Author: Peggy Ployhar

Peggy Ployhar, SPED Homeschool Founder & CEO, is a leader in the special education homeschooling community and a frequent writer and speaker on special education homeschooling issues.

SPED Homeschool Roundup of Summer Learning Ideas

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar

 

by Peggy Ployhar

 

You don’t have to be creative to take advantage of the many hands-on and out-of-the-box learning opportunities that summer affords us with our children.  Below you will find a blog round-up of some of our favorite articles that provide over 100 different ideas you can adapt for teaching your children this summer. Just click on the colored links below to get to these great articles.

 

Learning Adventures: Learning ideas to take on the road with you this summer to the campground, amusement park, and your local park.

Gardening Math: Ways to practice math skills while spending time with your kids in the garden.

Get Outside and Learn: Get outside with your kids this summer and boost their learning with these mostly free learning activities.

Field Trips and Stay-at-Home Learning Ideas: Take advantage of learning activities either out of the house or by just staying in by using these creative ideas to get the learning started.

Water Activities: Cool off and stimulate your child’s summer learning by using these creative activities.

Keep Active and Work on Developmental Skills: Keep those muscles in shape by doing some of these gross motor, fine motor, and visual motor activities every day.

Fun Family Unit Study: Create a unit study around anything your family wants to dive into learning about this summer and enjoy the theme-based learning fun all summer long.

 

Still looking for more ideas?  Check out theSPED Homeschool Summer Teaching Ideas Pinterest Board for even more creative summer learning activities and have fun this summer learning with your children.

 

 

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Does Your State Require Homeschool Evaluations?

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar

 

By Peggy Ployhar and Mary Winfield

One of the biggest stressors for new homeschoolers is trying to figure out what is required of them in their state. It can be overwhelming to dig through information to find what you need to do while being sure that you aren’t forgetting anything important. You also don’t want to have to hassle with testing if it isn’t required because often testing doesn’t accurately measure what your child knows due to anxiety, poor cross over skills, or other issues. Here is a comprehensive list of the bare minimum required for testing and evaluating in each state, so you can focus on what is most important: your child’s education. (States that have been omitted from the list do not have any evaluation requirements!)

“You also don’t want to have to hassle with testing if it isn’t required because often testing doesn’t accurately measure what your child knows due to anxiety, poor cross over skills, or other issues.“

Arkansas:

Norm-referenced testing is required for homeschooled students per state mandates for testing at students at specific grade/age levels . (Arkansas Department of Education, August 2007)

Colorado:

Standardized achievement tests must be given to homeschooled students in the 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, and 11th grades or the student should be evaluated by an individual deemed qualified.  Norm-referenced testing marks must be above the 13% national mark or evaluations should show sufficient student progress.  (Christian Home Educators of Colorado – Homeschool Law)

Connecticut:

Homeschool programs should be deemed equivalent to other schooling options available to that student and this equivalency is determined by an annual portfolio review of the school district. (The Education Association of Christian Homeschoolers Connecticut (TEACHCT) – The “Guidelines”)

Florida:

Homeschool families must be able to prove educational progress and back up that progress with a portfolio of the student’s work. (Florida Parent Educators Association (FPEA) – Florida Homeschool Requirements)

Georgia:

Homeschoolers are required to use standardized tests at a minimum every three years and yearly write an annual progress report.  Records of both of these requirements are to be kept by the homeschooling family and are not required for reporting. (Georgia Home Education Association – Georgia Law)

Hawaii:

Annually families must file a progress report including standardized test results, a certified teacher evaluation of the student, or a parent-written student progress report with supporting work samples.  Additionally, standardized tests are required for 3rd, 5th, 8th, and 10th grade students and can be taken through the local school or other evaluation alternatives may be requested by the parent in lieu of these tests. (Hawaii Homeschool Association – Hawaii Regulations)

Iowa:

There are some homeschooling options in Iowa that do not require annual reporting or assessment, but some options still do.  To find out more about these options and the requirements each entail, visit the Homeschool Iowa – Know the Law and Rulespage on their website to find out more.

Louisiana:

Based on the homeschooling option you choose, testing and curriculum submission may or may not be required.  To find out more visit the (Homeschool Louisiana – How Do I Start Homeschooling) website page.

Maryland:

Up to three times per year a homeschool can be assessed by the local superintendent (or designee).  These assessments may include a portfolio review, discussion with the homeschooler regarding homeschooling instruction, and/or monitoring/observation of the homeschooled child. (Maryland Home Education Association – Legal)

Minnesota:

Homeschooled students are required yearly to take a standardized test that is nationally norm-referenced.  Test results are not submitted for review, but there is a requirement that any student scoring below the 30% mark should receive additional testing for a specific learning issue. (Minnesota Association of Christian Home Educators (MACHE) – Legal)

New Hampshire:

An annual education evaluation for students can be determined either through an educational progress report written by a certified teacher, by a nationally norm-referenced test or local district assessment test, or another assessment tool “mutually agreed upon by the parent and the commissioner of education, resident district superintendent, or nonpublic school principal.” (New Hampshire Home Education Statutes Section 193:A6 Evaluation & Records)

New York:

New York regulations planning, reporting and assessments for all homeschooled students in the state.  These requirements rage from mandatory oversight and content requirements of student Individualized Home Instruction Plans (IHIP), required course and instruction material submissions, attendance requirements, quarterly reports, and annual assessments. To understand the specifics of these area of regulation, visit the New York State Loving Education At Home (LEAH) – Regulations website page as well as the New York Home Instruction Regulations page.

