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hi everyone. my name is cindy and i'm from south jersey. i have a 15
yr old daughter and this will be our second year h/s. the first year
was kinda mixed. we tried i guess you call it school at home with
textbooks and workbooks and stuff like that and it was a complete
mess. it justs seem like we were always fighting about what was and
wasnt getting done. (suddenly i was having the old homework wars
coming back) having "well meaning" relatives putting in their two
cents wasnt helping either. they kept saying how my daughter was too
lazy and unreliable to homeschool. (huh?) by the beginning of summer
i was ready to throw in the towel and send her back to public school.
but then i sat and thought of the positive things she had accomplish
this year. we kept a list of all the books she read this year and
there was over 60 (and a few were actually "classics" LOL ) she self
taught herself webdesign and html, drawing, and cooking. once i
started to focus more on the positive and less on the negative i
realized we did accomplish alot this year. and the biggest thing that
all the relatives seem not to focus on (cuz we know academics is so
much more "important" LOL ) is when i took my daughter out of school
she was so depressed and unhappy. now she's like a differnt person
she volunteers at a teen hotline center and makes reassurance calls
to elderly shutins. she has so many friends now and is so cheerful.
so i know this was a good decision and we will continue with it.
though i will admit i am a little nervouse about unschooling high
school. is anyone doing that now? and how do you manage things like
science, math, and history? sorry this was so long i just got so
excited when i found this list. thanks and any info would be great
most of the people i know who h/s use books and curriculm . thanks
again cindy

jefferson academy

--- cindylouwho169@... wrote:
> hi everyone. my name is cindy and i'm from south
> jersey. i have a 15

Hi Cindy! My name is Michele, I'm from North Jersey,
am fairly new to this list too, and am homeschooling a
13 year old daughter and we started last year too and
also started with the whole curriculum route. (Most of
my family would probably describe my daughter as
unmotivated as well.) Since I'm as new as you I only
have 2 possible suggestions: 1) I really liked the
Teenage Liberation Handbook. Don't know if my daughter
read it, but it sure helped me to relax!! (And sort of
addresses some of your concerns re: 'subjects'.) 2) I
also read Clonlara's info about what they consider
math, science, etc. in everyday life. It's taking me
a while to see 'subjects' in everyday life, and
reading their info helped.
Michele

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