We've done this twice before, as his sisters went away to school, so we know the drill. It's not new. Still, there are differences.
The biggest difference is that he's been homeschooled since the sixth grade. "Are you more excited about Alex than you were with Lana and me?" my middle daughter asked. No, not more excited; I do feel a bit more proud of myself, though, because his education has more to do with me. All I provided for his sisters was their genes.
OK, that's not true; I'm exaggerating. We provided good genes, a home filled with books, educational trips, parents who loved learning, a place and time for homework, perspective, incentive ("If your grades slip, you'll have to quit your job. School comes first."), and an environment that helped them succeed. Still, most of the responsibility rested on them, then on the school. We could help, but you know those studies that say that kids spend an average of ten minutes a day with their families? We had those days.
When they were young, they had dance classes, gymnastics classes, drawing classes, Scouts and church activities on various week nights. Thank goodness, they were not in all those activities at once, but it still meant 2 or 3 weeknights, on average, spent somewhere besides home. When they were in high school, especially their last two years, their schedules looked like this: 6:45 a.m. - early morning religion classes; 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. - school; 2:30 - 5:00 p.m. - band practice; 6 to 10 p.m. - job; 10:30 p.m. - bedtime. Add to that band performances at games and competitions, other extracurricular activities, time spent with friends and church youth group, and on many, many days, we'd see them just long enough to say, "Get up," and, "Go to bed." If there were large educational deficiencies, we could do little to remedy them except cut back on their work hours or extracurricular activities - and everyone knows that the standard advice on getting into the college of your choice strongly advises extracurricular activities, so cutting those too drastically would make for both unhappy teens and diminished educational opportunities. (Ironic, isn't it? You can't cut back in order to focus on education, because your educational opportunities will suffer.)
(Both, by the way, were honor students, both took AP courses. Both got into their first choice college.)
We've gotten used to having my son, and our youngest daughter, with us all the time. They, too, have had classes (fencing, dance, karate), Scouts, church activities and more. We've spent an average of one day a week, and sometimes two, at homeschool co-ops, where they're in classes taught by someone besides us for up to three hours. Even with all of that, we still see them for hours every day. This last year has been a big adjustment, since my son's been working an average of 30 hours a week.
And, of course, we're legally (and otherwise) responsible for making sure he has a chance to learn everything he needs to know. I don't have to teach it to him personally, but I have to make sure that he has a chance to learn it. That's a change from when my older kids just signed up for whatever their school offered.
I never worried too much about whether he'd be able to go to college after being homeschooled. (My husband worried a bit, but that's because it's what he does. I Worry, Therefore I Am.) There are so many avenues available. Many schools accept a homeschool diploma the same way they do a public or private school diploma. Dual enrollment, or enrolling at the community college during high school (ours accepts students 16 and older), the GED, placement exams, Credit By Exam/Advanced Placement exams and more are available for schools that don't accept a homeschool diploma.
There are so many schools, and so many ways to go to school; there are few wrong ways to become educated. One of the very few ways that I consider wrong is the need to go into massive amounts of debt so that you'll have a particular school name on your diploma. Sometimes debt is unavoidable - my second daughter needed student loans - but I think it's a bad idea in general to take on loans while in your teens or 20s that you won't have paid off until your 50s.
I loved recently reading a piece of common sense advice from a father to his daughter. She was a sweet, earnest girl wanting very much to do the right thing, and she asked her father how she'd know which college God wanted her to attend. His down to Earth response? "God doesn't want you to be an idiot, so go somewhere you'll learn." Bingo. That nails it.
Plus, my son had an A list (only two schools, but I browbeat him into adding a third), a B list and a C list of schools to apply to. His fallback, "if all else fails" plan was to stay home and go to the local community college and then transfer to the local university; that's the A list plan for many kids. It's a good one. Still, I wanted my son to have the experience he wanted. He wanted to go away to school. Plus, both of his sisters went to their A list schools.
Other people, it seemed, worried about my son's choices, and chances, a lot. Many of them would express general worries about homeschooling, then temper their expressed worries by saying something like, "Oh, I'm not worried about YOU and YOUR kid, just OTHER homeschooled kids," as if that wasn't irritating. (Obviously) I'm only responsible for my kid. The world in general doesn't answer to me.
Even my son, who asked us to do this for four years before everything aligned and it worked for our family, occasionally argued with my choices.
