Home-school laws for Virginia; textbooks and curriculum

So, I know I announced a while ago that I was officially home-schooling Cooper.  Well, I sorta did a 180* when an English Teaching job opened at his prospective school.  I thought I could "be there" for him in that way.  Then I found out about the discipline policy of the administrators, which is NOT appropriate for discussion in this forum.  If you are local and have questions feel free to email me.  Ask for my email in the comments section.  This new information explained A LOT of what I had experienced there as a substitute teacher, and I deemed it a hostile work environment, as well as a hostile learning environment and I withdrew my interest in the job and mailed in my "Intent to Home-school" form to the Superintendent.  So it's a done deal.

Virginia's Home-schooling laws are VERY restrictive.  Each state has their own laws, and most states offer a "religious" opt-out loop-hole.  Virginia requires that parents that intend to home-school their children provide the district Superintendent with their "qualifications", and curriculum.  Then the Superintendent looks over the information and makes the final decision.  There is no Unschooling here.  If you only have a GED, forget it, unless you have one heck of a curriculum, or have proof of enrolling your child in an online school.  At the end of each year a portfolio or test results must be submitted to prove the child has achieved objectives that are grade/age appropriate (those are two entirely different things, but go with it).  Luckily for us, we have www.soarathome.com because we are military.  If you don't have that, you can request that your child be tested with the public school kids on the state test (I am not sure of the cost of this, but I think it's free), or you can look into the CAT.  I think they run between 30-50 dollars.

Online schools you can access would be the Kahn Academy, which is free, or K12.com which may cost (depends on where you live), and I'm not sure how much it costs.  I know these two are VERY reputable.  I know there are others, but I'm not comfortable recommending them because I have little knowledge of them.  Feel free to add to this list in the comments section if you can vouch for your online school.  I know that both of these schools provide licensed teachers and are well respected.  On to curriculum.

I suggest using a curriculum if you are comfortable TEACHING your child.  I am in love with the texts I have chosen.  They will allow my son to self-guide his learning, which is important since he is almost 12 and not to into me hovering over him (insert angsty, 'maahh-oooohm' here).  I chose the grammar series by Michael Clay Thompson..  With my background as both an English teacher, and Special Education Teacher specializing in Dyslexia I must say that this process is the ONLY way to teach language to all kids.  He really breaks down language, and exposes the purpose of learning each segment and the relationship between the "ladder of Language" as I call it, or the micro to macro fro phoneme to essay!  The kids learn that words have functions (parts of speech), and the function determines a words place in sentence, and sentence punctuation relays a message and so on.  It teaches them the functionality of language instead of having them memorize the definition of a clause, comma, etc.  This is especially important for dyslexic kids.  The purpose of comma's, the function of suffixes, and their relationship to parts of speech, things that are often over-looked when grammar is taught in most classrooms.

I am getting my literature text from Kendall-Hunt.  I'm not using them for anything else, because Cooper has done their math curriculum before and not liked it.  I love their literature text because it provides kids with RELEVANT, age appropriate literature and analytic rhetoric.  It is by all means a Classical approach to literature.    I want him to think critically about what he reads.  This year I want him to learn to see the relationship between the author's life experience and the material they wrote about, as that will help him endure the boring biographical informational power point that will precede all literature he will read in public school.  I want him to be able to understand why the authors biography matters, before I send him back to public school.  Other wise he will be a very bored student.  There is often a disconnect, for students, when it comes to the purpose of the information they are receiving from their teacher.  They often think they are learning information so they can answer questions on a multiple choice test.  The Kendall-Hunt Language Arts texts, because they follow a Classical model, ensure the purpose of imparted information is clear.

I am using Challenge Math for Cooper.  It takes the student through each grade level math objective in baby steps.  This will allow Cooper, for whom math is quite the challenge, to self-guide his math instruction.  I also like Math-U-See.  Again, Cooper doesn't like this curriculum.

Science and Social studies are not as closely monitored by Superintendents, at least not for students in the Lower grades.  I will be providing him with lists of possible "units" for each subject and letting him research and teach me about the topics he's decided to learn about.  Each unit will be "tested" with his choice of project and demonstration, research paper (simple notation), or writing and grading a test he gives to me.  He will also be participating the Ft. Eustis Home-Schooler's Association T/Th PE class/get together.  No 12 year-old boy wants to hang with his mom 24/7/365!

I hope this information helps those of you who are thinking about home-schooling  in your journey to a decision.  If you are a home-schooler with valuable information to share, feel free to do so in the Comment section below!  Thanks!

