Father Needs Homeschooling Advice for Teenage Daughter

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Father Needs Homeschooling Advice for Teenage Daughter

by Concerned Father

Please share your homeschooling advice, thoughts and tips to encourage a concerned dad...

My 13 year old daughter is going into the 9th grade in August. She is now content on home schooling, is very pretty, would be going to nice school and is an only child (me 48, wife 46). She is at the crying stage... please help with some info.

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Father Needs Homeschooling Advice for Teenage Daughter

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Mar 28, 2009
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for unsure Dad
by: Jennifer L.W. Fink

If your daughter would like to try homeschooling, and is at the point of tears re school, I say you have nothing to lose. Homeschooling can be a GREAT way for children to find themselves -- their interests, passions and best working habits -- while rediscovering their self-confidence.

School can be a cruel,cruel place for a 13-yr-old girl. (I say that as a former 13-yr-old girl!) Sometimes some time and space is exactly what's needed.

If you're worried about socialization (you mention her being an only child), rest assured that there are plenty of opporunities for socilization in the real world. She can join clubs, participate in music, sport or church, do community service, etc.

All the best to you and your child. I can tell you care about her very much.

Jenny Fink
http://bloggingboutboys.blogspot.com

Mar 28, 2009
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Three Girls Here 1
by: mrsncook

Whether she is "content with homeschooling" or "intent on homeschooling", it sounds like she is making up her mind to try this. I don't think it would hurt to try it for a year, or longer if it works out. As a home educating family, she would have more opportunity to pursue her interests. For instance, if she likes animals, she could visit the zoo once a week. If she likes art, she could visit museums once a week. ...or more often if she chooses. (

My girls are 12, 11, 9.5 years old. They have more time to read about things that interest them, watch videos, log on to the internet, etc. They have come up with some really wild things that have me amazed at the way their mind works. Just yesterday we were working in the garden to move flowers around. They asked me how I could tell the tulips from the lilies, and I showed them the differences in leaves, color, etc. I pulled a couple out of the ground to show them how the tulip bulbs have one round bulb while the lily bulbs are a cluster like a mini carrots, as a neighbor girl said. My oldest exclaimed, "They look like sperm cells!" lol Okay, I never thought about it like that.

Mar 28, 2009
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Three Girls Here 2
by: Anonymous

My girls were in public school and often tell me that they are much happier home educating. Our school district is terrible (the school they would go to was 2/100 or 5/100, 100 being the best possible score and 0 being the worst). In our state, the highest proficiency in math, English, or writing is 64%, and the schools here barely have 20% proficient or better. More, my girls had to deal with incessant bullying. Just the other day, they were playing happily when three boys and a girl, whom they have never met, tried to start a fight with my girls. My girls tried to walk away, but the boys continued, and I had to run to intervene before my children got beaten up!

My girls are well adjusted, happy, independent children who love to help others. They will hold a door, pick up something off of the floor, initiate a conversation, ask a manager for an out of stock item, etc. I laugh when people ask me about socialization and point out that my children are talking to them. I laugh when people say it's not good to stay home all of the time and never do anything different, because we are not forced to sit in a chair for an hour at a time with scheduled bathroom and lunch breaks. My children can tell me when they're hungry and whip up a batch of blueberry muffins, hummus, or whatever their heart desires. They are always discussing how to have a well balanced meal, such as egg salad on mixed greens with a cup of fruit and yogurt. No grains? Add oats and wheat germ to the yogurt! We don't have to worry about chips, candy, and soda overload here, because they know they can have a small cup of soda, a piece of candy, or a handful of chips and be satisfied without overdoing it. My children's favorite food is salad, and they are always finding veggies and fruit to snack on.