In his 5th grade public school classes, they'd had the kids in the advanced group doing "beginning algebra." When we started sixth grade, he naturally wanted to skip any review and go full steam ahead. I think that a lot of current assembly line, run-it-past-the-kids-pass-an-exam-on-it-and-move-on instruction doesn't let the instruction sink into their long term memory. Sometimes I'll use a common term like "adverb" around kids in honors classes (or adults who passed them), and they'll be baffled and unsure of what it means. I've watched too many teens in honors programs - mine included - insist that they can't calculate how much, say, a 20% discount is on an item. My 16 year old daughter, who was in honors trigonometry at the time, insisted through tears that she couldn't do simple multiplication without a calculator. I was not going to teach with those methods.
When he couldn't tell me what simple terms like numerator, denominator or divisor meant, I told my son that we were going back to the basics until they were rock solid. He was furious, and sure that he'd be tragically behind other kids his age. (This was also his dad's biggest worry. Math is not my strong suit, and I'm upfront about this. He occasionally worried that I was not up to teaching it.) I did not want to hear about what tests he'd passed; I wanted to know what he could do. An education only works if it's functional, accessible knowledge. Plus, terms like "beginning algebra" are fairly meaningless. The first time a small child is presented with, "2 + _ = 4," that's algebra. It's solving for the unknown using a given formula.
One of the reasons we chose homeschooling was the ability to tailor it to our kids as individuals. The more "standardized" instruction becomes, the less effective it is, in my opinion.
I have four children. Two of them are relentless perfectionists, much harder on themselves than necessary (or than anyone else will ever be). Two will always take the path of least resistance, and have to be kept strictly accountable for making any progress at all. Naturally, I have to handle these kids differently.
In general, I'm pretty laid back as an instructor. When I used to teach theater classes, we'd play some sort of game, or do something that the kids loved but that they assumed was just goofing off, and then I'd tell them the skill they'd just mastered. My youngest child is all about fun, and my son's way too hard on himself, so I deliberately kept things casual.
Sometimes, my son would accuse me of being too casual. I usually just "grade" their stuff as, "OK," or, "Do it over," so there's not a lot of letter grades. For his official transcript, the one that I anticipated every college needing, I had to do letter grades (and justify them). I coach the local homeschool speech and debate team; we compete against teams from public and private schools. He happened to look over my shoulder during his junior year when I entered an A for speech and debate. He was aghast. "I didn't trophy once! I don't deserve an A!" Competitions are on average every month during the school year, and although he made finals all but twice, and came in 4th several times, he had not trophied (3rd place and up). He would have grudgingly given himself a C, "or maybe a B-."
I dragged out my official coaching manual, given to me by the national organization. It gives a grading scale based on the points kids earn at competition. He was far, far above the amount of points required for an A. He was deeply surprised. "I do not ever hand you an A because I'm your mommy," I told him.
It is worth noting that during his senior year, he brought home 5 trophies and qualified for the national tournament in two events. You can only represent your district at Nationals in one event (which he did).
When he signed up for the ACT exam, the exam preferred by his A list schools, I deliberately downplayed it. "It's no big deal. Plus, you can take it as many times as you want, and they throw out all but the highest score." We didn't get any practice books, but he did do the official ACT online practice, just because taking standardized tests is a skill unto itself, and I wanted the format to be familiar. Had he been his sister, there would have been lectures about how important it was, and how she needed to do her best, but he's a different person. I was very, very casual about it. The last thing he needed was to tie himself in knots.
His math was his lowest score, but - whoops - that was because we sent him in without a calculator. His scores were still right in the target range, and exceeded what he'd need for his B list schools. His lowest score was what his highest ranked B list school wanted as a composite score. But he wanted to take it again, and we totally understood. Armed with a calculator this time, his math score improved by 4 points, now putting him in the ACT's "college ready" range, and in the range for his A list schools. (Take that, naysayers!)
His highest score, science, was in the 30s. No big surprise to us - we know him - but a friend actually said to us, "But I thought that religious people didn't like science." Sigh.
In the fall of his senior year, we hit a small snag. One of his A list university choices required all homeschooled students to have a GED; actually, the state the school was in required it. By then he'd taken the ACT, which, in my opinion, should be enough info for any school, but hey, you jump through whatever hoops you have to.
Again, I downplayed it as no big deal. "It'll be kinda like the ACTs, only less difficult."
Here, though, it got a bit hairier. Our local laws required him, as a minor, to take a GED pre-test before he could take the GED. After the superintendent of schools himself reviewed the scores, he'd let us know if Alex had permission to take the GED. This is because they want to guarantee that minors, who are factored into state and federal numbers, don't show up as drop outs or failures. So of course, the first thing GED candidates have to do is drop out of school. I'm not kidding. If you are enrolled in a public, private, charter or online high school, you have to drop out to take the GED, or even the practice GED.
