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In my last post, I went over some of the ways we began preparing and thinking about high school in our oldest son's middle school years. Rob and I also prayed and talked to Nathan about his interests and abilities to see what kinds of careers he might be interested in and seek God's direction for His plan for Nathan's life (this is ongoing, of course). As Nathan will likely attend college, I did some research on our state's graduation requirements, CLEP testing and dual enrollment, and looked over some popular college's admission recommendations.

As stated in my first post, our current research for our oldest son is based on a college prep course because we are not yet sure what God has called him to do. We are not planning on locking ourselves into a rigid and traditional college prep course. We plan to remain flexible if the Lord opens up other opportunities.

Researching Graduation and College Admission Recommendations

I would like to stress here that it is important to find out your state's graduation requirements for home schools. In Michigan, home schooled students are required to complete one semester of Civics/Government - that's it. Try doing a Google search for "your state's home school graduation requirements" and "your state's graduation requirements," comparing them. It is really up to you, your student and your student's future goals as to how strictly you adhere to state public school graduation requirements if they vary from home school graduation requirements.

I downloaded Michigan's public school graduation requirements, put them in chart format by main subject area (English, Mathematics, Science, History/Social Science, Foreign Language, Fine Arts, Physical Education and Miscellaneous), and noted the number of credits needed to graduate. I will come back to this chart later.

I also bookmarked or downloaded the content expectations for each major subject, available at the Michigan Department of Education high school website. You could try doing a Google search for this information, or check your state's department of education website. I believe that most states make this information available to everyone. I may or may not use this information, but I know where to find it if I need it.

The next step for me was to compare the high school course recommendations of some major colleges with the state of Michigan's requirements. Since Nathan does not yet know exactly what career he would like to pursue, I chose to look at three popular colleges that vary in the rigidity of their admission requirements. I started at each college's "admissions" page to find this information. Many colleges offer helpful pamphlets with high school course recommendations. I added the requirements for each college to the chart I mentioned above, giving me a quick visual of what colleges look for compared to our state's graduation requirements. We will continue to look at other college's recommendations as we prayerfully narrow down Nathan's career aspirations. I just started with this last year so that I would have a basic idea of what to look for in high school curricula.

CLEP Testing

I found a series of posts by Jeannie Fulbright about CLEP testing that piqued my interest (links to these posts are below). I had heard of CLEP testing and dual enrollment, but really had not done much research about either of these options. Again, you should check your state requirements for home schoolers to see if there are any restrictions. I posted links to some helpful articles below; you can also do a Google search and find tons of information. You might want to do a general search for CLEP testing and dual enrollment and then do a search for more state-specific information.

I have read enough to know that I am interested in CLEP testing, so I went to the same three college websites that I listed in my chart and checked their CLEP policies. I found this information at the admissions sections of the college websites. I was able to download files listing the CLEP tests that each college accepts, minimum scores, and the equivalent college course. If we decide to pursue CLEP testing, I will download the latest CLEP policies from college(s) of interest, compare them and decide which ones are worth taking. We may plan some science and math courses around CLEP tests, as these scores may also be used on our student's high school transcript.

I did everything that I outlined in these first two posts over Nathan's 7th and 8th grade school years. If it seems like it took a lot of time, be assured that it did not. A few strategic searches and a few minutes putting a chart together gave me a quick overview of our state's public school graduation requirements and a few college's high school recommendations. A little searching at the same colleges' websites furnished CLEP test information, which I downloaded and bookmarked for future reference. The real work will be planning Nathan's course of study and possibly some customized courses.

Over the last month or two, I have been doing more research and reading, and we are currently in the process of preparing a course of study for Nathan's high school years. The next post will give our current progress in creating this course of study. I have been reading an invaluable book called Homeschooling: The Teen Years, by Cafi Cohen, that is helping me put high school into perspective. I was able to obtain this at my library, and I highly recommend it.