Mar 28, 2009
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Three Girls Here 3
by: Anonymous

My girls are able to speak up for themselves, saying when they don't feel very loving, are having a bad day, or don't want to be bothered. They don't stand quietly by while someone treats them badly. They will walk away, telling the person to leave them alone, and will ask for help when needed. I'm not sure what concerns you have with your child being pretty; we emphasize inner beauty here and don't think about outer beauty too often. My oldest does like to wear a light eye shadow or lip gloss sometimes, though, and will tell me, "I just felt really pretty today" and let's me know she wanted to have a little extra sparkle. lol We discuss images in the media, like comparing magazine pictures to discuss how some show anorexic thin models and other show thicker models. I have one child who is stick thin who doesn't need to unbutton her pants to put them on and off. If she sucked her belly in, she'd disappear. lol I have one that's (more like me) shorter and on the thicker side of average. My third is tall and thin like her daddy and has some pretty big feet. lol They each know that they are beautiful in their way, because they are healthy and natural. If you called them ugly, they'd tell you they don't know what you're problem is, but they're beautiful just they way they are and are sorry you don't see that. lol

Mar 28, 2009
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Three Girls Here 4
by: Anonymous

As far as academically, they are in a solid 7th grade curriculum even though the schools here would have them in 6, 5, 3. We're doing Religions of the World, Evolution vs Creationism, advanced algebra, beginner geometry, world geography (countries and capitals), etc. Today they watched Linnet in Monet's Garden about impressionist Claude Monet, they just finished metamorphic rocks, and we finished a review on multiplying and dividing fractions, fractions and percents, etc. I get a wide variety of Netflix videos for them to learn from, and we will be watching some information about Japan this week as well. We are free to take college courses if we wish, some free classes are available online, and with a child in high school there are some colleges that will allow you to take courses for credit.

Your daughter is at the age where she might be able to begin pursuing her interests at a higher level to prepare for a career if she has chosen one. If not, she can learn for the love of learning like my girls do. Find out what she is interested in, and pursue that with her. Want to learn ASL? Do it! Learn to speak another language, paint, play an instrument, you name it! If she doesn't have her heart set on a field, now is the perfect time to learn a variety of things and see what sticks. My oldest swears she wants to be a clown when she grows up. lol One wants to learn more about Texas, so I called Netflix to find a movie about it. It so happens the person who answered was a TX native who began a half an hour discussion with me about TX, which I then told the girls all about. One time I spent over an hour on the phone to Alaska, talking to them all about AK. My girls decided they wanted to see how potatoes grow, so I watched a video on Youtube, dug some ground up with them, and we have a makeshift potato garden. lol I have NO idea what we're doing, but we'll find out if we get potatoes. If not, the potatoes will break down in the soil and that patch of grass will grow back next season. lol

Mar 28, 2009
Rating

Three Girls Here 5
by: Anonymous

I put all of our favorite links on www.educationallinks.blogspot.com for them to get to very easily, and you might find something on there of interest. Homeschooling has really worked well for us. I considered putting them back in school for middle school, but the school district says there is no way my children can be this advanced. They don't think my girls can know all of the US states, capitals, and locations, presidents up to WWII, some foreign countries and capitals, several different artists and painting styles, etc. I also looked up the performance for the schools and found the above information about how poorly they're performing here. It looks like we're in this for the long haul, which is fine with me. I don't mind stopping to talk to the road crew to see if they have 5 minutes to tell us about how they're paving the street, meeting the landscaper to learn all about termite damage to trees, discussing proper hygiene and sterilization with the tattoo artist (as well as the origin, culture, and spirituality behind tattoos), learning about surveying from the city workers beginning a new building project downtown, etc. My youngest child just had a green birthday where she wanted to highlight how easy it is to go green.

School in America is only a few hundred years old (200?), and many successful people were homeschooled. President Andrew Johnson's wife taught him to read as an adult, and Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence by reading hundreds of books. Take a look at a list of famous homeschoolers (like http://www.knowledgehouse.info/famous.html). Maybe your daughter will be on that list one day! Good luck with your new endeavor! And remember, you taught her how to talk, walk, and feed herself. The rest is easy! ;)

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Father Needs Homeschooling Advice for Teenage Daughter

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Father Needs Homeschooling Advice for Teenage Daughter