Not that it affected my homeschooled student, but let's think about that for a second. Let's say that you know you're cutting it close, and may not graduate. You want a diploma, but between work, home and your family situation, it might not happen. Instead of letting you stay in school while you take the GED as a safety net, the law requires you to drop out to even consider it as an option. Really? Does this seem like a good idea to anyone?
When I talked to people, though, many of them defended this policy. "You want kids to stay in school. You don't want them to take the GED. You want them to graduate." My state has one of the worst graduation rates in the country, and my county has one of the worst graduation rates in the state. How could it possibly get any worse? How could we want to make any viable alternative harder? Newspaper accounts like these are our "success" stories: "The Washoe County School District's 2010 graduation rate increased to 63 percent after languishing in the 56 percent range. (Reno Gazette Journal, September 14, 2010)"
That year, 2010, my state ranked 51 in graduation rates, behind every other state and the District of Columbia.
This year, again, there are thousands of kids entering 12th grade who will not graduate even if they pass all of this year's classes. I mean, can anyone give me a reason that they should drop out to even consider the GED? Why shouldn't they have a safety net while they're in school? Would we rather they get an alternative diploma, or none at all?
A reason besides making the numbers look good, I mean. I consider this preoccupation with documentation to the federal and state government, under threat of losing funding, accreditation or jobs, to be equivalent to "cooking the books." But that's a conversation for another day. Back to my kid.
We had one month before the preferred application deadline to set up the pre-test, get it scored, get the official letter letting him take the GED, take the GED, get the scores back, and get them to the university. We took the first available slots for everything. The next pre-test was in 4 days. He had a cold, but we didn't care. We took the spot.
When we told people, some of them started to fret. "What will you do if he doesn't pass?" "They've really tightened up the exam. It's so much harder than it used to be." "After this many years out of school, I don't know if I'd be able to pass." I threatened any Negative Nellies - you will NOT say stuff like that in front of my kid! Good gravy! When my daughter and I went to the bookstore for something, I was glad that my son was at work, so he didn't see the entire shelving unit devoted to GED prep. I didn't want him thinking that it was a big deal.
I had no worries at all. I'm pretty sure that a few people wondered if I really understood the situation.
There are 5 sections of the test. "The math was so easy that I thought at first that they were kidding. I wondered if it was trick questions," he said. He got perfect scores on two sections, science and math. His scores were almost as good in the other three sections. There were hand written notes saying, "Wow!" and "Congratulations!"
Still, the superintendent himself had to review the marks. There is apparently no other entity, or computer program, available to say, "Yup, those scores are passing," or, "Nope, those scores are failing." We waited for the official letter, so we could sign him up for the real test. When we got it, we took the first available testing spot. My son was the youngest person in his testing room, and he got the highest score in the room, hundreds of points over the necessary "passing" mark. The university marked the scores as received two days before the application deadline. Success!
"So, he's done now, right?" his older sister asked. No, I told her. It's only October. We have an entire school year of stuff planned. I have a unit on Shakespearean tragedies planned, a research paper that he needs to write, a debate season to compete in. "I can't believe that you're making him get a diploma AND a diploma!" she said. Yes, I am, I assured her. His homeschool diploma has credits equivalent to (actually, surpassing) the requirements for our county's honors diploma. As far as we're concerned, that's his "real" diploma. The other one is just to satisfy the government, and anyone who worries that his home instruction "didn't keep up" to a public school education.
So, I feel that I can gloat a little more than I could with his sisters. I taught that kid. I coached that competitor. Yeah, it's still all about him, but I get a bit more reflected glory this time. I'm enjoying it; so sue me.
When he got the first acceptance letter from an A list school, we tossed out all the other brochures and applications. Whether the other two schools accepted him or not, the mission was accomplished. He was going where he wanted to go. I was so giddy that I bought him a school hoodie the day he accepted the offer.
He refused both the GED ceremony to which the county adult education office (repeatedly) invited him, and any of the homeschool ceremonies he could have had. I signed his diploma, stuck a gold seal on it, and dropped it in the Rubbermaid tub where his memorabilia goes. He grudgingly let us take cap and gown photos. He's not big on ceremony.
Now, he's packing silverware, dishes and a crock pot for his apartment. He has a schedule, a roommate, a start date. He's a university student. Just like we did with his sisters, we'll go there for Move-In Day and parent orientation. Then, we'll drive away and leave him on his own.
I think he's ready.
Like every parent, I hope that I'm ready.
No comments:
Post a Comment