North Carolina:

Homeschooled students are to take a nationally norm-referenced test on a yearly basis. (North Carolinian’s for Home Education (NCHE) – Helps Page)

North Dakota:

Homeschooled students in 4th, 6th, 8th and 10th grade are required to take a standard achievement test either administered in their local school district or that is nationally norm-referenced by an approved test administrator.  Test results are to be filed with the local superintendent. If the student’s score is below the 30% mark, a team is assigned to evaluate the student for any disabilities. Upon completion of the evaluation, the parent, with advisement from an licensed teacher, is to create a remediation plan and file this plan with the district superintendent. If a remediation plan is not filed, the district can revoke the right to homeschool the student in question. (North Dakota Home Education Code)

Ohio:

Yearly assessments for the prior homeschooling year are to be filed at the beginning of each new homeschooling year.  Assessments can be determined either via a norm-referenced test, a portfolio with written report, or by an alternative form of assessment.   The validity of any of the above submissions must be determined by either a licensed/certified teacher, mutually agreed upon professional with the local superintendent or by a test administer approved by a specific test publisher. If the superintendent determines a student needs remediation based on their filed assessment, then the homeschooling parent must file quarterly progress reports for the subjects covered and explanations is less curriculum was covered than in the originally filed homeschool plan.  If the student doesn’t show reasonable progress the superintendent has the right to notify parents the child must enroll the child. (Christian Home Educators of Ohio – Homeschool Regulations)

Oregon:

Norm-referenced tests are required for homeschooled students in 3rd, 5th, 8th, and 10th grade and some districts request for those tests to be filed. Students with learning difficulties can request other forms of evaluation if desired.  For students who fall below the 15% mark there is an allowance given to help the student improve over a three-year period. (Oregon Christian Home Education Association Network (OCEAN) – Summary of Homeschool Law)

Pennsylvania:

Evaluation of a yearly portfolio with the addition of nationally norm-referenced tests or state administered tests for reading/language and mathematics in 3rd, 5th, and 8th grade is required as well as a report which includes documentation of an interview with your student and an assessment of the student’s portfolio contents.  (Pennsylvania Homeschoolers Accreditation Agency – Law Guide)

South Carolina:

Homeschoolers have three options in South Carolina which vary testing and evaluation requirements.  Under option one parents must keep a plan book, portfolio, semi-annual progress report and yearly testing results from their student’s participation in the Basic Skills Assessment Program. Options two and three vary in their requirements per specifics are determined by your choice of oversight agency. For more information on these options and the laws associated with them visit the South Carolina Education Association Homeschooling website page.

South Dakota:

Homeschoolers are required to use test using a standardized test monitored by their local school, a norm-referenced test covering math and reading provided by the Department of Education, or a nationally standardized test of basic skills in the 4th, 8th, and 11th grades.  Test results are to be filed with the local school district. (South Dakota Education Association – Homeschooling)

Tennessee:

There are two homeschooling options in Tennessee. Under one option homeschooled students are to be tested in 5th, 7th, and 9th grade, while under the other option the oversight institution determines the homeschool students testing requirements. (Middle Tennessee Home Education Association – Is It Legal)

Vermont:

Annual assessment is required by one or more of the following methods:  a formal report submitted by a teacher licensed in Vermont; a student portfolio that demonstrates progress and is accompanied by a report from either a parent, teacher, or curriculum publisher; and/or standardized testing results from an approved achievement test covering agreed upon subjects and scored per publishers standards. (Vermont State Board of Education Home Study Program Statutes)

Virginia:

Homeschooled students not taught by a certified teacher must submit a yearly report that includes either testing results from a nationally norm-referenced test, an equivalence score from the ACT, SAT, or PSAT, an evaluation letter from a licenced teacher or other approved academic professional, or a report card from a “community college or college, college distance-learning program, or home education correspondence school.” (Home Educator’s Association of Virginia (HEAV) – Virginia Homeschool Laws)

Washington:

Annual testing is required and can be obtained either through a non-test assessment by a teacher certified by the state of Washington or through a standardized test approved the the Washington State Board of Education.  There is no requirement for filing testing results. (Washington Homeschool Organization – The Law)

West Virginia:

Yearly assessments are required via either a nationally normed standardized test, a testing program used in a state school in the student’s county of residence, via a portfolio reviewed by a certified teacher with a written report, or through an alternative assessment “mutually agreed upon by the parent or legal guardian and the county superintendent.”  If assessments fail to show “acceptable” progress, a remedial program should be initiated by the homeschooling parent/guardian and if progress does not improve in the following year’s assessment their must be additional materials presented to the superintendent showing additional instruction remediation.(Christian Home Educators of West Virginia – WV Homeschool Law)

 

Hopefully you were able to find some clarity and peace as to what you will need to do to ensure a successful homeschool year in the eyes of your state from this list. Do you want to connect with other homeschoolers and maybe find some people in your state? Head over to your  Facebook support group; we would love to have you!

