Homeschooling info for Brittany

I decided to just go ahead and do it on here because I was reading stuff on here.

When my mom put me in public school I was excited because I wanted to go. So may just homeschool her until she expresses the want to go to school. If you feel you can't homeschool her past a certain point then putting her in school may scare her if she's not ready, but it won't hurt her.
One thing I will tell you is that I was in gymnastics, soft ball, church groups, soccer, co-ops, one day a week classes, dance classes, pretty much anything you can think of all throughout the time I was being homeschooled, so you would think I had plenty of social skills.. But no. I didn't. I'm not sure if it was being under my mom's wing or what, but when I got in high school I had no clue about how to approach someone and talk to them. I waited for people to approach me and ended up with friends like Pristine and Kevin. It took me two years to shake the reputation I got from hanging out with them.
So if you are going to homeschool her you are going to have to refrain from sheltering her, and that is going to be hard to do if she is pretty much with you 24/7 and basically learning everything from you.
Also, one of two things has to be done.. If you want to let her join sports teams and church groups outside of homeschooling you are going to have to be prepared for her to want to go to school because she is going to talk to peope who do and probably want to experience the things they do. On the other hand, you can keep her out of those things, but then you are going to have to be prepared for her to have no social skills outside of those that she learns from the other homeschool kids (which usually aren't very advanced).

I honestly reccomend allowing her to go to high school. I do not think I woul be thriving in college right now if I had not gone to high school. I needed those social skills and knowledge of how to talk to teachers and how to participate in class. So many of my classes base grades on in-class participation.. It also took me two years of high school to get to a point where I felt comfortable talking in class or asking questions. She is always going to be comfortable asking you questions, but if she doesn't get that skill somewhere else it is going to be a hard transition for her.

I can tell you that Catoosa County School Systems are some of the most sought after schools in the area. People move from hours away to have their children in the school system, and I can also tell you from interning at the primary school that it is not just testing there. They still have recess, they can still talk at lunch, they still take a couple of days off for field days, they still have games and fun things for learning, arts and crafts, and things like that. So while some schools may be going off the deep end, Sami would not be at one of those.
I am not trying to convince you one way or the other. I think that homeschooling during elementary and even middle school is fine, I even loved it when I was in my elementary years, but I really feel that children should go to a public (or private) high school. It is also easier to get into colleges with a public school diploma vs. a home school diploma. Sami could be valedictorian in a public high school, but places like Harvard or Yale would never consider her if she was homeschooled because they know that if a child is homeschooled the parents can make the grades look any way they want. Not saying you would do that.. just saying that's how they look at it.

Hope this helps. If you have any other questions or something I said was confusing just ask :)