Homeschooling Boys

Sweet Rewards
The other day, a college president called our boy. That boy. The one I wondered if I'd ever be able to teach him enough to fill out an application to work in fast food. It all started when he was small. I was pretty confident when we started teaching him. His older brothers all learned…
Six Ways to Raise Kids Who Love to Read
We were just talking the other night about how much we love to read. Want to know what makes us feel rich? A stack of new books from a favorite author and time to dive in. Our kids love books as much as we do. It didn't come naturally to all of them, though. Here…
Convention Season – Should You Go?
When our eldest was just one, we went to our first homeschool convention - in a picnic shelter (really!) in Modesto, California. It was so exciting to talk to homeschoolers and to look through all the books. We knew we wanted to homeschool and this little taste of it just whet our appetites. We’ve only…
Days Are Short and Shadows Are Long!
Observing the Shadows of the Passing Seasons Guest post by artist/astronomer Jay Ryan   At Classical Astronomy, we simply try to point out the easily-observable aspects of sky observing that are usually overlooked in our modern generation. One of those aspects is the varying length of shadows over the span of the year. As the…
The Scary Question, “What Grade Are You In?”
It’s funny the things that throw you for a loop when you’re homeschooling. Teach four grade levels? No problem. Volunteer at the local food pantry with kids in tow? Got it. Lead a field trip with a dozen parents and a hundred children of all ages? No problem. “What grades are your kids in?”  <runs…
The Write Time for A Novel Idea
We've always found boys like a challenge and some competition -- who's fastest, strongest, and scores the most points. Here's a program which plays right into that trait: See how much you can write in a month. Several years ago I ran across a peculiar little project. The National Novel Writing Month is a tongue-in-cheek…
Q&A: My 16yo Won’t Grow Up! How Can I Get Him to be Responsible?
A mom asks, "My 16yo is driving me crazy! He won't do his schoolwork. He argues with everything we say. He blames someone else for everything that happens. He's not obeying and he's disrespectful. If we say he can't use the internet, he does anyway and says we don't trust him. He just won't grow…
Homeschooling High School? Sure, Why Not?
Can I Homeschool High School? Do you ever ask yourself that? And maybe doubt how you'll answer? Many years ago, we started homeschooling our first child, thinking we’d do it till he hit high school. Once we started, though, we found so many benefits to homeschooling we didn’t want to give it up! Now we’ve…
Planning Your New Homeschool Year
Planning ... it doesn’t sound very exciting, does it? When we look back at our more than two decades of homeschooling, though, we see that the years we planned well were much more productive than the years we flew by the seat of our pants. It’s not that hard, really. The most important thing is…
Tips for Learning Online
  Years ago when we were newlyweds (and dinosaurs ruled the earth), we both took graduate classes by a extension program. A box of video tapes and textbooks arrived in the mail, and we arranged for some one to proctor our exams. It was a great improvement over the old “correspondence courses” we used to…