away from graduating my first child.
We went over some things yesterday, I was trying to get a feel for where he is mentally and also academically. Khan Academy has helped about a billion percent. I know 100% is max, but it does not seem like enough. I am REALLY not good with math. Matt had said he would take over in high school, but he has not made a single effort to help. I am SO glad to have Khan, Jake is zipping right on through Algebra. He said last night he was going to go back 3 lessons and watch them again before bed because the new video had a concept that threw him and he wanted a review. *sigh* I am SO happy to hear him say things like that. Sunday night, he came in with a math problem written out and wanted me to check it. : ) I have tried to stay out of the way and only provide support, but it's HARD coming from my background as teacher's kid to just abandon the system and forge ahead, nudging my children out in front and not really knowing how it will all turn out.
Jake's gotten into the science part of Khan as well. The other day he explained how heart attacks worked when I was wondering what an infarction was. We are going to pull out the GED test Thursday for him to take, he did well last year-maybe could have passed it other than the writing. We have been working on that a little via e-mails. He sends me essays and such, I flesh them out and show him what they are looking for. I know he'd like to get his GED sooner rather than later. Then there's the SAT...I swear, for an unschooled kid, there sure are a lot of tests to get into college.
I know we still have time, that 18 is not The End, that he can take more time or he can change his mind and go a different route. Compared to where he was at 2.5 years ago-the difference is vast. Still, there are moments when I panic, when I know that I don't KNOW how it will turn out, that I have essentially bucked the system that was no good for *me* and in doing so, have gambled my children. I am reliant on each kid to pull their own weight and follow their own interests and fill in the blanks with knowledge and experience of their own choosing, some I help with, most they go about independently-more so now that they are a little older.
I always start down this road to panic, or just to worry, and about the second bend, I am rewarded with some definitive proof that they really ARE learning, that they are picking up the basics and immersing themselves in interests that are nothing I would have chosen for them. That's the point, I think. That they make their own choices all of their lives, that they don't wait for someone to tell them-they go and make their own decisions. I just hope the biggest decision in their lives-the one I made for them-the decision to unschool-was a good one.
