns out, he’d surveyed the neighborhood kids who went to a “real” school and following a schedule was how they did thing there. The best part of the day, they had reported, was recess. Mike probed deeper and found out what you do at recess is swing on the swings. Like the Velveteen Rabbit, Mike was doing his best to be a “real” student so he could hold his own with his more conventionally-educated friends.

    Many of us start our homeschool adventure with the same concerns my son Mike had. We want to be taken seriously, and we want others (including our spouse and children) to treat our homeschool as a “real” school, too. If you are anything like me, this can lead to a lot of angst and earnestness that puts undue pressure on us and fills the air with tension (just sayin’). Now with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight (my gang of four are all graduated—and they even have jobs!), I thought I would pass along a few things I wish I’d known. It would have made the journey a bit more pleasant for all.

    1. There is a learning curve. My good friend, Marie, an experienced homeschooler, told me, “The first year’s the hardest.  It gets easier after that.”  I didn’t really believe her.  I mean I was only tackling kindergarten back then. I couldn’t imagine that being harder than, say, high school physics. Now speaking from the other side of high school physics, Marie was right.  Figuring out how to homeschool is really the toughest task of all. Tell your kids to expect the unexpected.  In fact, the first years of homeschooling are really about finding out what doesn’t work. Ask any veteran, they’ll tell you, “Nobody does what they did the first year again!” So relax. Enjoy the process. That’s part of the fun.  There isn’t just one way to homeschool your kids. You have a lot of options. It’s okay to try out a few different resources, schedules, philosophies, curricula, etc. until you finally settle into a groove. And just when you think you’ve found that groove, your kids’ needs will change, your family circumstances will shift, new options will come down the pike, and you’ll be on the upside of that learning curve again.

    2. Kids are resilient. Just in case you fear all this trial and error will mess up your kids, the good news is kids are pretty adaptable. Learning how to adjust and flex is an important life skill they are going to need in the future – you’re just giving them a head start. The best thing you can do is don’t pretend you have it all together. Ask your kids to pray for you. Mine let me know they were already on that when I suggested this source of comfort.

    I have five more things I wish I’d known. Find out more by checking out part 2 and part 3 of this blog series.

    Debra Bell is the author of The Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling and The Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling Teens from Apologia Press.  Join Debra Bell’s Aim Academy Facebook group here.

  • What I Wish I’d Known about Homeschooling (Part 2)

    What I Wish I'd Know about Homeschooling (Part 2)

    Read Part 1 here.

    “I was always in a hurry with my homeschooling, fueled by a nagging sense of falling behind.”

    3. You are going to skip something. And worse, it will be something really important. My twin sons enjoyed calling me from college their freshman year to report in on yet another news flash that would have been good to know! I told them thanks, and that I’d make sure their younger siblings benefited from their feedback. Seriously speaking, we are living in a world of rapid transformation. The skills and knowledge base our kids will need for their future lives is anybody’s guess. That’s why majoring on learning how to learn is the very best use of our time. My sons were teasing me when they called; they knew I was at home sweating bullets that first semester they were away at school. Fortunately, raising an independent learner had been a focus of our home school. And they just headed over to the library, searched online or visited their professors during office hours to get the information they needed to be successful. Posture yourself as a fellow lifelong learner alongside your kids. Modeling a love for learning and taking joy in the process will be a powerful influence on your children’s attitudes toward education and the effort they put into it. It’s also the best backup plan to offset the effects of your inevitable failures and oversights.