 

 

The data shared in this article is for informational use only. In no way is the contents of this article intended to constitute legal advice.

 

Also we are aware that homeschool/educational law in every state is constantly changing.  The information shared in this article was compiled in March 2019. There is no guarantee the data above is currently correct, complete, or up-to-date.

 

Please refer to the links provided in each section for further investigation into each particular state law referenced.

 

 

 

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Navigating College Admission without the ACT/SAT

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar

By Peggy Ployhar

Did you know a student does not need to take the ACT or SAT in order to receive a degree from a 4-year university?  For students like my oldest who has anxiety issues, this fact removed a large amount of stress when he realized his call into a profession that would require a 4-year degree.

The ACT and SAT are placement tests often used by universities to award students freshman placement into 4-year universities or by scholarship organizations to award funding. So, if your student is not looking to attend a university right out of high school or compete for any academic scholarships, then these tests are more than likely not worth the time, energy, or stress they would place upon your student.

 

Navigating College Admission without the ACT/SAT

That being said, the route to a 4-year university without taking a stressful entrance exam does not negate testing all-together.  If your student enrolls in a community college as a precursor to enrollment in a 4-year university, that school will usually require a placement evaluation.  Each community college has different regulations around these enrollment tests, but most can be taken without time limits over a multiple day period, or without penalty if there is a need for multiple re-tests.

The most commonly used community college placement test is the Accuplacer Test, but some community colleges use a state-standardized placement test or one they have developed for their own college system.  To ensure you understand the specific testing requirements of your community college, as well as the required courses your student should have on a transcript for college admission, it is best to set up an appointment with the college if your student is preparing to transition into post-secondary education via this route.

Also note that even if your student doesn’t pass the community college placement test, that does not limit enrollment in the college.  For subject areas your student has shown college competence, they are awarded the ability to enroll in college credit classes. For those subject areas where the test shows the need for remedial work, they can enroll in various non-credit courses; a passing grade in these courses would allow credit hour enrollment.

Most community colleges also offer tutoring help for students who are taking remedial courses and work with students who need accommodations.  These special services departments also help students with testing if they discover a student may have a learning disability and may need help in gaining more services for their college career.

Transferring from a community college to a 4-year university requires certain qualifiers set by the university be met by incoming transfer students.  Each university is different based on courses that are allowed to be transferred, GPA of the incoming student, and admission requirements for specific degree programs, but none require an ACT or SAT score.

“Transferring from a community college to a 4-year university requires certain qualifiers…but none require an ACT or SAT score.“

For my son who is now in his third year of studies and on track to graduate from the University of Houston’s Biomedical Engineering program in a little over a year, the ability to work towards his degree one step at a time has provided him a much more successful route to achieving his goal.  My hope is that, if you too have a child who struggles yet feels led to a career that requires a degree, neither of you will let go of that dream just because of an admissions test.

To find out more about how we can help you homeschool your struggling high school student, visit the SPED Homeschool High School Help Checklist pageon our website.

 

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Start Homeschooling Before Deciding on Curriculum

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar

 

By Peggy Ployhar

Many parents who homeschool children with special educational needs jump into homeschooling without much preparation.  Unfortunately many times school situations, health conditions, or other factors must be given precedence over deciding on curriculum and preparing everything needed to start homeschooling like many well-meaning bloggers suggest.

I was one of those parents.

Deschooling Before Deciding on Curriculum

We dove into homeschooling without much preparation because my oldest was sinking into a deep depression in kindergarten with yet a few months left before the end of the school year. I had to figure out what to do right away, and so I quickly decided I would use those months before summer as a testing ground to see what teaching techniques worked best for my son and his younger brother, as well as myself.

Nowadays we would term what I did as “deschooling,” but I found it was an instinctual route I took that not only allowed me to understand how to chart our homeschooling course moving forward, but also regroup as a family so we could deal with my son’s depression and help him move out of that place of despair.

Experimenting Before Deciding on Curriculum

Considering this was 17 years ago, there weren’t a lot of homeschool curriculum options, but what I could find I narrowed down into three categories.  The first category was a classical/literature approach, the second was a textbook approach, and the third was a unit study approach. I then decided in order to make it a fair experiment, I needed to eliminate bias and other factors that may sway the results (yes, that is my inner physicist coming out), so we stuck to a specific theme and time period as we tried out these three approaches.Pirates and seafaring around the time of the 16th and 17th centuries was what I finally settled on.

Over the next few months we read historical fiction, had discussions, acted out what we were studying, did workbook pages, read textbooks excerpts, built structures, created costumes, watched movies, went on field trips, and even tried out some recipes and learned how to tie quite a few different types of knots.  And, it was the knot tying exercise that sealed my choice on how were were going to proceed in our homeschooling the following year—and eventually all the way through my oldest son’s graduation.

“…it was the knot tying exercise that sealed my choice on how were were going to proceed in our homeschooling the following year.”

