Last edited Mon Feb 27, 2012, 05:34 AM - Edit history (1)
Bullying had gotten extreme, to the point I was assaulted in the *classroom* and the administration did nothing about it.
The University of Nebraska at Lincoln provided a great science curriculum that wasn't based in religion, and even had labs, at a very reasonable price. Duke University provided a great math curriculum, but eventually we decided to go with Saxon as the books really don't require a teacher and explained things better than the Duke curriculum did -- math was NOT my strong subject, nor my mother's.
For the rest, Mom spent several hours with me after she got home from work. Part of our deal was that I cooked dinner for her and had it ready when she got home, and had all my work complete. She ensured my science work was complete (they graded it) and once a week she gave me the tests out of the Saxon curriculum. Actually, I usually was able to get far ahead enough that she had to do it twice a week, but she only required that I do one lesson a day which equated to a weekly test. We realized that buying most of the "grade level" stuff was a waste of our time and money. She had bought a 12th-grade grammar book, then gave me the final exam to see where I was... I aced it, so she moved on to literature. Was great when I re-entered public school in 11th grade... already had papers written for most of the books we studied in AP English. She used her old college texts for history -- I passed the CLEP for American History and Western Civ.
We had a lot of discussions over dinner. It was really very enjoyable -- it helped that I loved to learn. She was extremely critical (in the good sense) when she graded my papers, always making suggestions about how I could improve my arguments. It shocked me that my first paper in public school (on The Scarlett Letter, which I actually hadn't read) the teacher just wrote "100%" and didn't suggest ways I could improve. Mom always found something that could be expressed better.
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Of course, all this worked because I was mature enough to be left unsupervised all day while she worked, and self-motivated enough to learn without someone standing over me. I could sleep as late as I wanted, watch whatever I wanted on TV, spend as much time as I wanted on the computer, and didn't have a curfew... as long as I kept up with my studies and housework.
The only reason I was willing to give up that kind of freedom was because at the time, Arkansas law required a person to get the permission of the local school board to take the GED before they were 18, and because I was not a dropout they wouldn't let me...
There are correspondence options available for younger kids, but a five year old can't be left alone all day.
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Edit to add: UNL now offers an accredited correspondence degree for high school. Total cost for the entire four years is $5000. No question that it's a bargain compared to private school.
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