back to school!

Back to Homeschooling with the Duggars

FAMILY MATTERS on 09.03.13

Michelle Duggar19 Kids and CountingBIO

 

Photo: DCL

Question from a "19 Kids and Counting" fan on Facebook: How do you monitor how the kids are doing with homeschooling? Do they have tests that they take every year? And how do the kids feel about going “back to school” in the fall?

In the state of Arkansas, we take tests every year just like the public school kids do, so at the end of each school year, we will go and take our standardized tests. Every state is different on how their homeschool laws work, but we file our letter of intent to homeschool at the beginning of each school year. We start in August and do a little through the summer, to keep up with things like music lessons and reading. My kids are always reading. They’re usually reading either science or history books -- keeping their minds busy with good reading material, a lot of biographies and that sort of stuff.

Our schedule changes depending on the season of life that we’re in. Right now, we’ve got a lot of older children that are working, driving, and coming and going. Often, I will have a schedule on the wall and then six months later, I’ll switch it up a little bit and change the times that they’re going to be practicing their music or doing their science, history, or law, etc. I switch it up just because it makes it a little bit more interesting than always doing the same thing at the same time. Usually we do breakfast, lunch and dinner about the same time, but all those other things can move around in the schedule. And that makes it more fun for them.

Their excitement about going back to school is probably the same as everyone else’s kids. When they’re young, it’s always so exciting to get back or at least get started on schoolwork. The first time, they feel like big kids and they’re in school. They’re just thrilled.

My bigger ones that have been through it year after year see it more like going back to the grind. Once we’re in that routine, I can tell everybody really is glad to be back -- even though they might not say it! There is the comfort of being in that routine again. We’re checking off our list. We’re accomplishing this stuff. And we’re actually remembering all this great stuff we have learned!

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