The day we were learning to tie knots I noticed how my children didn’t mind listening to the book and looking at the examples of how to tie the knots as they were explained one by one (a textbook approach). I also noticed that my kids found it interesting when they were given rope and allowed to tie the knots that the book walked them through (a more classical approach). But when I gave them 20 feet of rope and told them they were allowed to tie me up as long as they used proper knots (unit study approach), their energy and enthusiasm for the task escalated by 10-fold.  Thus, we started our homeschooling using unit studies the following year.

I am so grateful I look the time to explore our options with my children before deciding on curriculum. No matter what other things we had to tweak in our instruction to help my children overcome other learning obstacles, we always had a base curriculum that worked for all of us.

What about you?  How did you decide on the curriculum you are now using in your homeschool?  Share with us on our social media sites.  Haven’t decided on a curriculum yet?  Check out all the articles and broadcasts in this quick guide focused on helping you make the best choice for your student and your homeschool.

 

 

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Spirit Led Parenting: Letting the Holy Spirit Do the Heavy Lifting

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar

 

By Peggy Ployhar

In our years of homeschooling the most profound way we have taught our children how to live a life of faith has been by allowing the Holy Spirit do the heavy lifting.  I have always believed it has been my job to live my life of faith before my children with excitement and to share with them the walk God has me on, especially as it affects their lives. As I pray and commit to Spirit-led parenting, the Holy Spirit does the heavy lifting of convincing, convicting, and moving my children’s hearts.

 

 

Spirit-led Parenting: What it Looks Like

 

One example of God working in the hearts of our children has been through reading biographies together. When we’ve read together, my children often remarked on how amazing God is to use those who seem ordinary, unfit, and sometimes all-together unworthy of His attention to perform some amazing things for Him just because they trusted Him and believed what He said He could do with someone who turned to Him with an obedient heart.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another story I share often is when God had impressed upon both mine and my husband’s hearts that He wanted us to sell our house and move to the county.  For our oldest on the Autism spectrum, it seemed like a death sentence to leave behind his comfortable world for the unknown. But I trusted God had clearly spoken to me. One day when he was protesting about us preparing the house to sell, I decided to let the Holy Spirit do the heavy lifting of convincing my son this was God’s will not mine.

 

 

I basically told my son, “You ask God to tell you if moving is something he wants our family to do, and then come back to me when you have clearly heard from him.”

 

 

 

A few days later, unbenounced to me, he prayed to God to show him that day if we were supposed to move. All day long he was looking, but he never told anyone of his prayer for fear we would add in our own interpretations.

 

 

Then when evening rolled around, he went to his sister’s  room with his other brother to listen to an audio tape of “Mr. Henry’s Wild and Wacky Bible Stories” as they did most evenings. It was their practice to not turn the light on because our daughter usually fell asleep during the story, so in the darkness my son picked up a tape, put it into the tape player, and sat down with his siblings to listen.

 

 

 

Do you know what story he happened to put into the player that night?  The story of Abraham being called out of his homeland. As soon as the words, “Abraham, get out of this land” hit my son’s ears, he knew those words were the answer he had been looking for that day.  He ran out of the room screaming at the top of his lungs,”Nooooo!” And that is when I was brought up to speed with the prayer and God’s answer. Never again did he complain about moving.

 

We forget too often, no matter how old or young we are, we have access to the same God and the same Holy Spirit.  Spirit-led parenting trusts God through the Holy Spirit to do the convincing, convicting, and moving of our children’s hearts, and God’s ways will always turn out more positively then when we try to force our will or our faith upon our children.

 

 

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Changing Parenting Anger Through Prayer

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar

By Peggy Ployhar

As humans we instinctively know we need to pray.  When tragedy strikes we ask for prayer, we gather to grieve and cry out, and our hearts seek healing from beyond what we can see, feel, and touch.  But, the biggest tragedy is that we don’t practice praying much when things are going well in our lives. We forget we have needs and large voids we can’t fill on our own.  The biggest void I could not fill through my own self-determination was the one created by the damage my parenting anger had created in my own life and in my relationships with my children.

 

 

 

A Spiritual Battle

Parenting anger at its core is a spiritual battle, and therefore prayer is fundamental to changing parenting anger and bringing about healing, in both the parent and the child. Prayer alone brought forth this healing in my life.  How? By ushering forgiveness and restoration to places grace alone could reach.

 

 

 

 

 

Prayer is about asking, but it is more than that.  It is also about seeking something greater and desiring for it to come into our lives and change our nature; the nature which often brings us to the place where we realize our need for forgiveness and healing.  And, prayer is about submitting to that change by pursuing it with tenacity rather than pursuing our natural inclinations or good intentions.

 

 

 

 

A Plea for Change

When I decided in my heart that I no longer wanted to live with the rages I often experienced, I started to pray for God to change my heart and to heal my relationships with my children with more vigor than I ever had before.  My prayers went from “stop this” to “change me.”

 

Change was slow, but every time God revealed a new lesson I then prayed for His help to heal me, change me, and restore me.  When I backslid in carrying out this new lesson, I sought out His forgiveness as well as the forgiveness of my children, and we prayed together for God to help us accept His grace and do better the next time. I also started to make it a point to pray with my children when they met with failure in their own battles.

