Going back to public school!

via Google

A year ago I was so excited about starting our homeschool journey but I found out along the way that it left me feeling constantly behind and overwhelmed.

JG slipped further and further behind. I am NOT a person who understands math and I understand English (conjunctions, etc) even less. Trying to teach stuff I could hardly grasp proved to be really difficult. 


JG did okay. She is actually a very motivated learner but I know I held her back by not being as organized as I could be and not be able to teach the way she needed. I know I let her have way too much down time, not enough structure, she wasn't challenged nearly enough and I feel like she missed out on making friends and learning from a teacher who could have helped her understand and grasp things that I couldn't. 



We didn't buy a curriculum when we started homeschooling last year and that may have been my first mistake. We wanted to save money so I pieced some stuff together here and there but felt like we still had a lot of gaps. 



I knew we needed to do something different this year. I really didn't want to send JG back to public but after weighing various options we decided public or K12 (public online) would be best for 5th grade. We have JG on the waitlist for K12 but there's no guarantee when she'll be accepted so we went ahead and enrolled her in public and feel great about our decision! 

Image via Google

She'll be in 5th grade at the same elementary school S will be going to. Since it's out of district she had to be approved by the district office. We were anxiously awaiting her letter (we saw on that app that it was coming Saturday) and she was SOOO excited to see that she was approved!! :) If she went to the intermediate she's zoned for I'd be driving to three different schools every day so I'm really glad she'll be at the same location as S! 

via Google 

And JG is SOOO excited to be going back to school! She got a new backpack and school supplies at the Back 2 School Bash Saturday morning then got her letter of approval Saturday afternoon. She was so excited she immediately went and started packing up her backpack lol! I imagine she'll have an outfit picked out for the first day soon too. :) 

As much as I love the idea of homeschool I think she really needs teachers who can patiently teach her rather than a stressed out mom. We're not sure what we'll do after 5th but we're hoping she'll be approved for K12 by 6th grade so she'll be home again then. And I'm not opposed to trying traditional homeschool again sometime down the road. 



J and I both feel like JG and I need this year as a break from homeschooling. JG fell behind a last year but just finished her end of the year homeschool test yesterday and scored pretty well.. so she isn't as far behind as we feared. She was always top of her class in public school and we feel like she'll catch up again quickly! 



I feel like the poor girl is such a guinea pig being the oldest. Counting homeschool this will be her FIFTH school since kindergarten. A few of those were due to moves but still. I feel really bad about that but she has a great attitude and has made great friends at every public school she's gone to! C, on the other hand, will be at the same school for 1st, 2nd and 3rd. And I really hope to keep S in her current school long term and plan for L to go to the same school long term too. 



It's such a great feeling to have 4th grade wrapped up, the big test finished and have JG registered and enrolled in public for 5th!! Now I just need to close out our homeschool in the next day or two. Praying all our kids have a great year!!