from disaster to victory

Welcome to my new blog, The Hall Pass.  Join me here every other week for discussions concerning homeschooling today as an alternative to public schools and even private or parochial schools.
Some of you that have followed me on Twitter know that I homeschool our youngest. Making this decision wasn't easy but it was absolutely necessary. 
Our local public school did wonders with our child but when common core kicked in, our child was entering the 7th grade and was required to perform at a 9th grade level.  Any ding bat can tell you that you don't learn 2 x 2 before leaning 2 + 2. It would prove to be disastrous to ask a student to perform at a 9th grade level without a firm foundation of 7th and 8th grade.
For many schools, 7th grade is mainly spent reviewing 1st through 6th grade.  But, there is a growing process during those middle school years that helps the student to become a little more academically grounded as well as emotionally grounded to handle the more difficult curriculum and social atmosphere. Education is not a one size fits all issue as our government thinks it should be.
This common core arrangement, in my opinion, is the worst academic blunder in U.S. history. And I know many of you share the same or similar opinion.  Like many  students, our child fell through the cracks of the system and we found ourselves facing the tough decision to pull our child out of a school we thoroughly believed in and whose effort we will continue to praise.  As a side note, common core is not our schools faults - that was a federal level decision, but it affected every student here in the U.S.
I have several friends who are state certified school teachers and they each taught special ed.  So, it was a major advantage to me to be able to call on their help and support.
But what do you do when you don't have that?  There are two programs I highly recommend that you research: ACE, Accelerated Christian Education and the
Alpha-Omega system.  And for more support visit a Mardels, Christian teacher supply and bookstore, near you. 
We use a combination of ACE and products from Mardels - it's a win - win situation for us. 
In closing, how and why did you make the decision to homeschool?  What curriculum do you follow if you are not a school teacher?
Lexi

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Hope you all had 
a safe and refreshing 
Easter weekend.​

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