 

 

 

Fundamental to Change

Prayer was fundamental in keeping us moving forward, in giving us the strength to keep going on, to accepting our imperfect natures, and in realizing all the more our need for a Savior and a constant help as we navigated life with a desire to become less angry and hurt and more loving and compassionate—more like our heavenly Father.

 

When I started this series on parenting anger, I never could have imagined this process would take so long to complete and I would have so much to share.  If this is the first article in this series you have read, I would highly recommend you go back to the beginning and digest each article one at a time. Savor the wisdom God shared with me as I healed through my own struggle and allow the lessons to go not just to your head, but also your heart.

 

 

 

My prayer for you is that you don’t give up, on yourself or your children.  The struggle to change and grow in this ability is worth the battle, and the best part is that God will be fighting right alongside you all the way.

 

Check out all of the articles in this series: 

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Slow and Steady: The Key to Homeschooling Success

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar

 

By Peggy Ployhar

A few weeks ago as I was interviewing Andrew Pudewa on our weekly live broadcast, SPED Homeschool Conversations, I made a comment about the process I used to successfully teach my own son how to write using IEW’s (The Institute for Excellence in Writing) program. Slow and steady was my response. You can watch the the long interview or shorter videos taken from that interview on  our YouTube channel, or listen to the podcast at this link.

 

In this article, I wanted to expand upon my answer and explain not only how to homeschool slow and steady and how it led to educational successes for my own children, as well a how it can lead to success in your own homeschool.

 

 

Pressure to Succeed
Too often I speak to parents who are extremely anxious about getting their child caught up with a typical learning or developmental timeline. There is so much pressure in the educational community, including homeschooling circles, to press children towards measurable success. Unfortunately, this pressure can have parents focused on college readiness while their kindergartner is still learning numbers and letters.

 

Having now homeschooled for over 16 years and graduated 2 struggling learners I find myself looking back and realizing how much of this pressure I allowed to side-track our homeschooling. If I were to be honest, my “progress panic attacks” caused as many problems as my children’s learning issues and defiant outbursts.

 

 

Progress Instead of Pressure
In hindsight, I realized when I let external pressure take control of my teaching, I was least effective in homeschooling. On the other hand, when I kept my nose down and stopped looking at what we weren’t doing and how far we were away from where I wanted my children to be, progress was evident.

 

Now, I have to admit I didn’t always see a measurable product of my efforts when homeschooling slow and steady. We just kept moving forward at a steady pace gauged to match the speed each child was learning. Many days it seemed like we were just going through the motions, repeating things WAY too much, and moving so slowly that no progress was happening. But, that is the essence of teaching slow and steady; it grasps being in the moment and teaching what needs teaching now, not tomorrow.

 

 

5 Tips for Keeping Your Homeschooling Slow and Steady
If you struggle with homeschooling at a slow and steady pace, here are my 5 tips to keep you teaching in the moment towards homeschooling success:

 

1 – Create a General Plan
Make a learning plan not constrained by dates. Instead, focus on learning goals and steps that progress towards those goals. Many parents find it helpful to write a homeschool IEP for their student with regular assessment intervals – monthly or quarterly is best for measuring notable progress. We have everything you need for free on our site to write you own IEP, just go to this link.

If you are interested in writing your own IEP, check out these other great articles on our website:
4 Things to Prepare Before Writing Your Child’s IEP
How to Write IEP Goals and Objectives
Writing an IEP: Accommodations and Modifications
How to Track IEP Goals

 

2 – Teach According to Your Plan
This may sound simple, but sticking to the plan is one of the most difficult steps if you are like me and panic gets you off track. One day at a time, nose down, and determined to not get off track is the way to stay consistent.

 

3 – Don’t Accelerate Faster Than Your Student
Moving too fast actually makes learning take longer. Progress takes time and moving at the pace of your student will ensure your child is absorbing the lessons you are taking the time to teach and integrating those lessons into their long-term memory for better recall when those facts need to be used for more complex processes.

 

4 – Take Frustration Breaks
If frustration sets in, take a step back to re-evaluate. Don’t blame yourself or your child, these breaks are natural. Sometimes you will need to switch tracks on how you are teaching a subject if your student has a learning block. Other times you both need some time away from that subject altogether. If neither of those methods works, then it may indicate you need to seek out help from a professional. But stepping back is essential in determining which course of action is the best for your situation.

 

5 – Remember to Not Compare
No matter what learning pattern is set by other children in your household, your friends’ children, or any “normal” developmental timeline, your child is unique; and therefore, your child’s progress will be unique. This is true whether or not a child has been diagnosed with a learning disability. All children learn in spurts and stall out at times, this is natural. By not comparing one child to another, you allow your child to learn and grow at the pace that best suits your child’s level of learning progression.

