Anyone here send their kids to Montessori or homeschool?

[HeatherPrins]

I am looking at options for my youngest, any info you have would be great. Thanks!

[bluelemur01]

Heather, my sister has sent her kids to a Montessori and they love it. I also have a few friends who have their toddlers in a MOntessori pre-school, and they all rave about it too. I don't know too much about home-schooling but everyone I know who's tried Montessori seems to love it!

What are you leaning towards?

[kdif]

Hi Heather,
I homeschooled my 3 kids for about 3 years when they were pre-school to 2nd grade. I loved using Montessori methods to teach math. They have some very good manipulatives so that when you are teaching addition, subtraction, etc. the kids can visually grasp what you are talking about. At the time, I couldn't afford to buy all of their supplies, so I made a bunch of them myself (my husband cut wood blocks to represent the 1000 block, I strung beads on wire for the 10's, I think I bought the 10 thin block). Anyway, I also liked their ideas for preschoolers and was able to make quite a few things. I liked the broadness to their method and incorporated parts of it into our homeschooling. But it's been a long time now so things have probably changed somewhat. But overall, I loved their concepts.

p.s. not to brag on my kids, but all 4 of them got academic scholarships to colleges. The girls are at UF with 100% academic scholarships and the boys just finished also with scholarships. I like to think that all of the stuff I did in the early years really paid off.

[LisaD]

My son went to kindergarten last year. This year we are homeschooling. I'm more eclectic with emphasis via classical and charlotte mason. And my goal for next semester is a whole lot more hands-on science experiments.

I think it's just important to realize how your child learns and try to cater to them.

[dugarner]

Originally Posted by LisaD

My son went to kindergarten last year. This year we are homeschooling. I'm more eclectic with emphasis via classical and charlotte mason. And my goal for next semester is a whole lot more hands-on science experiments.

I think it's just important to realize how your child learns and try to cater to them.

Lisa---whoo hoo! I've never seen anyone refer to the classical method outside of my "circle" before. My daughter is in a small classical Christian school---if we didn't have that available, we would probably homeschool. Our school uses a lot of Veritas (Lancaster) and Logos (Idaho) materials.

And I agree---every child learns differently. They are all made a little differently. Find what works for you!

[LauraBean]

We have homeschooled for years; my homeschooled oldest is now in college, and the boys are teenagers and still home. The early years were, hands down, the most fun for homeschooling and I would change nothing about that decision we made in 1995.

[Joey_M]

I do a partial homeschool with my oldest two, ages 6 & 8 (4 yr old goes to our church preschool 3 days per week for 3 hours). I teach the two oldest math and language arts, and they go to a private Christian school for science, history, art, Spanish, etc. The school they go to is University Model school. The kids go to school 2 day per week (for 3 hours), and the rest of the week they are homeschooled following the lesson plans of their teacher. This schedule works well for our family. You can google University Model to see if there is a school like this near you. I think there are 40ish schools nation wide.

[kdif]

Lisa,
I haven't thought of Charlotte Mason for years. I read all of her books and remember doing things with my kids, like taking them out to grassy pastures to listen and observe nature around them and then to draw what they saw. Unfortunately, I no longer have her books or I would pass them along to Heather.

[HeatherPrins]

thanks for all the info!!!!

[LisaD]

Originally Posted by kdif

Lisa,
I haven't thought of Charlotte Mason for years. I read all of her books and remember doing things with my kids, like taking them out to grassy pastures to listen and observe nature around them and then to draw what they saw. Unfortunately, I no longer have her books or I would pass them along to Heather.

I don't have any of her books. I've gleaned off the web and used my library.