eBay Prohibits Textbooks for Homeschool Teachers - A new policy by Internet trading behemoth eBay that bans homeschool teachers' texts from its auctions is prompting a tirade of complaints from the company's faithful customers.

Textercise Books are sold as a series of illustrated Master copies in paper format or in .pdf format which can be copied back to back then mid-stapled to make workbooks. When a purchaser buys a set of Textercise Book masters they can produce as many individual books as they wish. The books combine the formal qualities of a textbook with the more informal qualities of an exercise book to produce a “Textercise Book” with spaces provided for pupils to record their answers to the questions asked, to make comments and even to record points made during class discussion. Book topics include: Manners Bullying, Jobs and Career Information, Business and Science. They come in Standard and Simpler formats. Textercise is located in the UK, but ships internationally.
 

MI Home-Schooled Students Have Opportunity to Take Michigan Merit Examination, Obtain Free ACT Scores (PDF) - Home-schooled students in Michigan this coming spring will be able to take the Michigan Merit Exam, the state’s new high school assessment that includes the national ACT college entrance exam.

AZ 'Unschoolers' Can Learn - or Not - As most schoolchildren are sitting down for their morning classes, Taylor Gavin is just rolling out of bed. "Sometimes I get up at 8, sometimes not until 9 or 10. It just depends," the talkative 11-year-old says. The Gavins are "unschoolers," a small branch of home-schoolers with parents who reject the structured and authoritative nature of today's education system. Some call it "discovery learning" because of its laissez faire attitude.

The U.S. Department of Education's Gateway to Educational Materials (GEM) Web site allows educators to quickly search over 40,000 materials by school subject, grade level, activity type, target audience, stakeholder group, and price. You can look for third grade lesson plans on fractions and decimals, for example. To get started on your search, go to http://thegateway.org/.

GA Hybrid Schools Blend Teaching at Home and in Class - On Tuesdays and Thursdays, children file into the tiny classrooms at Victory Academy, where teachers lead lessons in math, reading and foreign languages. On Mondays and Wednesdays, however, those classrooms are empty. The school's 48 students are taught at home. [Login/registration required.]

AZ K-8 Web-based Learning a Slam-Dunk With Pupils - A devoted sports fan, teacher Mark Anderson wanted to find a way to bring the excitement of a big game into the classroom. While watching college football on TV one day, he found his answer.

Online Courses Help Boost Advanced Placement Results - More students are taking--and passing--Advanced Placement (AP) exams in every part of the country, as college-level work in high school becomes increasingly common, the College Board reported Jan. 25. Many state education officials attribute the gains in participation at least in part to online courses that expand the reach of advanced-level instruction.

SD Tighter Monitoring of Home-school Students Rejected - A move to tighten state control over the testing of home-schooled students was rejected by a South Dakota Senate committee Thursday after critics said the measure is not needed.

SD Lawmakers Want State to Monitor Home-school Tests - Two state lawmakers want to ensure that home-schooled children meet the same standards and take their tests under the same conditions as those in formal school settings.

Election Co-nection Project - The Election Co-nection Project is a free, online curriculum and interactive learning experience that focuses on the process that a candidate must follow to run for president of the U.S. and how citizens participate in the electoral process. The project has two main online activities. The first activity, Vote for President is open to all K-12 students. In this activity, students are able to vote, from October 18–22, for the presidential candidate they want to win the 2004 election. Includes teacher guide.
 

Rural Schools Turn to E-learning - Across the country, E-learning has changed from a technological curiosity to an integral part of rural public school education, offering more class options to students and even educating teachers. Forty-three percent of the nation's public schools-and nearly one third of the country's 48 million public school students-are in rural communities. Now, with the spread of advanced technology that aims to close the "digital divide" and make public education more equitable, groups of isolated schools in more than a dozen states--including Minnesota, North Carolina, and Oklahoma--can share qualified teachers in subjects like physics, advanced math, and foreign languages.

Featured Website: Read 180 - A comprehensive literacy program producing impressive reading gains for adolescents.

