home schooling while doing the BIG TRIP

Well gooday fellow traveller,
My wife (and myself to a lessor degree) are also going to do the same thing only we already are home schooling so that makes it a bit easier. You dont say if you are already home schooling? We are leaving the Brisbane area about mid December and going to see the turtles nesting at bundaberg late Jan early Feb and who knows from there. My wife is away until Monday and she will be able to let you know any thing you need to know. Hope to catch you on the road sometime.

............Bob

Good for you troopy4us. It will be one of the best educations you can give them. It will open their minds to a lot of things. You obviously have the guides to keep you on track for what schools require. The other major suggestions are reading, writing and maths (surprise surprise). READING: download articles related to the next area you are stopping and add a fictional book to give it some flavour. POETRY: Its not all that dull. Years ago we picked up an anthology in Adelaide called "Down the Track". It has great contemporary poems about Australia (eg America's Cup) and some bush classics like "McArthur's Fart". My 9 year old can recite McArthur - all 32 verses. They can write their own poems and bush stories modeled on the books and poems they read. Maths can be calculating fuel consumption and distances etc. Travelling is a chance to put learning into a context. My older brother had his kids keep a weekly diary and photo journal tracking where they had been and how they felt etc and now they have a detailed record of the trip. But hey, that doesn't mean you can't write as well. A dinner of beans will give the kids some stimulus to write a poem to rival McArthur.

Happy travels
Black Jack

HI Troopy4us,
as i said in my earlier post my wife can give you all the info you need but wont be back till monday. she is excited to be able to help you in any way with suggestions. we home school through A.C.E. dont worry about not keeping up as the kids basically teach themselves and work at their own pace. if you like you can send me your e.mail address and wifey can get in touch when she is back. my address is rlhal@hotmail.com waiting to here from you. we are in laidley so might see you on our way north too.
....Bob

I am a school teacher!!

The best eductaion you can give your kids is to be out and about with them, they will come back with so many real life experiences and have a wonderful time.

Don't stress to much about 'being organised' get the kids involved in the actual operations of being away. There is heaps of 'work' that you can do in a normal day, looking at maps, for example, can lead to heaps of things.

you may notice a landmark on a map, it could then be decided that the next town that you stop for a while in, the kids could visit the local library and find out a litle about the person who named it!!!

The kids can help work out mileage, the kids could prepare route cards for a days travels, the kids can help with the shopping.......

If you make it a chore, the kids will hate it, if you make it part of the trip, the kids won't even realise that you are trying to 'teach' them.

...and I'm glad that they love their school, imagine the stories that they will return with!

Can't speak from personal experience but know several families who have done home schooling. Common thing they all say is that the kids have been well on track and in some cases in front, when they eventually returned to school. It seems the exposure to a larger "schoolroom" and meeting new and interesting people on a regular basis does wonders for their confidence. Also, being away from a more structured environment and the usual influences such as TV, peer groups etc leads to better creativity as they think more for themselves and have to make their own fun.

Have friends on the road now since Apr'03 with 2 daughters about the same age as your kids. So far their experience has been great once they and the girls got over the initial sense of freedom (from work, school etc) and realised that they weren't on a permanent holiday...school work still had to be done even though the latest destination and adventures were beckoning. It was all a matter of establishing a routine (as far as possible). When staying put in one place they have school days and set goals. Once completed, the rest of the day is theirs. When on the road, they encourage the girls to do their reading as they travel and assign "homework" which takes max. 1 hour and is completed after dinner. With the incentive of "free time" for swimming, exploring etc once the school work is done, our freinds reckon the kids get through their work very quickly LOL.

:o) Meliss

Hi Troopy, we are planning to take the BIG trip next year. Heading off for a year with our 4 boys (ages 7,9,9,10).

I talked to our School Principal and he is chasing up the info from the distance education school here in Vic. Each state has something like it aparently and I have seen an online school too( I think it was NSW based). From what he has found, we'd still be enrolled in our school (we plan on leaving late June) and "subbed" out to the distance ed school. The distance ed school will set classwork every two weeks. They will send them to any address in Victoria (our school has happily said that they are willing to be the "Send On" point) and then we'd send the work back every two weeks. We were told it'd work out to be an hour or two's worth of work a day.

Good luck with your trip :-)
Kristen