Teacher Student Conferences {Our} Homeschool Style

I remember Parent Teacher Conferences when I was in school, and when my own kids were in public school. It was an opportunity to get either days off of school or get out of school early for a few days. Oh! and of course to hear the progress of the students. Yes... It must have been a lot of work for the teachers! Each of my classes usually had at least 30 students {that's why it took days to cover everyone}. Homeschooling only two can be really easy {sometimes}. There are only two 'stacks' of assignments to look at and assess. And there is only one set of parents to confer with {heehee}.

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Back in June I planned a lot for the year. The most in depth was for the first term, 12-weeks. I knew I would have to revise terms 2 and 3 if I did more than just tentatively plan. I used Evernote this year, along with print-outs of the schedules in hopes to keep myself more organized. {You can click the image and see it larger, if you'd like. This is for Lee but Fox's looks just about the same.}

So this is how our conferences went. We had one-on-one time. Lee was first with her print-out and me with my Evernote on the Fire. We discovered that we'd 'forgotten' to schedule Ourselves into the weekly readings. And we also discussed the books and scheduling for her Editing studies. I'm not entirely sure how out-of-date the The Copyeditor's Handbook*  is at this point, but I still think it will be useful. The same with The Elements of Editing by Arthur Plotnik*. I think that I will also add in Woe is I by Patricia T. O'Connor*, but it will be a more 'at your own pace' book. 

With Fox, we'd forgotten to 'find' the book Rural Hours by Susan Fenimore Cooper for natural science/nature study. I had it on the computer somewhere before I cleaned it and thought I saved all important files. That one was apparently a fatality and didn't make it. When I went searching for it for the Kindle, the only ones I found were terribly formatted. Finally I downloaded it as a pdf and put it on the Kindle Fire. Also we've missed working on Francis Bacon essays. I'll admit and tell you that I think this has been mostly my 'forgetting'. I tried to work with Lee through the essays when she was in 9th grade and we quit. I am almost dreading them now with Fox. The final thing we had to make a spot for was Fierce Wars and Faithful Loves by Roy Maynard* {that's the Kindle version and it is beautifully formatted even though it might be noted otherwise in the reviews and on AO's site- trust me}.  Both the essays and Maynard's book I am going to have to get Spark Notes or something. I don't want to short change Fox by my inability to understand what I want him to understand. 

With both of the kids, they had their planner {Lee has an actual planner, Fox writes things down on lined paper for now; his planner* is on its way!} with completed subjects/assignments. We went through and matched up the weekly assignments as planned to see where we are in reality. For both, they are fairly caught up but for what I mentioned above.

And just a side note: We use Well Planned Day planners. We've used the yearly student*, the family homeschool*, and the 4-year high school planner* {Lee's high school years}. Right now, the older 4-year high school planners are on sale. The 2010-2014 planner is only $7.98! Even if you only use it for one year- that's quite inexpensive for a planner like this. Or until Saturday, Sept. 7, HEDUA is having a sale- 30% off family planners*. Use coupon: wpd30

And yes, those are affiliate links but I really like WPD planners. Really like them. 

School has been going along well, even with a few glitches and hitches. My next step is to start making their Term 1 Exams. Ambleside Online has both Y8 and Y10 exams online, with keys, but I will have to come up with some of my own material since we are not using everything from AO. Almost everything.

I guess I know what I will be doing for the next few weeks. I think I am looking forward to it as much as I am dreading it lol.