Today we started school… kind of…

For the purposes of keeping track of what we do each year, our school year runs from July-June. I consider us year round homeschoolers, taking breaks when we need to.

Last year was pretty relaxed, what most would consider unschooling. While I still love that idea, the older two are now middle school aged, and I want to see what they actually know, so we are on a one month subscription to Power Homeschool.

With this program, they can have up to 6 classes at one time. They can go up or down grade levels that differ from their age. It tracks attendance, keeps grades, lets me see what they are learning, and holds us all accountable for doing some of the subjects we may not enjoy so much.

A few steps in each class doesn’t take a whole lot of time each day, so I’m hoping to use it as a starting point to introduce parts of a subject that we can dive deeper into.

We still have lots of other things that will start back up soon, like nature classes, bowling, girl scouts, karate, swimming, and many other things that crop up throughout the year.

It also helps on those days that we don’t want to leave the house, that we have 2.5 acres of woods to explore, where we can find a lot of things to research, build, plant, and draw. Our options are nearly endless for what we can learn!