Sat. March 28. Quarterly Reports

It's Saturday, and I have a few minutes to blog before Connor and I head to the boating safety class. I've already blogged about how school is not 9-3 at our house, so it should be no surprise that we are attending an eight hour class on a Saturday. What I want to address is the issue of quarterly reports. Earlier this week,while I was waiting for two hours in Warsaw during Austin's Civil Air Patrol meeting,I met several other home-schooling mothers. Since several of the mothers have been home-schooling for 15+ years, I asked them questions about the quarterly report that I have to file at the beginning of April. I have been recording on this blog every day,keeping every test, museum ticket stub, and taking photos of Connor's various activities for almost ten weeks. I went through all my notes, and spent hours and hours filling in the form the school district sent me. One of the mothers told me that I am wasting my time because no one will even bother to read my report. Huh? I read on a few blogs about various school districts investigating home-schoolers to the point of harassment. Therefore, I have gone to great lengths to make certain that I am in compliance with NYS guidelines,and I spend hours every day documenting our studies, and no one is even going to read my report? Holly told me that she writes less than one page, and she uses the same report (with only slight changes) every year. Her friend writes "See IHIP" on her quarterly report and that's all. One part of me is happy that rural school districts leave home-schoolers alone, but the other part of me really wants someone to acknowledge that Connor is learning a whole lot more at home than he could ever learn in any public school. As I write this, he is upstairs working on his Math pages. We calculated that he has 9 more units to complete (journal 2, 5th grade Math) and only ten more weeks of school. He wants to get it finished early so that he can be done with school when Austin is done, which is June 11th. Xiao has school until June 29th, and that is how I paced our curriculum, but Connor wants the extra time off. Ha ha. Like he will really be completely off, ever. But that goal keeps him pushing forward, and that is a good thing. Off to boating safety now!