We’ve been talking with Vickie Smith, author of The Quiet Doll Queen and president of Ark Essentials Publishing, about her decision first to homeschool, and then to send her children back to public school. You can read part one here and part two here.
Vickie, you mentioned that most of your children did very well acclimatizing back into a public school routine, but two of them did have some difficulty. Can you tell us about that?
My fourth daughter started in public school- my first daughter to attend public kindergarten. She did well in kindergarten but struggled severely socially in 1st grade to the point of scratching her head until it was covered with huge gaping scabs in various stages of healing. I was tempted to pull her out but worked with her teacher and to make a long story short she was fine before the end of her first grade year.
So, in this case, the child wasn’t adjusting to public school vs. homeschool, but was instead struggling for other reasons. This is a good clarification to make – sometimes a child is struggling for another reason altogether, and we may be focusing on a solution other than what they truly need.
What about your other child, Vickie?
He has had issues. I have on occasion pulled him out and homeschooled him for periods of time. Let’s just say he has been in the principal’s office more than all of our other children combined, and that was just in the first year in kindergarten. He is now in second grade, and this year has been completely different. To make another long story short, he takes a B vitamin suppliment call Inositol and he can’t have sugary foods during the week, not even syrup on pancakes- he uses applesauce, and we have a new principal. He is now emotionally ready for school and has just the right teacher. I could’ve kept him home, but with me working at home and with his personality, I don’t think it would’ve been much different until we figured out the things we needed to figure out about him.
So this child’s sensitivity turned out to be physical, rather than emotional. Some children definitely do react badly to sugar, and Inositol is awesome stuff. We’ve used it over here from time to time – it’s a great mood balancer and can be found in nearly any health food store.
Vickie, thank you for joining us today and sharing your thoughts about homeschool and public school. We appreciate your time.
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