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What about socialization? Won�t it be difficult for children who are homeschooled to learn to relate to others?
How do homeschooled students compare to students from public and private schools in terms of academic achievement?
You are an advocate of constantly adjusting your teaching techniques and methods. How do you deal with your own frustration with this stop and go approach?
You advocate taking regular breaks throughout the school day. When you take five minute breaks, after 40 minutes of school work, how do you get your students back to work?

What about socialization? Won�t it be difficult for children who are homeschooled to learn to relate to others?

Studies have shown that typical homeschooled children are involved in multiple social activities outside the home, both with public school students as well as other homeschoolers. Many participate in field trips and group classes with fellow homeschooling families. Research has shown that homeschooled students are less peer dependent, have significantly higher self-esteem, and are well adjusted emotionally and socially. There is no evidence that adults who were homeschooled were disadvantaged socially or adversely affected as compared to adults who attended public schools.

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How do homeschooled students compare to students from public and private schools in terms of academic achievement?

Homeschoolers typically perform quite well, with standardized achievement test scores showing percentiles averaging in the mid 80�s and higher Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores than the national average. These scores are significantly higher than the scores of both public and private school students. Homeschoolers are also performing very well in national geography and spelling bees.

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You are an advocate of constantly adjusting your teaching techniques and methods. How do you deal with your own frustration with this stop and go approach?

I try to remind myself of my ultimate goal, which is getting students to learn the material. If I have to try something new to connect with my distractible child I will continue to experiment. I also acknowledge that there is no way I can possibly teach my children all the information that is available. What I need to focus on is teaching them how to learn, and how to find material and resources when they need it. Once they know how to access the variety of information that�s available, they can learn about any subject that interests them. I would much rather have students who know how to find information and truly comprehend it than students who can memorize and test well but lack the ability to generalize what they have learned. It make take longer, but if true understanding is the result it is time well spent. Because my own approach to learning is to start at the beginning of a lesson and continue nonstop until it is complete, it is hard for me to continually have to reevaluate the effectiveness of various approaches with my son, Josh. His learning disability causes him to struggle in varying degrees from day to day. It would be easy to become extremely frustrated when I try something that worked well yesterday but is totally ineffective today. I think the idea that has helped me retain my positive perspective about teaching Josh is the notion that the only thing that would be more frustrating than teaching Josh, would be to be Josh. No one, including Josh, would deliberately stretch a twenty minute assignment into two hours. He doesn�t want to spend his time that way. He has many interests and activities he would much rather pursue. Not only does he struggle to meet academic goals, he has difficulty meeting his own personal goals. Since he continues to struggle without giving up and he truly wants to be successful, I am willing to come alongside him and find ways to help.

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You advocate taking regular breaks throughout the school day. When you take five minute breaks, after 40 minutes of school work, how do you get your students back to work?

I make sure they understand that if they are not back after five minutes, they are using up their time from the next break. I call them back when their time is up. If they do not return right away and are gone for eight minutes, next time, they only have a two minute break. This is punitive to me as well (I need the breaks too!), but if I am consistent, eventually they learn. Also, I use a kitchen timer for the breaks. The ticking is not a distraction for that time, and the bell sound is a clear, objective signal to return. I limit what activities they can do during a break. There is no way my son can play a computer game for five minutes. It will take ten minutes to disengage and transition back to schoolwork! He is allowed to draw or read. It is easy to transition by putting a bookmark in the book or closing the sketchbook.

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