Samisan
Continuing on our conversation about curriculum, you said:
"Interesting about the curriculum, I had planned to pick and choose, but yes I have been concerned about following it.
How do you 'grade' a child if they have not followed a general school curriculum and its tests if you ever wish to put the kids back into a school.....don't they then rely on what level the child is based on what they have done and tests they have passed ?"
In my experience, kids who return to a schooling system are put in with children their own age. They (the homeschooled children) are usually ahead of their peers. In my own experience, my children were well ahead when they returned to mainstream education. One so far ahead that she was bored to tears. We got around that by sending her to school 4 days a week and having her tutored in the subjects she excelled in (Maths, English, Science and Spanish) elsewhere on the other day. It worked fine.
My other daughter was ahead in certain areas and on a par in others.
I think the most important thing, for me, was to get away from the notion that we were trying to ape school. Schools are a relatively new invention - they sprang up around factories during the industrial revolution to ready a workforce for the factories, or the agricultural living nearby. in part, that's why we have a tradition of long summer holidays here in Ireland - the children were needed to help out on the farms saving hay etc. in the summer months.
I found that my girls were interested in a deeper and broader understanding of subject matter than they would have received in school. There are loads of online resources for home-schooling or un-schooling, depending on what you're looking for. How old are your children?
H