I think I’ve mentioned before that I did a majority of my college courses online. I love the online learning format and I find that I learned the best that way.

I was really excited when my state announced plans to start a “virtual school.” They made it available to all students..homeschooled, public school, private school. And they had a certain number of seats which were available through money funded by the state. Meaning if you got one of those seats, you could attend for free. If they filled up all the seats, you had to pay tuition if you wanted to attend.

Unfortunately though, this year they are only offering K-5 and 9-12 (including a pretty kick ass AP program and even a Latin program.) However, when I went to read about it, I realized that there was an opportunity for Bug here. Just because the classes were ranked as “5th grade” doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t be appropriate for Bug, who technically should be attending sixth grade when she resumes schooling. (We are taking a short summer break.)

For instance, they are offering 5th grade Art. Bug and I studied some Art while she was homeschooled and when she was in public school she had art once a week. But she didn’t have a comprehensive Art class, or at least as comprehensive as I would have preferred, especially given her artistic talent.

So I went ahead and put Bug into the lottery in order to get a seat and I signed her up for 5th grade Art, Music, Technology Literacy, Spanish (she’s never taken Spanish..only Latin so far), and Math (she is behind in math.)

I just got word that all the kids who went into the initial lottery got a spot, so once Bug’s age and residency are verified, she will get to take all five of those classes online. The classes are available 24 hours a day, and like I said..they are free!

I’m really excited about that. I think Bug will enjoy it, and it will take a big load off of me in terms of lesson planning and having to purchase homeschooling materials. It will also help with the record keeping. Our state is pretty lax about homeschooling records..we don’t have to turn in anything or even tell anyone we are homeschooling, but we are supposed to keep records and have to produce them if they ask for them.

I will be teaching her History, Science, Latin, English and Literature. And whatever else we throw in. I’m thinking about doing a Charlotte Mason approach for those subjects because Bug is SO into reading and I think she would learn well that way instead of learning through doing workbooks or the like. I haven’t worked that out yet.

So good news for sixth grade Bug. Looking ahead, I would guess that Bug will not attend public school again, unless her behavior drastically changed. Our area has such a large homeschooling group, with a graduation ceremony and field trips and the like, that Bug will never hurt for socialization. She just can not flourish in a public school setting right now, and I’m not sure if she ever will be able to.

I’m not upset about it though, because I certainly would have attended a virtual school had it been an option when I was in high school.