Wednesday, September 2, 2009

What We're Doing This Year, Part 1

We've been back-t0-homeschool for a couple of weeks now. The first couple of weeks are always so relaxing. None of our activities started until this week, and now our schedule is getting a bit more hectic. Next week kicks in for real. If I didn't love everything we do so much, I'd drop it all and stay home all the time. I like being at home. The problem is that I also like being with other people!

This is a big year: Jesse is a senior. I'm not quite sure how high school happened so quickly, although he is doing it in three years instead of four. Still, we're just suddenly…here. There are about 16 kids in our support group graduating this year, and about 12 of them are planning to go on an actual senior trip to NYC. They've been doing all kinds of fundraisers and planning, and I get to go as a chaperone. I haven't been to NYC in over 20 years, so I'm excited about that!

But that's several months away. In the meantime, he has classes to do. So Jesse's senior year brings:
• Biology 2: He's taking this at the local community college for dual enrollment, so he'll get 4 hours of college credit and 1 hour of high school.
• Piano and guitar: Also dual enrollment at the community college. One hour each for college credit, and a half credit each for high school.
• Russian: He'll finish Rosetta Stone by the end of this year for his 2 years of high school language.
• World Literature and World Geography: I'm teaching this high school credit class to about 10 high schoolers on Friday afternoons. This is his English 4 credit as well as 1 social studies credit.
• Media Tech internship: He's working at a local church with a fellow homeschooling Dad on Sunday mornings and evenings, learning how to run everything from the sound system to video equipment. This falls right into his plan for majoring in the entertainment industry in college.
• Next semester he'll be taking psychology at the community college.
• He is also finishing up a few odds and ends on Boy Scout merit badges and should be able to get his Eagle Scout award this fall. The project is already done; it's just a matter of tying up loose ends.

This is the first year in his decade of homeschooling that he isn't doing a Sonlight Core. I had so many requests from parents that I teach a class, and teaching World Lit and World Geography together was really what Jesse needed. (Turns out they all need the geography part, according to the pre-tests I gave them on the first day of class! Me included!!) Fortunately I still get to do Sonlight with Duncan and Laurel for years to come.

Jesse will be taking the ACT for a second time in a couple of weeks. He took it a year or so ago and did great, but we'd like to see him raise his score a few points to where the really good scholarships kick in. And that reminds me: I'm also supposed to be signing him up to take the SAT. Down here in the South, the ACT seems to be the thing; whereas we were strictly on SAT scores in New York where I grew up. Dr. H. thought it would be good for him to try his hand at the SAT as well, just to see.

Right now he is hoping to go to Belmont University in Nashville and planning to major in entertainment industry studies, perhaps in film but certainly in music business. Yep. So next year at this time, my firstborn will most likely be away at college. And I'll be missing him.

But I'll still have my two younger ones at home, and tomorrow I'll share what we're doing this year!

2 comments:

  1. Sounds like a great year for Jesse. I am planning (hoping) we can do the dual-credit community college work too, when our time comes! Thanks for sharing; it's quite encouraging to read.

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  2. Sounds like a great year! Lord willing, our oldest will be taking some classes at the community college next year, so I'm trying to challenge him a bit more this year-we'll see how it all goes!

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