New Homeschool Adventures…Kind Of.

If you’ve been following my blog then you know that we started this whole homeschooling thing because William had trouble with bullies at school.  (If you haven’t been following my blog, then , fyi, we started this whole homeschooling thing because William had trouble with bullies at school.)  Before everything went down with the bullying, the reacting to bullying, and the shaming of the victim; I never ever would have considered homeschooling.  It just seemed like a crazy idea for me.  But, of course, now I love it. 

There are some drawbacks, of course. That glorious me-time that occurred when the kids were in school was pretty awesome.  And, I totally miss that.  But, not enough to want to change anything.  And they are here more to make more messes.  That kind of stinks.  But, again, still worth it. 🙂

So after the whole “turning our lives upside down” thing for William’s sake, he wants to go back. 

He told his father.  I’m guessing that he wasn’t sure how I would react.  Smart kid. 😉  But, yeah, he told Brian that he wanted to be able to go to high school and that he was willing to serve his time at the alternative school to make it happen. 

At first, I was like “No way!” And “What? So he hates spending time with us now??”  (This is why he told Brian first.) This was in my head, of course, not to him. And eventually, I came around to the understanding that he wanted and needed to be around other kids his age.  Lizzie and Antwan are pretty cool but they are 8 and 9.  Kaleb is also pretty cool but would rather have his wisdom teeth removed than spend time with William.  Sadly. ;(  He has a couple friends in the neighborhood but Kaleb is also friends with them. So you can imagine how well that works out for William when Kaleb is around.

So, things continue to be harder for William. Across the board. I try to help where I can like paying the neighbor girl to walk the dog.  It benefits Rose (the dog) and William gets to walk with her, too.  But, in the end, he still feels isolated and a 15 minute walk with a kid in the neighborhood isn’t cutting it for him.

So, it looks like our basic plan is to have him finish most of middle school at home (virtually, on the computer) and then attend the alternative school for the last 45 days so that he can be all ready to start high school.  A quick call to the school board indicated that it would be a relatively simple process.

I’ve mostly come to peace with the plan.  I don’t love it, though.  And, I’m terrified that it will end in a similar way as his 6th grade year.  But, here’s hoping that high school kids really are “nicer” than middle school kids like everyone keeps saying.  Either way, we decided to home school William for his emotional health and now it looks like we have to public school him for the same reason. 

But, as is true with life, people keep you guessing.  And, after the soul searching and the school board calling, William unexpectedly announced that he had changed his mind and would rather continue to be homeschooled. When I asked him why, he said that he wanted to be home to spend time with us.

But, I’m thinking the speech that I had just given him about working hard to make sure to stay on pace so he would be on the same level as the school kids (when at the time, he really wanted to watch TV instead), may have had something to do with it. Haha.

Good luck, William’s future teachers, good luck. 😉