Homeschooling through the high school years can be a tremendous blessing and an opportunity for you and your children. This workshop will address parents' questions regarding these important years of growth and potential. You can do it!

you will learn how to do the following:

• Keep records, create transcripts and build resumés

• Earn college credits during high school

• Maneuver through the maze of college entrance testing

• Choose a post high school path other than college

• Participate in extra and co-curricular activities

• Manage the difficult subjects (algebra, chemistry, etc.)

upcoming "Finishing the journey (FTJ)" workshops:

Finishing the Journey: Homeschooling Through High School Workshop (in conjunction with the Considering Homeschool Workshop)

Saturday, September 8, 2013...

Have you heard about home education and want to know more about this educational choice for your children?  Do you want to know what is involved before you commit to this new lifestyle of learning?  If so, this workshop will give you a foundational understanding of home education in Minnesota and how it relates to you.

Find answers to important homeschooling questions:

• What are the legal requirements for a parent to homeschool?

• What do I need to get started?

• Am I qualified to educate my children?

• What about the socialization of my children?

• Where do I find curriculum?

• How do I choose curriculum?

• How do I know it's the right choice for me?

• What are the advantages of homeschooling my children?

• How much does homeschooling cost—financially and in other ways?

• What if my children are older and in high school?

• How is home education different from other education choices?

Make the most of the “togetherness” inherent in homeschooling—with some fun and games designed to build family relationships while reinforcing skills. Games promote family bonding while building math, language, and thinking skills. Game play reinforces both character and curriculum by encouraging children to take turns, follow directions, think strategically, and recall information learned or skills developed.

“There are many kinds of success in life worth having. It is exceedingly interesting and attractive to be a successful business man, or railroad man, or farmer, or a President, or a ranchman, or the colonel of a fighting regiment, or to kill grizzly bears and lions. But for unflagging interest and enjoyment, a household of children, if things go reasonably well, certainly makes all other forms of success and achievement lose their importance by comparison.” —Theodore Roosevelt, Autobiography, 1913

...

In May I permanently handed Math and Science over to my husband, Tim. I have wanted him involved from the beginning, and now that he is it’s really hard to let go.

I had reviewed basic arithmetic with the girls for quite sometime. They had just finished turning fractions into decimals the week before. My 11 year old was really into it. She asked me if there was a way to predict how many places over the decimal would repeat just by looking at the numerator and or denominator. I didn’t know and said causally, “Ask Daddy.”

The next day she systematically came up with fractions and charted the results of turning them into decimals. My husband saw the pages and pages of it next to her piano music.

He asked where we left off and I told him. It was his big debut as the math and science guy and I was overwhelmed with a desire to tell him how to do things. I knew I should keep my mouth shut but the inner conflict was killing me. I wanted to go on about which kid is more verbal, which one is better at abstractions, their learning styles, their personalities, their quirks, which math materials were manipulatives, etc. Instead, I listened to...

A funny thing happened to me the other day. I was having a chat with one of our neighbors as we watched our kids play. Of course, the topic of school came up. After hearing the news that we homeschool, my neighbor suddenly appeared starstruck and exclaimed, “Wow! You must be Supermom!” I mumbled something about being pretty normal and we left it at that. But the whole conversation stayed with me for the rest of the day.

This sort of thing is said to me often. As soon as the word “homeschool” is dropped, people look at me like they can actually see my cape flying in the breeze behind me. As if somehow I have this amazing superpower that enables me to stay home with my three sons 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and somehow keep my sanity.

Later that night, I relayed the whole story to my husband. His wise reply to me? “So? You are Supermom.” (He’s so nice to me.) Why, then, did it bother me so much?

WHY AM I BOTHERED?

After some time, it hit me. The reason it bothered me so much that everyone, including my husband, thought I was Supermom was this: I’m just not. It seems so simple and...

       MÂCHÉ began holding annual commencement ceremonies in 1986 when John and Lynne Cooke felt a need to honor the graduates who were part of the growing home education movement in Minnesota. They started with thirteen graduates in the first commencement and grew to over 100 in the next twenty years. The formal ceremony for MÂCHÉ members is held annually in May.

This MÂCHÉ-sponsored event, which relies on parents’ involvement, includes a formal ceremony with caps and gowns, graduate speeches and musical presentations performed by the graduates. MÂCHÉ facilitates the commencement by securing a location, furnishing caps and gowns, making arrangements for reception activities, ‘off-setting’ part of the expenses, scheduling monthly planning meetings and guiding graduates and their parents in planning the ceremony. Families share in the cost of the commencement and commit to attending the three monthly planning meetings.

Participation in the commencement ceremony in no way implies that MÂCHÉ has endorsed or approved the course of study of the graduating graduate. MÂCHÉ commencement participants are required to have been...

Add information about the MÂCHÉ Legislative Training Days. Explain that this is a member-only event. Give information on how to purchase a membership.

Join MÂCHÉ or renew your membership by clicking the Membership tab at the top of the page.  Annual membership fee is $35. Membership extends for twelve months from date of join or from expiration date if you are already a MÂCHÉ member.

I recently volunteered in our church nursery to help with an upcoming high attendance day.  However, I warned the staffing coordinator that there was only one teeny-weeny little problem.  I knew with absolute certainty that when the day arrived for me to show up and actually work in the nursery, it could be guaranteed that I will have forgotten. 

This new mom smiled, and said, “Oh I understand.  Isn’t that just awful when you know there’s something you’re supposed to be doing, and it just nags at you and nags at you ... and it takes forever for you to remember it?”   I looked back at her with what I think was a pained expression and said, “Before I homeschooled, that was my experience too.  What you just said?  That was it!  But now...it doesn’t even nag at me.  It’s just gone!” 

It’s not that my brain has become empty.  On the contrary, it’s that it has become overwhelmingly full.  And not full of lovely, high and lofty thoughts such as what powerful symbolism that oil painting is revealing to me....or just how many angels can dance...

The great debate occurs every year 

“Am I expecting too much of my child or not enough?"  
"Is this groaning and moaning about writing just a discipline problem, a character issue, or is there really a problem here?"

Common comments I hear from homeschool moms are:

"She can tell me the answers well orally, but then it takes her an hour to write it down!"
"When he writes his spelling words to learn them, he leaves letters out of the words."
"If he dictates to me, the story is great, but he can’t write it himself.”
“His dad says that he’s just lazy and unmotivated.  He can do his work if he really tries.”

One of the most common and most misdiagnosed processing problems in children is a blocked writing gate.  This is the number one processing glitch in gifted children.  Many of these children seem to be “allergic” to their pencil.  They break out in whining as soon as they get a pencil or pen in their hand.

Let’s look at what is...

God has a wonderful sense of humor, I believe.  He wants us to grow and stretch, and one of the ways He does this is to give us children who are very different from each other.  Just as it is very likely that a right brain person will have a left brain spouse, so it is that if our first born is left brain dominant, the next child likely will be right brain dominant.  This brain dominance affects both personality characteristics and learning styles.  

How do you determine if you are teaching a right brain child?  Children tend to display these characteristics at an early age.  All children are creative, but your right brain child will seem to be even more imaginative.  The right brain learns things in "wholes" rather than parts, so that child will get math concepts well, but may struggle with the "details" like the math facts or checking work.   In thinking styles, the right brainer often goes by "gut feel" whereas the left brainer prefers multiple facts before coming to a conclusion.  In test taking, the left brainer prefers the black and white choices presented in multiple choice questions,...