Homeschool Curriculum for the 8th Grade Transition Year

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It’s hard to believe that in just one week, Ben will be starting his 8th grade year. Look at this little cutie on the first day of first grade:

To say that the time has flown is a massive understatement, but that’s a post for another day. Today, I want to share with you an idea of what homeschool will look like for Ben this year.

I consider this an important transition year. Next year, Ben will begin high school (someone, please pinch me), so it will be important that we work through any issues that might prove problematic for him in high school. To that end, I have a few goals set and while we will still have some delight-directedness to our homeschooling, it won’t be quite as loosey-goosey as in the past.

Bear in mind that we have had a mostly unschooling/delight-directed homeschool practically since we began homeschooling. This will be the first year in a very long time that we have chosen curriculum to use for the entire year. And it will be the first year I will insist Ben work through these resources mostly in the way they were written. While he had input into all of the choices, I do suspect this will be a challenging year for him for that reason. The structure of it all will be challenging for us both. But I know this is necessary in order to prepare him for high school.

I know that there are some who continue to unschool all the way through high school, but knowing Ben like I do, I don’t believe that’s the best choice for him. He will always have the freedom of delight-directed learning though. I don’t see ever completely taking that away.

Can I be honest and say I am feeling a bit overwhelmed, and maybe a little nervous? I’m just trying to take a deep breath, pray, and remember that the foundation we are setting for him now will serve him for the rest of his life.

That said, here we go . . .