CLEP Testing and Dual Enrollment Articles

Articles by Jeannie Fulbright

College Without Compromise book review

CLEP v. Dual Enrollment

CLEP for College

CLEP Tests

Articles by The HomeScholar

Search results for CLEP at The HomeScholar's blog

How to Homeschool College

College at 14: spin-off comments 2 at The Mom with Brownies - Shelly uses dual enrollment and explains it quite thoroughly here (hat tip to Kristie, who linked to this post quite a while ago - I can't find her post now)

* Update: Kristie noted in the comments that The Mom with Brownies does not do dual enrollment. However, her son did start college courses at 14, and her post would be helpful to those considering beginning college early or dual enrollment if your state allows it. Thanks for the clarification, Kristie!

~Andrea

Nathan is going to be entering ninth grade this fall, and for the last year or two Rob and I have been trying to prepare ourselves and Nathan for high school. It has always sounded so scary to me. I find myself second-guessing the way we have handled his education so far and laboring over a high school plan. Should we follow Tapestry of Grace strictly? This would be easiest for me, but possibly not best for our son. How far should he go in science and math, and where should we begin in these subjects? How will we schedule time for him to pursue his main interest, music? How will we determine grades? Should he go to college, and, if so, should we pursue dual enrollment, CLEP testing or AP courses?

I am sure that most homeschoolers are faced with at least some of these questions, and I also realize that there is no one answer for any one student or family. That being said, I have decided to share some of the resources and ideas that I have found to be helpful, as well as what we have decided so far. These are just my thoughts and experiences. I do not believe that there is any one "right way" to homeschool; we are all too diverse for that. Nathan is our oldest, so he will be our first child in high school. In other words, we still have a lot to learn!

As Nathan still is not sure what type of career he would like to pursue, we are beginning with a college prep type high school course. However, we also want to give him plenty of time to pursue his interests and passions; we do not want to lock him into a college prep course if the Lord has something else for him. We are still in the process of preparing a course of study, so we do not have all of this hammered out yet.

Additionally, all of these plans are being bathed in prayer. We believe that God has a purpose for each of our children and we have the opportunity to help ease or direct them into that purpose. Because of this, our journey towards high school and life after secondary education will most likely look very different for each child. Please do not take my experiences as firm advice; I am really just sharing what we have done so far. If any of you who are experienced at homeschooling high schoolers have input, please feel free to share it.

Our Preparation in Organization and Grading

Once Nathan began "seventh grade," I decided that we should be a little bit more organized in keeping track of his assignments, developing good habits that would make writing his transcript less difficult when the time comes. Michigan does not require testing or submission of portfolios at this time, although I have always kept samples of work that could be organized into a portfolio if necessary. We began putting completed work in binders organized by subject and I began using Homeschool Tracker Plus to record everyone's progress. I did not keep up with Homeschool Tracker very well at that time, probably because I was trying to enter each and every assignment for all four children. As a full-time wife, mother, homeschooler and homemaker, as well as a part-time medical transcriptionist and part-time church worker, trying to keep up with entering assignments became overwhelming. However, we did have at least some of Nathan's work in one binder that was fairly well organized, which was a beginning. It was really a trial run anyway.

Last summer, before Nathan's eighth grade year, I decided to use the lesson plan and course tools of Homeschool Tracker Plus, setting up courses and entering lesson plans for Unit 1 of Tapestry of Grace. I did well with Unit 1, but fell behind for Unit 2. At the end of November, I quit doing medical transcription and was able to enter all of the Unit 3 information. At that time, I decided that I would only enter assignments for Nathan and Jordan, as they are doing the dialectic level of TOG. Of course, I also entered information for other academics, but I focused primarily on entering courses for Tapestry of Grace because it covers several subjects and I wanted "practice" keeping track of them. I find that other subjects, like math, are much easier to keep track of if you are using a textbook. We will be finishing Tapestry of Grace Year 3 this summer, and I have not yet entered the Unit 4 information. If I can get to it, then I will enter it. Otherwise, I am not going to stress over it. Nathan and I will have to work on a feasible plan for keeping up with his work; I will post about that after we have done it. All in all, trying various organizational methods has helped me to see what will and will not work for us, so I do not think it has been a total waste of time.

