Lisa-online school, questions?

[jbrain]

Hi Lisa,
could you tell me a little about the on line school? I have thought about it as a solution for my difficult child 2 who will be going into 11th grade. She is on home tutoring right now because her emotional issues get in the way of her being able to concentrate at school. The school is approving a correspondence class she can take to make up English 10 so if that works out well maybe other on line courses would too.

Thanks for your help,
Jane

 

[flutterbee]

I can answer this, too, as we've used the online school - in the past (and probably next year) for difficult child and easy child is doing it this year. It's a charter school. IOW, it's a public school that is internet based. The kids have teachers and can correspond via email or the phone. Assignments are turned in via email - either as a Word or Excel file, or via scanner. I believe Lisa's kids and mine use the same online school. Since it is a public school, all state education curriculum is followed and achievement tests are mandated. For this particular school, you have to be a resident of the state of Ohio. You may check with your State Board of Education on their charter schools.

It's important that your daughter is responsible enough to do her work timely as she's not going to have a teacher standing over her like in a classroom. It requires a bit more motivation in that regard. But, what's nice is that the assignments are usually posted for the whole quarter - sometimes for the entire semester - so the kids can work ahead. The online school is officially out June 14 (I think), but easy child will be done by the end of next week.

For this particular school, I've been extremely happy with the level of commitment from the teachers. They have the same number of students - or more - than in a traditional classroom, but since they're not all in front of the teacher at the same time, the teacher has more time for individual instruction as needed by the child. Also, a lot of kids that attend this school do so because they cannot function in a traditional school environment, so the teachers are familiar with working with the un-typical kid.

I'm sure Lisa will pipe in with her opinion on the school, too. I've been more than happy with it.

 

[jbrain]

Oh, I don't think we have any on line schools in our state. I am aware that there are some private on line schools but some of them are really expensive. Molly's guidance counselor gave me info for the English class she can take--it would be from a university.
Thanks,
Jane

 

[Steely]

Just FYI there are also a lot of online schools that are only online, and not affliated with an actual physical school. I did research via a google search, and found one that is great. When they graduate they still get an actual diploma, and can actually go onto college via online if they choose.

 

[Martie]

Hi,

Ex-difficult child did two courses at Keystone National High School which is a full high school program (including driver's ed !?!) that is on-line or by mail and is private.

Ex-difficult child occupied himself between the end of EGBS and the start of the next term. The good news about Keystone is that it is accredited and ex-difficult child's courses transfered to two subsequent high schools with no hassles. The bad news is, unlike some public programs, it is not free.

I strongly agree that the student has to be a self-starter. It would not have been a good way for ex-difficult child to complete 5 semesters of high school that he had left after EGBS. However, in contrast, easy child had a friend with serious school avoidance issues who finished on-line a year a head of her class. I do not think it is the same (no discussions, interaction, etc) but this particular student wouldn't have participated had she been in class, so it didn't matter. She was a bit Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and a self-starter by the way.

Good luck,

Martie

 

[jbrain]

HI,
thanks for the info, Martie! I took a quick look at Keystone and I think it would be affordable. I am looking at this as sort of a last option. Molly hates high school though she likes seeing her friends. She really would like to go to a very small private high school that one of her friends attends but the tuition is $10,000 per yr (though they do one yr in one semester). We can't afford that after paying for Emily's Residential Treatment Center (RTC).


She is on a waiting list at her high school for a day program called the Turning Point, a program for kids with emotional problems. Right now she is receiving home tutoring since her emotional problems make it difficult for her to go to school and concentrate while she's there. She has a great tutor and we are hoping she is going to get credits for most of her classes despite getting D's and F's the first 3 quarters.


I guess the hope is that by Fall she will be able to attend regular school but I would like to have other options for her if that isn't possible. She can be a self-starter, she used to be an excellent student. Her teachers all agree that she is very smart, capable of the work. I guess we will see how this English correspondence course goes this summer. That should give me an idea of how able she is to do on line school.

I sure appreciate everyone replying to me--what a great group you are!
Jane

 

[flutterbee]

One other thing - and you may look into this with Keystone - with our online school, the kids can take some courses at a local community college that count as both high school credit and college credit. They have to maintain a certain grade point average in order to do this. However, our online school pays for those classes.

 

[Kathy813]

I am very familiar with Keystone's Algebra 1 class as I am currently tutoring a student who takes it online.

While I am very impressed with the course layout and materials, the student that I am working with simply can't learn the material by reading through the tutorials or textbook. I have had to teach her the skills and then she works the assigned textbook problems and takes the online quizzes and exams.

I personally think that high school level math is very hard to learn online ~ especially if you have weak math skills. I could see other courses like history or social studies being much easier to take online.

The state of Georgia also has online courses offered by the state's virtual high school and the school district that I teach in has it's own online courses. None of it is free, however, like in daisylover's state. I have been very impressed with what Lisa says Ohio offers as free online coursework. I think that she said that they even provide the computer and browser connection (correct me if I don't remember that correctly, Lisa).

I wrote a paper on this topic for a course that I was taking and found a lot of options by googling the subject.

It does take self-motivation to be a successful online student.

~Kathy

 

[DDD]

I have used Keystone with success. There are alot of other choices too. University of Florida has some correspondence courses. I also used University of North Dakota. There is a
wealth of "distance learning" choices AND they also have AP
courses which are often used to help compete for high honors.
It is not just for difficult children any more. DDD

 

[Hound dog]

Jane

We found out about Ecot thru a lady who ran Hawaii's version of it. If New York has an online public school program you ought to be able to contact your state board of education and they will be able to tell you about it. According to this family friend many states have a similar program although they may go by different names.

N received all of her homework via email and was taught via pages on Ecot's site. She could email teachers questions or even call them at home. ECOT supplied the computer, printer, and internet service. All of N's teachers have been amazing and she's thrived in this type of school environment. (teachers bend over backward for the kids)

I never thought I'd be a homeschooling parent. Nor would anyone have convinced me N would be a prime candidate for this type of school. But without it, it would have been difficult at best for N to have graduated high school. Her graduation is June 2nd. :smile: The program is free as it's a public school.

 

[WNC Gal]

Another great supplement to online education would be a subscription to Discovery Video at: http://www.unitedstreaming.com/
It costs $150 year (some states pay for this for homeschoolers). It has a plethora of fascinating videos on all educational subjects including robust foreign language video courses lectures on math.

For my 14 year old daughter we also supplemented her curriculum with: http://www.brainpop.com
http://www.time4learning.com/ (preK-middle school)
http://www.etap.org/ (K-12)
http://www.vhomeschool.net/mambo/

You can see her home page at: http://www.ashworthacademy.com

I agree that some subjects may be to challenging for kids to tackle "on their own" - we also utilized on-line tutoring from Sylvan in which the child has hour long lessons while speaking on the phone to a teacher and utilizing a digital writing pad. AND hired a middle school teacher to coach her on algebra after school.

 

[WhymeMom?]

Great resources! Thanks for posting....