My daughter is now a junior this year and will be pretty much done with her high school requirements at the end of this school year, however, we are not planning to graduate her yet because this would have implications for her future. I always dreamed of “graduating my kids early” only because It would show my family that homeschooling was the right choice-I know lame. The reality is, that I don’t want my 16 year old graduating yet we still have a lot of work to do and she would miss out on “high school” stuff if she graduates early.

So my attention has been turned to Dual Enrollment. Many people have never heard of Dual Enrollment. Some colleges are calling it “Early College”. Our local junior college calls it “Concurrent Enrollment”.

What is Dual Enrollment?

Basically it is an opportunity for high school students in high school to enroll concurrently in college-level courses. Different colleges have different requirements. Some just ask for a parent approval and transcripts. Some require SAT or ACT scores. Some others ask for placement tests. Our local community college is very relaxed and only require a parent or administrator approval. To find out what your requirements are, go to your local community college website and search for those terms mentioned above.

What is the Benefit?
– Earn your college degree in less time
– Eliminate duplication of coursework between high school and college
– Save Money! Concurrently enrolled students pay only minimal fees (in some cases)
– Experience the college environment
– Explore career fields before starting college

What are the downsides?
– A college course will take more time and precedence over all other course work. You don’t want a
bad grade on a college transcript.
– College courses will be with older adults
– College courses may have adult material, discussions, and topics
– Colleges can be very liberal, and the environment not “conservative friendly”

How will it work for  my children?
We’ve been doing online classes since she was an 8th grader, so I believe that the online college courses will work well for us. Unfortunately, our local community college usually has wait lists for their online classes so we will need to look at other community colleges that are less impacted.
I am also looking into several Christian Colleges for opportunities. They are popping up ever where. Here is just a few:
Regents.edu
Bluefield.edu
Liberty.edu
Grand Canyon University

Is it worth it?
As long as my child is committed and invested in the process I think it is worth it. Since she will be doing the work. She wants to travel so I know that getting a head start on college will help her achieve that. We will save time and money by starting now. This might not be the course we take with my son. He has dyslexia and dysgraphia and we might have to wait longer.

Ligia

I had great intentions of blogging all summer long, but life happens.

I have been diligently working on my 2016-17 school year. I will be posting each of my children’s curriculum choices starting with:

8th grade Selections:

Study Skills-We are going to start our year with Victus Study Skill Program. I really feel this is important for him and so we are going to tackle his before he starts his heavy school load.

Pre-Algebra–Teaching Textbooks finishing level Pre-Algebra in January and start Algebra 1. Not sure if we will stick to TT or switch to Math U See with him once we hit Algebra 1.

Science– Apologia’s General Science at co-op along with Audio CD and Notebook Journal.

Language Arts- Hewitt Homeschooling Lightning Literature 8th grade curriculum. We did their 7th grade curriculum last year and I liked it. This year I am adapting it big time because of his two courses on Landry Academy.

Spelling– this will be our 4^th and final year using Barton Reading & Spelling. Since he was diagnosed with dyslexia in 2013, we’ve been plugging away slowly. We are working on level 8 and need two more after that, but they seem shorter than the previous ones.

Analytical Grammar– This is our first attempt at formal grammar instruction. I chose Analytical Grammar because it is, well, very analytical. I am hoping it makes sense to him! Dyslexics have a hard time with grammar. I considered Winston Grammar which I will try next year if this fails miserably. We are doing it together with her sister.

Bible-CBS Bible Study this year we study “Return to Jerusalem” covering the journey of the Israelites from Capivity to Jerusalem.

World Religions-doing during Morning time with sister. I really felt it was important for the both of my kids to know about other religions but to study them in the safety of our home and with a Christian perspective. Hoping to have them both try and pass the DSST for college credit.

Ancient History– We will be using Exploring World History by Notgrass Unit 1-10 only. This is a high school course that I am adapting to 8^th grade. Next year he will finish the book and earn his 10 credits.

Other Co-op Classes:

Spanish– This teacher (happens to be me) will use La Clase Divertida to teach Level 2 Spanish. He has been “learning” Spanish for the last 3 years but he will doesn’t want to speak. So my hope is to just get him used to hearing the Spanish and hopefully one day he’ll just speak….

Pop Art- Class in co-op not sure what this will entail but I hope its fun!

Drama– he will be part of our co-op drama troupe for Shakespeare’s Mid Summer night Dream.

Like his sister, Buddy Spuddy will start taking classes at Landry Academy. She has loved online learning, so I am really hoping he does too.

He will start with:

Writing Ropes- this is a 15 week course focusing on sentence, paragraph and essay writing for 6th-8th graders.

In the spring:

Programming in Python using Minecraft- I am hoping this is up to his level and he enjoys the challenge.

Reading Ropes-Focused on reading comprehension and “how to” read. I am really excited about this one.

On top of all this, I will be starting Home Ec which includes: cooking, home manangement, vehicle mantainance and carpentry.

It’s funny to compare what her sister was doing in 8th grade here.

Next time I will share my 11th grader’s curriculum choices.

Ligia