Nathan had also asked for grades at the end of seventh grade, so I set up a grading system for Tapestry of Grace based on points. If you are interested, you will find it here. We have not followed it strictly; I just wanted to have written guidelines for myself. I recently discovered that Michigan's new high school graduation requirements focus on "proficiency in expectations, not seat time." (Michigan Merit Curriculum High School Graduation Requirements) Many homeschoolers seem to focus on mastery for "grading" or passing our students. I was very encouraged when I saw that the public schools in Michigan are now doing the same thing. I am reevaluating evaluation strategies for unit study type subjects based on my research. Most states, including Michigan, make downloads of course expectations available. They are boring to read (imo), but would make good checklists for those interested in putting together their own courses.

Evaluating High School Readiness

In addition to "practicing" organizing and grading Nathan's work, we sat down together last September (the beginning of his eighth grade year) and evaluated his readiness for high school subject matter. Math and writing were the weak points.

I love the "Living Math" approach, but I have never been successful in implementing it (sigh). We put together an eclectic plan for math using living math books, a video tutoring program that my husband won at an HSB contest a couple of years ago and some Key to... Series materials. He made quite a bit of progress using the Key to... books, but other than that there was not much progress. After some research and discussion with Rob and Nathan, and evaluation of Nathan's math progress, we decided to order Teaching Textbooks Math 7 in March. Nathan is halfway through the program right now and is doing well. Jordan (finishing seventh grade) is also doing the program. It looks like TT Math 7 will be enough to prepare them for Algebra I, but I will know more once Nathan completes the program. The question at that time will be which Algebra program to use. That, however, will be a topic for another post.

Now for writing.... This has always been a struggle with the boys. The girls write voluntarily and often, but the boys hate writing. The plan was to stick with the Tapestry of Grace writing assignments, which are excellent. However, as usual, I had difficulty keeping up with the evaluation and Nathan fell "behind." As I look back, though, his writing has improved and he did quite a bit more than I realized. I highly recommend downloading and reading the free copy of Teaching Your Children to Write, available at Cardamom Publishers. This is an encouraging 4-page article that has helped me keep my focus and not stress out about writing. I have it printed out and available for when I need to get back on track with this subject.

This post is longer than I thought it would be, so I will turn it into a series. This sums up some of the organization and evaluation strategies we pursued during Nathan's middle school years. In the next post, I will detail some of what we have discussed and planned over the last couple of months, eventually followed by a post covering our plan of action for ninth grade.

Helpful Related Websites and Internet Articles

Google "your state's graduation requirements" to find all kinds of helpful information

The HomeScholar Helper (a very encouraging and helpful website - sign up for her newsletter here)

Planning High School Courses (a Heart of the Matter article written by the HomeScholar Helper - see a list of her HOTM articles here)

Answers: High School Homeschooling, by Dr. Ruth Beechick

Homeschooling Thru High School (HSLDA - tons of info, including developing a plan, evaluating credits, and much more)

High School Resources (at about.com - quite an eclectic mix of articles)

Older Kids at A to Z Home's Cool Homeschooling (another great list of articles)

~Andrea

Today is Menu Plan Monday. If you want to see others' menus for this week or post your own, head on over to orgjunkie.com.

I cooked a lot of "base" foods and put them in the freezer over the last several weeks, so I will be using these to throw together quick meals. We have commitments every night during the week, so I am very grateful to have precooked, mostly nutritious food in the freezer. I am thrilled to have found so many tasty recipes that include dried beans and whole grains; these types of foods really help keep the food expenses down and are full of nutrition, and it is definitely a plus when the family likes the food (at least a little).

These dinners are pretty frugal and healthful. I have a few favorite sites for really inexpensive recipes: Lentils and Rice (a new fav), The Family Homestead and Hillbilly Housewife.

Monday

Black Bean Burritos (I made two of these casseroles last week and we only ate one - everyone loved it), Corn

Tuesday

Red and Yellow Chowder, Salad

Wednesday

Lentil Burgers (made from frozen cooked lentils & rice), Steamed Greens, Carrots

Thursday

Chili (from frozen cooked white and red beans), Salad

Friday

Leftovers, hopefully

Saturday

Spaghetti (with meat sauce from the freezer), Salad

Sunday

Sandwiches, something crockpotty, or something easy to throw together!

