Love In A Time Of Homeschooling: A Mother And Daughter's Uncommon Year (2010) - Plot & Excerpts
The most important thing I got from this book was the hint of how flexible school systems can be with regard to homeschooling. That excites me for the future. Furthermore, this book was beautifully written. However, it didn't seem to have much of a point, and was very self-congratulatory. The author didn't seem to have much perspective when it came to her merits and those of her daughter, and after a while I found it irritating. An interesting story, well written and easy to read with a great deal of wit in the telling. I think it was the finite term and the single child involved in the homeschooling experiment or sabbatical that made the book possible. Those who spend year after year with multiple children don't have one clearly defined story with a beginning, middle, and end. Instead they have a complex way of life. Many of the conflicts described would seem to be the result of poor planning choices. This starts with the idea of doing just a single year (fifth grade) of homeschooling after the daughter has already experienced public school and has developed a distaste for much of it. The other problem is that it's not a whole family experience and this affects decisions negatively. For example, the mother is committed to filling an entire 6-hour day with one-on-one instruction (simply because that's what her other two children are doing at public school) and there is friction? No wonder most homeschooling isn't done on such a timetable. It could be that many of the author's ambitious ideas would have worked if they could have been implemented in a less forced way. If you don't have to squeeze things into one school year, maybe all those cool plans would have eventually fit in more naturally. The mother went in to homeschooling with a number of preconceptions and stereotypes, despite what much of the literature says about the variety of reasons for homeschooling. Perhaps this is again an example of her half-heartedness on the topic. She wants to like the public school system (though it clearly isn't right for this child at least) but has to work outside of it all the same. A man cannot serve two masters and all that (though her prejudice against anything somewhat religious might make her shut down if she read that maxim).
What do You think about Love In A Time Of Homeschooling: A Mother And Daughter's Uncommon Year (2010)?
Have to come back to this one later if I start homeschooling for the resources.
—Gail
Interesting ideas for unconventional, authentic learning.
—patrickecox
Could have been written in 1/4 the number of pages.
—annynik
