Homeschooling question

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I use the Seton Curriculum for my dd and have for the last two years and will for this coming new school year. It is a very demanding curriculum and we both get frustrated. This year I had a new teacher evaluate her for our county. This teacher is a retired teacher and has been doing homeschool evaluation for 29 years. She doesn’t like using curriculums and said it causes stress on the kids and the parents. What she told me is very new and scarely to me to try, but she says the student strive with it. She told me not to use any curriculum and to allow my dd to go to the library and pick out the books for her to read to do her book reports on. She told me for her to have a journal where she would draw on one side and write on the other. Any misspelled words would become her spelling words and she would have to write them four times each. She told me to give her a list of adverbs or adjectives at different times and ask my dd to write a story on what she read in the books she picked for science and history. She said that the only book I would have to buy is a math book and recommended Saxon Math. I asked her about testing and how would I make up test to see how she knows her work and she told me that I would not ever give her any test. She said at the end of the year, we give her a standard test to see where she falls and she said she has had all students who choice their own books score above average on these test.

Has anyone done this and is there truth to what she says? By the way, she herself, homeschooled her four children this way and are all college graduates. Her baby is going to graduate from a masters program soon.
 
I use the Robinson Curriculum which sounds a lot like her advice, but has the books on CD to print. It’s all older literture and my kids are very well read. I hadn’t tested them before this year, we did in May and they scored a full grade level above their ‘school age grade’ counterparts. They are 9 & 10. If you have ?s about it let me know, I have all kinds of little things to talk about. It uses Saxon Math and is a cheap way to go, just get a good printer and have a decent Catechism to use.
 
As a certified math teacher, I dislike the Saxon curriculum for math. I am not familiar with Seton so I cannot make any comment on that at all. Saxon uses rote methodology, which isn’t all bad, but the way they structure their curriculum is very confusing to many children. It doesn’t produce good results or retention, IMHO. And, it’s too simple in its content.

What this evaluator is talking about is a concept called “unschooling” where the students learn about whatever interests them and make their own decisions about what to learn. I dislike this idea, but that’s the teacher in me. There is structure to learning, and if you don’t have structure concepts needed later might be missed.

Are you confident in your ability to go without curriculum and still give your daughter a solid, comprehensive education? It’s not the evaluator who has to carry out the plan, it’s you. This lady sounds a little nutty to me.
 
Seton is tough. No question about it. But you can make it a little easier by not being so tied to the stuff they tell you that you need to do. There is not enough time in 12 months to do all the activities they suggest to do in 9.

One good thing about Seton… it prepares the student for college. My oldest said college courses were a breeze compared to Seton High School courses. :whacky:
 
I third what the previous posters wrote. (Including about Saxon - if I wasn’t such a penny-pincher, I’d have used it for fire kindling.)
No matter what curriculum you use, there’s going to be some level of frustration in any challenging course.
What the evaluator prefers really doesn’t have anything to do with you or your dd’s evaluation because she isn’t doing the teaching or learning there. She is supposed to simply evaluate that you are progressing.
If your dd is learning and doing well, I wouldn’t try to fix what isn’t broken.
If you are having problems with Seton, give them a call and they will make sure you get it settled. That’s what you pay for enrollment for - so use it.😃 You don’t have to do the plans exactly as written and if you aren’t comfortable with tweaking them, Seton will help you. And if you aren’t comfortable with tweaking what you have, going solo as the evaluator suggests might be nothing more than exchanging frustration of one kind with the stress of another kind.
just my .02
 
nana3 said:
I use the Seton Curriculum for my dd and have for the last two years and will for this coming new school year. It is a very demanding curriculum and we both get frustrated. This year I had a new teacher evaluate her for our county. This teacher is a retired teacher and has been doing homeschool evaluation for 29 years. She doesn’t like using curriculums and said it causes stress on the kids and the parents. What she told me is very new and scarely to me to try, but she says the student strive with it. …
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It sounds like going from one extreme to the other. I’ve never used Seton as it did not appeal to me, but some people like it. The approach this teacher recommends sounds like “unschooling” (as another already wrote.) That may be an approach that works for some parents and students, but not everyone is the same. Without strong motivation from either the parent and/or the child, I personally wouldn’t feel comfortable with the approach this teacher recommended for all subjects.

You don’t sound comfortable with this teacher’s recommendation either. I suggest you look into other curriculum–something you find less demanding that works for both you and your children but that still offers structure. There are numerous styles to homeschooling and it’s important to find the style that works for both parent and child. I like Catholic Heritage Curriculum, which is a gentler approach from Seton. I also use various other material too. We use Singapore math, but if Saxon math worked for you through Seton then maybe continue with it. For some subjects we do the majority of our learning through “real books” rather than textbooks, but I don’t approach all subjects that way. You need to find what works for you and your child. The beauty of homeschooling is that it gives you that freedom.

If you are frustrated with Seton, try something else, but to give up on using an organized curriculum altogether sounds like the opposite extreme. If you were attracted to Seton in the first place, I doubt that the approach this evaluator recommended best fits your style.
 