 

 

Evidence Worth the Wait
In that same conversation I was having with Andrew Pudewa, I confessed we used his curriculum with my oldest son, but this same son never wrote a paper for me in the entirety of his homeschooling career. Each day we did the writing lesson, went through the steps, learned the process, and slowly and steadily I taught him the mechanics of good writing. After graduating high school this same son would text and email me while he was away studying at welding school, but he still never wrote a paper. Then, when he started college just after turning 18 he started writing beautiful papers and getting A’s in his college English classes. That was when it became evident to me that he had learned the process of writing because I had taught him slowly and steadily using a system that worked. It just took him time to use what he had learned and produce a product that showed the process had worked.

 

I pray as you look to the new year and set goals for your teaching and homeschooling, as well as for the individual progress for each of your children, that you will conquer any anxiety or fear you may have about the future by following the steps I have outlined above.

 

 

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Time Management: Step 6 In Cultivating Your Child’s Heart for Instruction

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar


By Peggy Ployhar

Over the years of working through my parenting anger issues, the biggest lesson I have learned about myself is my natural tendency to want to always be in control. I have talked about letting go of control in many areas of parenting throughout this series; control of my children’s character development, as well as my parenting approach in respect to my use of authority, of conveying acceptance, in providing forgiveness, and with my desire to  restore honor. The final, and most deceptively hidden, area I needed to surrender my need to over control as a parent was time management.

 

Finding Balance in Time Management
Controlling every single moment of every single day in my children’s lives was not healthy. Plus, if my goal was to help my children learn the skill of managing their time effectively they needed opportunities to practice. Opportunities I was denying them by always micro-managing their schedules.

 

My blindness to my overly controlling approach towards my children’s schedules was aided by the fact that all my children deal with varying degrees of executive functioning deficits. These deficits limit their natural abilities to quickly and efficiently schedule, plan, and organize themselves. So, as a mother who is naturally gifted in this area, it was easy to just step in and take over these responsibilities for my children instead of letting go and teaching them to take ownership for their own use of time.

 

For any parent of a struggling child, the tendency to overcompensate and take control is a constant battle. On one hand you desire for your child to learn and grow, but on the other hand the pain this struggle causes your child and often your own self (extra messes to clean up, extended length in completing tasks, etc.) is much more easily alleviated by stepping in. How then is a parent to win over this desire to control while still keeping a child on track? The answer is balance.

 

A balanced time-management approach involves evaluating three things: your child, your approach, your tools. Looking at these three areas and then determining a balanced plan on how to appropriately give your child the help needed to get through a regular schedule while developing time management skills of their own along the way.

 

Your Child
Understanding the true capability if your child to manage time is critical when figuring out how much this child can manage realistically without your help. Have you ever done a critical analysis of how well your child can break down a larger task into a checklist of smaller parts to complete the whole project?

 

One easy way to figure out your child’s executive functioning capability is to test it by asking your child to do a task which requires multiple steps. I would suggest doing this test with different types of tasks because children often have a greater ability to focus and plan when they are interested in the task (like building a Lego set) than they do when they are disinterested in a task, like cleaning the bathroom.

 

If you have an older student, you can also use this free time management quiz. The quiz has 15 simple questions your student can answer, and then the website provides ideas for goal setting based on the deficiencies revealed by the quiz.

 

Your Approach
Now that you know what skills your child has for managing his own time, and which ones you need to help teach for greater mastery, you should develop a strategy for teaching time management skills. Here are some website with great resources on helping kids with mild time management issues, moderate executive functioning issues, or even more severely limited scheduling abilities.

 

Mild Time Management Strategies
11 Easy Tips for Teaching Your Kids Time Management
The Age-By-Age Guide to Teaching Kids Time Management
6 Ways to Teach Time Management Skills

Moderate Executive Functioning Strategies
Graphic Organizers from the Learning Disabilities Foundation of America
Helping Kids Who Struggle with Executive Functioning
10 Frightfully Useful Tips from Executive Functioning Coaches
5 Must-Have Apps for Improving Executive Functioning in Children

 

Strategies for Students with Severely Limited Scheduling Abilities
Tactile Schedules for Students with Visual Impairments and Multiple Disabilities
8 Types of Visual Student Schedules
Object Schedule Systems
Free Printable Visual Schedules


Your Tools
Based on how much help your child needs and what approach you feel would best help in teaching better time management, you can now start putting together your tools. The various articles above are filled with everything from digital tools to very hands-on physical tools.

 

For our family, we did a lot of visual schedules on a huge blackboard in our kitchen when our children were very young. We supplemented that schedule with daily conversations about upcoming activities and plans to ensure our children remembered what lay ahead and weren’t surprised when we had something planned that didn’t fit into our normal routine. But, as our children grew older those schedules moved to student planners, apps, and shared documents along with the daily conversations.

 

Knowledge has great power. In my experience with letting go of controlling my children, knowing more about the type of help they needed and when I was becoming overly controlling greatly helped with restoring a proper parent-child relationship in our home.

 

Check out all of the articles in this series: 

Did you know SPED Homeschool is 100% donor funded?

Donate today

 

Homeschooling Families Strengthened by Respite and Opportunities

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar


By Peggy Ployhar

When our family started our homeschooling journey it was because of the needs of my oldest child. In no way was I prepared or equipped to handle teaching my son who was diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome only the month prior, nor did I fully understand how severe his depression was, but I knew in my heart keeping him home to learn would keep my son from slipping any further away from me than he already had in his 8 months while attending private school.