God's Currency Part 2

I had a dream a few months ago.  I was in a hard wood forest.  For as far as I could see there were fat, sturdy trunks that shot straight to the sky, except where I stood.  I stood in a small open meadow.  The sun beamed into it, while the rest of the forest was darkly shadowed.  In this meadow stood, well I can hardly say "stood" it was so degenerate looking, a twisted, gnarly, crooked tree.  It was almost as if the other trees created this meadow in an attempt to steer clear of this crippled tree, all of the trees except one small sapling.  This sapling was bent as if looking up at the branches of the degenerate tree with admiration.  Then I began to communicate with the trees (yes, I have very interesting dreams).


"Why do you want to be like that tree?  Don't you want to be like those trees, straight and tall?"
"No."
"Why not?  If you grow like that you be thought of as ugly and crippled compared to the other trees."
"But the light favors it.  I want the light to favor me too."
Then I heard a voice say, "Those who suffer the greatest pain receive the most light."

At this point I was woke immediately and continued to "hear" internally, "I see this great pain in the world today.  A pain that comes from a wanting to be beautiful.  God doesn't make mistakes.  Everything he makes is beautiful."  There was much more, but I am not comfortable sharing it as of yet.  Since I was wide awake, I wrote it all down. Needless to say, I wasn't sure what exactly had happened or why.  Then a yesterday a friend shared that she had a "tree dream", not knowing of my dream.  In her dream.  She saw a tree. It's sturdy trunk was large and strong and its full branches stretched out overhead, lush and green. She was then told that it was rooted in Truth.
"Truth comes from the ground?" She wondered. 
"It was planted there by God," came the reply.

I thought this was VERY peculiar.  I didn't immediately draw any conclusion, but then after stumbling upon Isaiah 53 this morning it all made so much sense.  "He grew up like a sapling before him, like a shoot from the parched earth; There was in him no stately bearing to make us look at him, nor appearance that would attract us to him.He was spurned and avoided by men, a man of suffering, accustomed to infirmity, one of those from whom men hide their faces, spurned, and we held him in no esteem."  and on and on, the entire chapter is applicable.

I came to understand, that in my dream the gnarly tree is Christ as the world sees him.  Since Jesus said, "I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do.  Amen, amen I say to you no slave is greater than his master nor any messenger greater than the one who sent him.  If you understand this, blessed are you if you do it."  This means that if we live for him the world will also see this way.  We must die to the world.  We must cease to care about the worlds opinion of us and how we live our lives, because the world will see us as twisted and crippled.  

My friends dream then the soil is the "truth" of the word, and tree is Christ, as God sees him.  It is how we look to God when we plant our roots in the truth of Christ.  What the eyes of the world see is a lie because the heart of the world is deceived into believing that money and material goods are the currency that determines our true value.  This is not true.  Our true value is determined by our honest intentions to live as God calls us to live.  

Peace, God's Currency Part 1

A doe swollen with the life inside of her, neck arching gracefully for grazing barely notices as I run past.  For a moment our eyes meet, and she returns to her feast.  Leaves pass over head in various shades of green so vibrant I feel as if their chlorophyll and my blood pulse to the same rhythm.  If you cut me I'm pretty sure I'd bleed green.  In this state of oneness with the natural world I become acutely aware that I am but another creation of God, beating in chorus with all his creation.  I live for this time when I surrender my existence to existing and cease worrying about material existence, and listen.  Today's conversation revolved around currency.

Only when I'm at one with creation do I cease to worry about human currency and all it provides for me.  This peace that I come by when I surrender to existing as part of a much broader world, not my world but his world, this peace is God's currency.  When I see with clarity that I am but a thread woven into the fabric of all creatures for all time, and feel purposeful peace, God has paid me for my obedience in his currency.  When he tells us, for instance in the Parables of Talents, that "to the one who has, more will be given and he will grow rich, bur from one who has not, even what he has will be taken away."  God is talking about peace, NOT money.  When we use our talents for God we receive peace.  Sure Jesus could mean money or talent, and we could receive more of those things if we are using them in accordance with God's Will, but peace is GOD'S CURRENCY.  Money and worldly success are ours, Fear is satan's.  This was the conversation on my run today.

In all honesty, I have plenty of experience with this.  I have often allowed fear to creep in.  "Why hasn't he called me today?  I bet he's hurt.  If he hasn't called and he isn't hurt, what could he possibly be doing?  He'd better not be compromising our values." or, "how am I going to pay that bill?!" or "What if they all make fun of me?"  Once you head down this path you only create more fear for yourself, unless you call on your faith and hand it over to God.  The reward, then, is peace.  We are made to live in peace.  We must first turn away from all fear; fear of not having enough, of not being good enough, of not being approved of by others.  Then we will stop seeing things as the world sees them, stop seeing ourselves as the world sees us, and begin to see with God's eyes the beauty of ourselves, of others, of nature and find peace as we're meant to.  We will stop craving material stuff, and start craving Jesus, and all things divine, because we ARE divine beings.  We are children of God.  Each of us is beautiful.  Each of us has a purpose.  Each of us has a choice, daily.