What she suggested is unschooling. It’s not something I would do. However, there are curriculums which are very similar to it. They have much more structure, though. One is Ambleside. It is based off of Charlotte Mason’s ideals. Another is Mater Amabilis. That one is Catholic, but I don’t like it as much as the other one. It isn’t as challenging. They are both free resources and seem to be excellent. If you both find Seton to be frustrating, it might be best to switch. You don’t want to get burnout.
 
Thank you all for your advice and I really appreciate it. I agree with Rob’s Wife that if it ain’t broke than don’t fix it. My dd does very well with Seton. She scored above average on the standardize test. I do believe that Seton will prepare her the best for college. I did look at other curriculums like Catholic Heritage and found it easier, in fact, too easy for my daughter. I want her to be challenged as well. I will check out the other curriculum that Claymont said that uses CDs to see if I can do that, but for 5th grade I already have ordered my dd’s book for Seton.

I am uncomfortable with what this evaluator said because I am very organized and need structure myself and I think my daughter will too. I don’t think it will work for me and it is going to the other extreme after Seton.

I am grateful for CatholicTrain who wrote about her children saying that college is easier compared to HS with Seton. You know, Seton has a forum and I asked them a question about the program in the parent forum. I received a private message and to my surprise it was from a student. She can’t post in the parent forum. I was so impressed with what she said and she has been using Seton since grade K. I asked her what grade she was in and she said 8th. She too told me to stick with Seton and it is worth it. I have put in a call to the counselors for I have to get my dd to study on her own and need suggestions on how to do that. She won’t do that on her own. I will be homeschooling my niece too this year and my dd needs to do this. Anyway, this student’s grammar, spelling and the way she expressed herself was so great, I was impressed. Not only was I impressed in her educational abilities, but spiritually. Here she was an 8th grader and she was giving some great spiritual advice. The first time she wrote to me, I thought an adult was writing this, but when I asked her grade level, I was even more impressed. She told me to pray at night, which I did anyway, for the best way to teach my dd the next day. She said more. I was just impresssed how much she knew about the Catholic Faith too. So I know that Seton is a great program, I just need to cut some things out in order to have a life for me and not get so frustrated.

I use to do everything Seton had on the list, that was when my dd was in 3rd grade, and in 4th I started to cut out the repetition and unneeded things. I hope this year to be better at it so that I can include Spanish in my curriculum. I am hispanic and my dd is half hispanic and doesn’t know Spanish. I want her to know how to speak Spanish especially to my mother.

Thanks again guys for your advice!! I needed to hear all of this.:rolleyes:
 
I don’t homeschool so take my suggestion with a grain of salt, but what if you tried the evaluator’s approach with one or two subjects? There’s a website called “Reading Your Way Through History”. I suppose you wouldn’t get the whole effect with the spelling words and such, but it would cover history and give some extra writing and vocabulary practice.
 
**Oh goodness! You’re making me really rethink my re-registration w/ Seton. :o I was enrolled w/ them 2 years ago, however this past school year, we did a whole mish mesh of books that I chose based on what my child would do well with. IT worked out great, very laid back, he learned a LOT AND we weren’t so stressed. For some strange reason I went back w/ Seton for this coming school year, I guess I missed the whole ‘having someone to hold me accountable’ (in a way) for the kids work. This past year, we didn’t do ‘tests’ etc. (except his Horizon’s math book had tests in it). He (my oldest who is 10) tested w/ Seton’s placement test at the end of this year and he was well ahead of the game (going into 6th grade instead of 5th). So…you’re probably asking why I went back to Seton. Well to be honest, having everything laid out for day to day is what I really like about it. I also like knowing that they will have ‘transcripts’ if they happen to need them someday (I know, I know, I could make those myself is what I’ve been told but this is so much easier). They may never need them, but it’s nice to have an actual ‘enrollment’ in an accredited school if someone comes knocking at my door. 😉

Also I wanted to add that I’ve learned a lot from talking to other Seton moms over the past year about why I left Seton. Over and over again, all these various parents said the same exact thing, you do NOT have to do everything that is in their lesson plans. THAT was my biggest mistake w/ them 2 years ago, I was so particular about my son finishing EVERYTHING every single day that it made it so very stressful and not at all fun for him or me. So this new school year, we are going to take a more laid back approach to Seton. He’ll do most of the lesson plans but if there’s something I see that looks like ‘busy work’ then we’ll just skip it. 🙂

I know this may all seem so confusing, it is to me, lol!! But I hope it helps somewhat. 👍

P.S. Saxon hardbound book DOES look to be very boring. :o OH well, we’ll see how it works for him, I guess. **
 
Sounds like you’ve got your questions answered, but i wanted to recommend Sonlight. they are a protestant company, but the religion portion of the curriculum is separate. I like them because they use regualr books for both English and history (instead of textbooks or ‘readers’ with excerpts of a book). You can select from several math components–we used singapore math. Also, because they started as a service to missionary families, all the supplies for the science projects are included. LOL Not necessary really in the states, but very convenient!
 