Watch our story here.


This journey started 17 years ago for our family and through it, our entire family has dramatically changed. I would say for the better. Homeschooling is a hard road, but homeschooling a child with extra learning, emotional, social, and behavioral needs is also often an isolating and lonely journey. Some families are able to push through this isolation and build a small support community, but for others, the needs of their child(ren) create barriers too large to overcome on their own.

 

 

Opportunity Complications
As I described in the video above, our family created our own support and many families can create their own tribe if they dedicate a good amount of time and energy to the task. But for families who homeschool children with a more complicated diagnosis or family dynamics, the solution for finding time to rest and opportunities to do activities and develop relationships are not as simple as pulling a few families together to create community. Instead, these families must rely on someone else to do the support legwork for them. Otherwise, they just continue the journey alone as best they can.

 

I would like to introduce you two homeschooling families who have been part of SPED Homeschool since we launched our nonprofit in 2017. SPED Homeschool board member Elaine Carmichael and SPED Homeschool team member Shanel Tarrant-Simone. Both of these hard-working homeschooling parents are mothers of boys on the more complicated end of the autism spectrum.

 

Elaine shares her story here about how after homeschooling her typical children for many years in a loving and nurturing co-op, her support system crumbled as her youngest son’s needs grew greater.


Further on in this same interview, Elaine also shared that even though her son just turned 18 this past year, there really is no place for her family to turn for the respite and help; respite she and her husband need and buddy opportunities so her son can have experiences similar to other kids and young adults his age.  


When I emailed Elaine last week to ask her some questions about the hurdles they face with integrating into their community and what it would mean to her family and her son Aaron to have reliable respite and buddy opportunities, here is how she answered my questions:

Q: How difficult is going out in public with Aaron? What roadblocks are a constant hindrance?
A: “Roadblocks are sights & sounds that overwhelm Aaron which most of us take for granted because they don’t bother us or we can ignore them.”

Q: In what ways does bringing Aaron out in public without help hinder your family’s ability to integrate into society?
A: “Having an extra set of hands can be a tremendous help. Aaron will try to run if he is uncomfortable with a situation.”

Q: How could having a consistent, trained, and caring buddy/helper for Aaron improve your family’s ability to participate in your community?
A: “It would be helpful to have “buddies” to come alongside us to allow us to go to dr appts, date nights, to a Bible class together, or both be able to be involved with choir & music rehearsals and worship services at the same time. Those are just a few. Maybe even be able to attend activities of our older children and granddaughter, knowing Aaron was enjoying good company.”

Q: Why did you choose to homeschool despite knowing the school could have helped provide some respite or buddy opportunities for you and Aaron?
A: “We continued homeschooling Aaron after his siblings graduated from homeschool. We felt it was still a calling God has given us. We had also heard many stories of the struggles families had with public schooling their special needs kids.”

 

Q: What else would you share with families/individuals about the advantages of homeschooling Aaron?
A: “We have the advantage of setting our own schedule, especially with dr appts and therapies taking time in a day. We can work around our son’s poor sleep schedule. We don’t have to concern with bullying or teachers who don’t understand Aaron’s needs.”

 

In the same way, but with even greater demands upon her time and resources, SPED Homeschool team member Shanel has raised and homeschooled her nonverbal autistic twin sons as a single mother. Shanel deals with similar issues as Elaine in caring for her boys who also just recently turned 18, but an added stress to her life is the sad truth that as a single-parent she often walks this road almost completely alone.
Opportunity Possibilities
SPED Homeschool understands a special needs homeschooling family’s need for respite and opportunities intimately because we have experienced those same needs within most of our own family’s homeschooling journeys. It breaks our hearts every time we have a new member join our Facebook support group asking for help in connecting them to local resources and not having anywhere to send them.

 But we are not satisfied with providing just an online support for these families we have a heart to serve. We instead want to meet their greater needs and develop local support groups in communities throughout the United States through a program we are calling SPED Strong Tribes. These tribes will focus on filling 5 basic needs: togetherness, respite, opportunities, networking, and growth. Each of these components are being covered in blogs this week before our campaign to increase awareness of the essential nature of each in supporting special needs homeschooling families.

 

To learn more about the SPED Strong Tribes campaign and how you can help build stronger special education homeschooling families by partnering with us in this campaign, click here.

 

We have also created this simple video to explain the whole program. 

Thank you for sharing this information and partnering with us to help our isolated families get the respite and opportunities they so greatly desire and need.

For more information on the five basic foundations we will be building into our new SPED Strong Tribes, check out all the blogs in this series:
Homeschooling Families Strengthened by Togetherness
Homeschooling Families Strengthened by Respite and Opportunities
Homeschooling Families Strengthened by Networking
Homeschooling Families Strengthened by Growth

 

Did you know SPED Homeschool is 100% donor funded? 

