Before I had kids of my own I had never heard of homeschooling. In fact when I was expecting our oldest a friend who was also expecting was waxing poetic about homeschooling their child. I thought no way! She must be crazy kids need to go to school!
Well times changed quickly once andrew hit the school system for kindergarten. He already had a diagnosis of HEDS which caused many challenges that were poorly understood by his teacher. Part way through the year he was diagnosed with a latex allergy. He was on home instruction for the last half of the year. Since the home instruction teacher only came an hour or two a week I began supplementing what she did.
Just after Andrew should have started grade one we moved and the school he should have gone to wasn't accessible. The home instruction teacher seemed to change weekly or cancelled at the last minute so his education fell mainly to me. He did eventually go to school for part of grade one but the challenges and difficulties were unending.
Josh started could hardly wait to go to school. He was already reading at 4 (we had no JK in our board at the time). Trying to support both boys at school often required as many as 6-10 trips a day to the school for dislocations and medical issues that were not handled well by the school board. On more than one occaission my sons nearly died at school. No parent should ever have to go through that.
Chronic strep kept Andrew out of school more than he was in in grade 2. I did my best to try and keep up his school work. During that time his favourite authors we Tolkien and Shakespeare. He saw his first production on stage and his love of theatre was sealed.
Grade one was a very difficult year for Josh. His teacher really didn't know how to cope with him. He possessed very little tact or tollerance for her. Getting him to go to school became a battle. He was beginning to hate learning so we made the decision to pull him out for the rest of the year. He was much happier and learning plenty. His brother stayed in school.
The following year both boys started back at school. Andrew injured his back at school and was unable to sit only a few weeks into the year. His grade 4 class had 34 kids and could not accommodate his needs so he was back home again with a revolving door of home instruction teacher. Sometimes he went weeks without instruction so again the bulk of his schooling fell on us.
Josh also struggled that year. There were many incidents of bullying related to his disability and his allergies. the teacher tried to keep him challenged but often seemed to be loosing the battle because there were so many needs in the classroom.
The icing on the cake was a letter that came home from school telling us that since the school could not afford outdoor equipment the students should bring in basketballs, tennis balls and soft rubber balls all of which could kill my children. The letter was signed by the same principal who sign both life threatening allergy plans! There were messages on our answering machine warning me about this before I got home from school with Josh from other concerned parents. The school staff actually seemed surprised when I informed them that the boys would no longer be attending school as we would be tking responsibility for their education.
This was the beginning of our home school adventure together.
No comments:
Post a Comment