Well, I wouldn’t call what the evaluator described unschooling. Unschooling would be less structured than that. But I bristle whenever I hear someone say, “you should” about the way you educate your children. If I wanted to do what someone else told me to do, I’d send my children to building school. I homeschool because I believe I’m the best judge of what my children need. I gather information about how various methods worked for different people, try to assess why those things work (or don’t work) for them, and then decide for myself what our family will do. So whether it’s telling you that you should completely switch your style to the method that worked for one person, or whether someone tells you that you should stick with a program that isn’t working because it worked for someone else, these things are not helpful. Every style of homeschooling has turned out academically strong, prepared students. And every style and program has probably turned out kids who didn’t benefit from them. There isn’t one program that is going to work or not work universally. The beauty of homeschooling is that you get to choose specifically what will work for your family. So if Seton makes you happy, stick with it. If it is stressing you out, see if you can tweak it to make it work better for you. If it still doesn’t seem right, look at the other programs out there and see if they match your goals and desires better. And if you want to throw all curricula out the window, go for it. But only if you want to.
 
One thing they don’t tell you in Seton until after you pull your hair out is that you DON’T need to do everything.

You don’t have to read every story or learn all the history. Much of the English builds but if your kid gets it don’t bothor going over it again and again. Saxton is repatitive and i think it drives one nuts, but if you call Seton they can sub it out. (they used to atleast). And again, you can skip questions and chapters.

And in this world where hs’ers are up against a wall, having a curriculum saves you alot of pain when applying for college. EG. your child is guarenteed to never have to take a GED.
 
I was homeschooled most of my life and we switched to Seton for High school. While I agree that it was tough-- extreamly tough sometimes-- I feel that it was the best possible prep work for College. In the state where I lived when I graduated from high School they emphisized the ACT’s instead of the SAT’s. For those who don’t know, the top score is 36 and I scored a 33, the highest in my county of all the hundreds of Seniors who took the exam that year. I breezed through Feshman & Sophomore years in College with easy work so I’m 100% an advocate for both Home Schooling & Seton work. 😉
 
TamaraSieja said:
I was homeschooled most of my life and we switched to Seton for High school. While I agree that it was tough-- extreamly tough sometimes-- I feel that it was the best possible prep work for College. In the state where I lived when I graduated from high School they emphisized the ACT’s instead of the SAT’s. For those who don’t know, the top score is 36 and I scored a 33, the highest in my county of all the hundreds of Seniors who took the exam that year. I breezed through Feshman & Sophomore years in College with easy work so I’m 100% an advocate for both Home Schooling & Seton work. 😉
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This is what keeps me with Seton to at least some degree - I’ve never heard otherwise from Seton grads.👍
 
Rob_s_Wife said:
This is what keeps me with Seton to at least some degree - I’ve never heard otherwise from Seton grads.👍
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Me too, Rob’s wife. I have a very good friend in real life who also graduated from Seton (along w/ her sister) and both of the girls are grown, married women (w/ kids) who were/are very well educated and still solidly Catholic. 👍😉
 
I will be staying with Seton. It works for my daughter and I will be how my niece does with it. This year I will try to be less stressed out for my sake and for my dd’s and my niece. Seton didn’t like that I didn’t order their Art book for the fifth grade but it didn’t look like fun and was all educational stuff. So I ordered DVD’s on how to draw some things and paint. I think my dd would have more fun with that than learning the history of art and all that. I didn’t learn that until College.
 
Hi,

Although I don’t homeschool my own kids, I can tell you this:

A very good friend of mine with 8 children does use Seton. Her children not only are bright & well educated, they really know their religion! Her daughter is only 13 & is so bright & articulate you would think she was much older.

And on Saxon math: our school district switched to this about 5 years ago. I HATE IT. Doing homework with my kids drives me absolutely nuts. And my 10 year old son just doesn’t get it. How could a kid get A’s & B’s in everything else, and an F in Math??? If I could, I would homeschool, but we’re barely making it financially as it is. 🤷
 
churchsecretary said:
Hi,

Although I don’t homeschool my own kids, I can tell you this:

A very good friend of mine with 8 children does use Seton. Her children not only are bright & well educated, they really know their religion! Her daughter is only 13 & is so bright & articulate you would think she was much older.

And on Saxon math: our school district switched to this about 5 years ago. I HATE IT. Doing homework with my kids drives me absolutely nuts. And my 10 year old son just doesn’t get it. How could a kid get A’s & B’s in everything else, and an F in Math??? If I could, I would homeschool, but we’re barely making it financially as it is. 🤷
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Is your child doing Saxon math hardbound edition or the soft cover book? That makes a difference, I looked at both books at the conference. If it is the hardbound book, they have cd’s (Dive cds) you can buy to pop into the computer and it shows a better explanation for each topic covered in the book. 🤷
 
I ordered the saxon homeschool edition books that are new and do come with a Dive CD. I hope that will be better than the hardbound books.
 
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