Donate today

(all donations are tax-deductible)

 

Honor: Step 5 in Cultivating Your Child’s Heart for Instruction

Posted on by Peggy Ployhar


By Peggy Ployhar
 
In restoring relationships with my children after the healing process began with my parenting anger issues, the primary focus of my actions concentrated on being worthy of their honor. Asking their forgiveness was only the first step in this process. The rest of the wide divide my anger had created between myself and my children required more than lip-service, it required action. And, my actions needed to show my heart was changing and willing to take responsibility for the effects of my post-anger aftermath.
An Act of Kindness
How did I do that? Well, it started slowly, but began with a new something in our house called a “re-honor job.” I took it upon myself to be the first to take on these “jobs.” Through them, I demonstrated these jobs were a means for restoring broken relationships. And having done more than my fair share of destruction, due to my parenting anger episodes, I realized it was up to me to start the restoration process.
 
Every time I did something to dishonor a child, I followed up with asking forgiveness and doing a “re-honor job,” a physical act of kindness. This physical act worked as a bridge to start spanning the gulf created by the many years of inappropriate actions taken towards my children. As I learned to let go of my anger and harness it properly, as well as use these “re-honor jobs” to start repairing relationships, I also started incorporating these “jobs” in my child training, to ensure even the smallest relational fractures were repaired within our home.


An Example
I will provide you with a scenario to illustrate how these “jobs” worked into our family life and child training. The following scenario played itself out many times in our early years of homeschooling. In general, this is how it went:
 
Boys will be boys.  If you have boys, more than likely they fight as much as mine did. It really didn’t matter what the fight was about, but one would say or do something to get the other riled, and a fight would ensue. 

My general policy was not to get involved in my children’s fights. But, when the outcome was not being worked out on their own accord (or there was the potential of blood being drawn), I stepped in.  Usually, my intrusion was only long enough to bring them into the kitchen, assign them each a chair, and remind them not to leave their chairs until they’d forgiven one another.
 
Sometimes they followed (even begrudgingly was fine with me), but if not, they knew I would bring it up later, so often my wishes were followed without complaint. Once in the kitchen, and after making sure they were settled, I would give them my reminder and take my leave. Now, I didn’t go very far…just another room where I was within ear-shot, but out of their line-of-sight.

Depending on the day, and their attitudes, my boys would either agree to forgive one another immediately, or they would start a very long and drawn out shouting battle across the kitchen. Either way, at the end of their dialogue, the two would agree to forgive one another and call me into the room to let me know they’d settled their argument.
 
Now, I must point out that, if a child got out of his chair during the process of working out his differences with his brother, he knew this was an issue he would have to take up with me afterward, which I will explain in just a moment.
 
At the point peace was declared and I was beckoned into the kitchen, if one or both had not followed me to the kitchen without a fight or if anyone had gotten up from their assigned chair before receiving permission to leave, I would ask that child(ren) if they were also willing to ask my forgiveness for their disobedience towards me. Additionally, if I had lost my cool during any point of the process, I made sure to also ask forgiveness. 
 
After forgiveness was given at the kitchen level, we took it to a higher house and prayed together asking God to forgive and restore. And then we did “re-honor jobs.”


An Opportunity
These jobs were to be physical manifestations of our desire to restore the relationships our actions had damaged. Often the boys would do a small chore or clean up something for their brother. On the other hand, if the re-honor job was directed at me, they would usually do something I normally did around the house. And, if I was re-honoring a child(ren) then I did a chore(s) to restore the honor I had compromised with my son(s).
 
What our family learned through these exercises over the years was it has never become easy to re-honor someone. Saying “Sorry” or “Please forgive me” can become meaningless words, but physically honoring another person requires us to bow our lives during each act of kindness to serve that person and elevate them above ourselves. And, with that bow, healing and restoration happen and the sin which compromised that relationship is snuffed out by love.
 
When we honor another person, we put ourselves into a submissive position which says, “I have chosen to place you ahead of my own desires and will.”


An Established Pattern
Honor is a tricky thing in relationships – it needs to be earned, but it also needs to be maintained. I pray that if you are in the process of healing the relationships in your family because of your own struggles with parenting anger that you work to re-establish honor starting with yourself and then work the concept into your child training process. 

Honor truly is a key element to cultivating your child’s heart for instruction and it comes through living out forgiveness by purposefully building in acts of kindness, or “re-honoring jobs”, into your training.

Parenting Anger Series Articles:
Why We Should Be Talking About Parenting Anger 
Parenting Anger Demystified
The Parenting Anger Escape Door
Shifting Parenting Anger from Controlling Mode to Training Mode
How-To Effectively Instill Godly Character in Children Using Parenting Anger 
Integrity: Step 1 in Cultivating a Child’s Heart for Instruction
Humble Authority: Step 2 in Cultivating Your Child’s Heart for Instruction
Unconditional Acceptance:  Step 3 in Cultivating Your Child’s Heart for Instruction 
Forgiveness & Mercy: Step 4 in Cultivating Your Child’s Heart for Instruction
Honor: Step 5 in Cultivating Your Child’s Heart for Instruction
Time Management: Step 6 In Cultivating Your Child’s Heart for Instruction

Did you know SPED Homeschool is 100% donor funded? 

Your contributions keep our ministry running! 

Donate today on GuideStar

(all donations are tax-deductible)

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