~Andrea

Today is another Menu Plan Monday, which is being hosted by Heavenly Homemakers this week. If you want to see others' menus for this week or post your own, head on over to HeavenlyHomemakers.com.

Money is tight right now, so I'll be using a lot of dried beans and grains for a while. These dinners are pretty frugal and healthful. I have a few favorite sites for really inexpensive recipes: Lentils and Rice (a new fav), The Family Homestead and Hillbilly Housewife.

Monday

Mujadarah, Salad

Tuesday

Red Beans and Rice, Salad

Wednesday

Baked Beans over whole wheat toast (meal #2 here), Green Beans

Thursday

Black Bean Burritos (this is more like a casserole), Corn

Friday

Chili (with cooked white beans from the freezer), Cornbread

Saturday

Lentil Burgers (made from frozen cooked lentils & rice), Carrots

Sunday

Red and Yellow Chowder, Salad

~Andrea

You are invited to 2 weeks of summer fun and savings at CurrClick's Back to the Beach Sale! From June 16th through June 30th, you'll find a huge selection of discounted summertime titles to choose from. Discounts up to 75% OFF! From beaches to The Beatles to biomes, from novel studies to dream diaries, you'll get unbeatable discounts on books and audio, sure to entertain and educate all through the summer - whether you're at the beach or in your own back yard!

I feel that an explanation is due for my absence on this blog lately, so here I am to give it!

This is our family's busiest time of the year, so my blogging will be sporadic at best until August. Rob and I coordinate our church's annual vacation Bible school, which begins next Monday. We are also part of a team that plans a large community outreach that takes place at the end of our VBS week. To top it off, we are training and taking a team of youth to Mexico for a short-term missions trip in July.

I thought that I would at least be able to keep up with the MPM and HOTM memes during this busy time, but I really have not had a chance to blog at all. Although I have really been enjoying it, I have to be careful of priorities at this busy time of year, and blogging has to be low on the list.

If I have a little time here or there, then you will see a post, but there will be nothing regular until August.

Thanks for taking the time to read this, and have a wonderful summer!

~Andrea

Today is another Menu Plan Monday. If you want to see others' menus for this week or post your own, go to orgjunkie.com.

Monday

Red and Yellow Chowder, Salad

Tuesday

Crockpot BBQ Chicken, Brown Rice

Wednesday

Homemade Macaroni and Cheese, Salad

Thursday

Shepherd's Skillet, Corn

Friday

Red Beans and Rice, Salad

Saturday

Dinner Out

Sunday

Grilled Chicken, Potato Wedges

~Andrea

We finally completed the tenth Outdoor Hour Challenge assignment, which was to have a picnic. This one took me a while to get to; every time I planned to eat outdoors, it rained. I guess I will have to learn to be a bit more spontaneous with our picnicking!

We had a family fishing trip planned in northern Michigan over Memorial Day weekend, complete with outdoor eats, so we finally had our "picnic." We did get some pictures of hot dogs being roasted, but forgot to take pics of people eating them (probably because we were too busy eating ourselves).

Rob and I saw a beautiful snail and a spider on a walk in the woods (click on an image for a larger pic).

We did see some insect life to go with our focus area, some still to be identified.

As an added bonus from kingdom Animalia, we saw two green frogs (one of which was my buddy for the weekend; I was able to identify him by his banjo-like call), a baby painted turtle, and a turtle egg (I think something must have dug into the nest and eaten the other eggs since the nest was open and there was only one egg).

Look at these beautiful red-winged blackbirds! The brown one is the female, and the black one is the male (and, no, I didn't know what the brown bird was until we looked it up at home).

I almost forgot the fish (probably because I didn't catch any)!

Moving onto kingdom Plantae, I was able to capture pictures of ferns in three different stages of development!

Here is some more plant life:

My sister found a morel, and her boyfriend found a patch of about five of them. Yummy!

Kathryn and I collected several rocks that we will work on identifying.

We finally had time to pull out our field guides and work on identification, but we were unable to identify everything in one session.

If you are looking for a simple and gentle way to incorporate nature study into your schedule, I highly recommend the Outdoor Hour Challenge. This is the first time I have been successful at sticking with nature study for a decent length of time. Thanks so much for hosting these challenges, Barb!

~Andrea

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