Co-ops. What are they? How are they helpful? Do you have to be in a co-op to homeschool? Visit some of these blogs to find out the answer to these and other questions in this week’s Blog Cruise. Be sure and let us know what you think about co-ops.
~Heidi at Reviews & Reflections – Co-ops? Nope!
~Lori at Loving Learning at Home – With All This Work, How Do I Fit a Co-op In?
~Nikki at Joy in the Journey – What Do You Think About Co-ops?
~Heidi at Chatter, Clatter, and Things That Matter – Co-ops? Not for me! Or are they?
~Debra at Footprints in the Butter – My limited experience with Homeschool co-ops
This article was written by Kristen at A Day in the Life. Don’t miss next week’s Blog Cruise when we talk about keeping grades.
Allow me to begin by saying that just one year ago, I swore I would never be involved in a homeschool co-op, virtually handing my kids over to others to be taught! I felt it flew in the face of every reason we brouht them from school to home! Now we're one of the minority that believes there can be some value in the homeschool co-op. So why our change in heart? My oldest enrolled in PSEO, otherwise known as dual-enrollment, where he could utilize courses from a local four-year college to fulfill high school requirements while amassing college credit at the same time. His first venture into this areana was a speech course. This course required him to have an audience of 12 peers for each of four speeches throughout the semester. We live in a very small community, and finding twelve peers who are available at the same time (and willing to sit through a speech!) is tantamount to climbing Mt. Fuji! Enter the homeschool co-op! By enrolling in the local co-op, the kids taking this course were provided a course guide and an automatic (and captive!) audience was supplied. Problem solved, and credits granted. The same scenario is true of dual enrollment courses such as Chem. If this is done at the college level, each student individually is responsible for purchasing a $100+ chem kit. Done in a group, the kit is purchased once and the experiments are done together. With ten kids in a class, the total cost was 1/10 of what it had been if each kid took the class individually. Homeschoolers are typically on a tight budget so this only makes sense! Lastly, some kids – especially at the high school level – really yearn for that social contact, along with the knowledge that they are not the only ones having to take something like Latin. Suddenly what was boredom and drudgery at home becomes both interesting and motivating within a co-op. We do very little with our local co-op, preferring to do the bulk of our work at home and either self-directed or taught by mom, but my kids without a dout appreciate the time they have each week at our co-op. And I appreciate the convienence and cost-savings I have realized.