    4. What’s the rush? You have a lot more time than you think. I was always in a hurry with my homeschooling, fueled by a nagging sense of falling behind. I see now that was just a cultural norm not rooted in reality. God has created an inner timetable for each child called development. And it is not the smooth trajectory we see drawn on the pediatrician’s charts. Our kids’ physical, psychological and cognitive growth moves forward in fits and starts often preceded by seasons of dormancy. Kids need time to ponder, to experiment, to rest, and to play—even into their teenage years. That’s how their brains develop, that’s how they learn anything deeply. We support this God-designed process by filling our homes with books and resources that pique their curiosity, by building leisure into their schedule, and by bringing a sense of playfulness to our homeschooling endeavors. And who says they have to be ready to leave home or go to college at age eighteen? Gap years are becoming far more common, as is a part time start to college or gentle entry into the work force. Don’t be afraid to slow down your curriculum and to draw out the time allotted for completing algebra or learning how to read. What matters is consistency, not the pace we set.

    Tomorrow I will post three more things I wish I’d known about homeschooling. I’d love to hear your thoughts too. What do you know now  that you wish you had known at the beginning of your homeschool adventure?

    Part 3 of this blog series

    Debra Bell is the author of The Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling and The Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling Teens from Apologia Press.

  • What I Wish I’d Known about Homeschooling (Part 3)

    What I Wish I’d Known about Homeschooling (Part 3)

    What I Wish I'd Know about Homeschooling (Part 3)

    Read previous articles in this series: Part 1 or Part 2

    “We assume there is only one right answer for every decisions, and we equate a choice that doesn’t work out well with failure. Not true.”

    5. Enjoy the choices.  A couple of decades ago, we didn’t have many options. There were only a few curricula suppliers; co-operative activities for homeschoolers were non-existent; the Internet was in its infancy. Today the challenge is sifting through all the choices available. There are any number of good phonics-based reading programs you can try; conventions are held in nearly every state with a full slate of speakers and a vendor hall filled with wares; support groups and co-ops in many towns offer monthly opportunities for parents and kids; and all of us, no matter where we live, can find virtual classes and support online. For most of us, all these options are stress-inducing. We assume there is only one right answer in each of these decisions, and we equate a choice that doesn’t work out well with failure. Not true. As long as we learn something from decisions we later need to abandon or tweak, our kids benefit from the process. It will help them become risk-takers themselves, and give them a healthy attitude toward their own missteps and mess-ups.

    6. Don’t try this alone.  I need my girlfriends, and I’m grateful the women I shared my homeschooling years with are still among my dearest friends. My kids are still close with the friends they made during our homeschooling years, too. I didn’t anticipate this side benefit to homeschooling. Find out where your local homeschool community is hanging out (in real time or online) and start networking like a pro. Your best advice is going to come from those in your neck of the woods. They’ll know the ins and outs of complying with state regulations; they can recommend the resources that have worked best for them; they can keep you abreast of all that’s happening in your area. Your kids will likely enjoy homeschooling more if they have their own network of support as well.  So don’t let the curriculum enslaved you. Seize opportunities to take field trips with others or join in some co-operative classes; such as, a homeschool chorus, a Spanish class, or a basketball team.

    7. Exploit the advantages of homeschooling. Don’t re-create conventional schooling in your home. There’s no need to.  Homeschooling looks more like mentoring or tutoring.  You don’t have to use materials created for a classroom of 20 kids – you can use your local library for a lot of stuff – and it is usually more engaging. Tests and quizzes don’t need to be the only method of evaluations. You have time for projects, papers,and performances – the kinds of activities that kids will remember and value. Get out of the house and into the world, you have the time and freedom to explore. When I was a classroom teacher, I could only take one field trip a year with my students. With my own kids, we did a dozen or more a year. Some were pre-planned and carefully built into the curricula; but some of the best were on a whim often after catching a notice in the morning’s paper.

    I enjoy asking my adult children what they remember most from our homeschooling years. They each take a shot at teasing me about the math program that flopped or the history lessons I skipped. But then they list the field trips, the projects, the friendships, the plays, the interesting people we met, and the wonderful children’s literature we shared together.  Their childhood friends from our homeschool community tell me the same. Homeschooling your kids will certainly give them a different education but it will be a “real” education, too.

    Debra Bell, PhD, is the author of Writers in Residence and Readers in Residence language arts program from Apologia Press.