MEL: Michigan's Electronic Library - The Michigan eLibrary is an anywhere, anytime information gateway to selected Internet resources, full-text magazines, newspapers, electronic books online practice tests and more. The Library of Michigan has purchased more than $3.6 million in resources for Michigan with funding from the State of Michigan and a Library Services and Technology Act grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. You need a drivers license, state id or can log on to it at the local library without supplying this ID. It has access to practice test taking for ACT and SAT's, full text newspapers as well as books and magazines such as Exceptional Child. Nice if you are on a budget and restricted to home.

PA Does the State Have a Right to Monitor Home-schooling? - Home-schooling parents in Pennsylvania fight the state's required reports on their children's progress. At dispute is the age-old but not yet settled question of who owns the children, and who therefore should oversee their education--the parents, the state, or God?

Free Homeschooling Course from Barnes & Noble Online - In order to gain the most from this course, all you need to bring with you is a curious mind and an open heart. One of the most important decisions you'll ever make as a parent is choosing which of the growing number of educational options is best for your child. Can the increasingly popular homeschooling option provide your child with the rewarding, successful learning experience you're searching for? This course offers a rare opportunity to receive the information you need to tackle that decision making process. Next session begins on September 7, 2004.

Home-schooling Up 29 Percent Since 1999 - The estimated number of students taught at home has grown 29 percent since 1999, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. In surveys, parents offered two main reasons for choosing home-schooling: 31 percent cited concerns about the environment of regular schools, and 30 percent wanted the flexibility to teach religious or moral lessons. A distant third, at 16 percent, was dissatisfaction with academic instruction at schools.

Families Challenge Pennsylvania's Home Schooling Oversight - In cases being closely watched by home schooling advocates across the country, two families have filed lawsuits under the state Religious Freedom Protection Act challenging the Pennsylvania's home school reporting requirements. In Pennsylvania, about 25,000 students are home schooled. Nationally, the number has reached nearly 1 million and is rising, according to the U.S. Department of Education.

Education Arcade - MIT researchers are creating academically driven computer games that rival commercial products and make learning fun. It’s early afternoon on a Sunday at Boston’s Museum of Science. Brittle winter light floods the lower lobby of the Green Wing, where about a dozen young students are huddled in teams, peering at Pocket PCs, their parents listening nearby.

EDC Offers Teachers a Guide Through High School E-Science - "Hands-on" science is becoming "hands-on-the-computer" science. To support teachers in that role Education Development Center of Newton MA, with support from NEC Foundation of America and National Science Foundation, has produced a guide for teachers: "Selecting Computer-Based High School Science Curricula." The guide is for teachers trying to decide whether to use a particular curriculum that comes in digital form. The guide questions them about the e-curriculum they are considering: what learning is likely to occur, the teaching requirements, the equity of access and benefit, and the dollars-and-cents feasibility. The tool tells them why they should ask those questions. It gives them sample answers written by teachers who use the tool. It also profiles 14 e-curricula available to classrooms electronically.
 

TX Brothers Complete High School Early, Graduate Together - Two overachieving brothers were among the Azle High School seniors graduating Friday night at the Fort Worth Convention Center. Robert Gobel, 17, graduated in his third year of high school, and Wayne Gobel, 15, graduated in his second. In addition to both brothers dealing with dyslexia and ADHD, Westin said that dysgraphia, an inability to write correctly, plagued Wayne. Cherie Gobel said that her sons did not do well in public school until after she home-schooled them for 2 1/2 years. Then, she said, they took off.

Homeschooled Adults Are Better Citizens - "Politics and government are too complicated to understand." Amazingly, more than *one out of three* adult Americans who were educated in government schools answered "Yes" to that question on a recent survey. However, only 4% of adults who had been homeschooled answered "Yes."

TX Co-op Classes Part of New Trend in Homeschooling - At a recent graduation ceremony, the students wore royal-blue caps and robes with gold tassels dangling near their faces. Personalized music and a video accompanied every graduate as they walked on stage to receive a diploma. It looked like a scene from dozens of high school graduation ceremonies around Houston in recent weeks.

MI Homeschooled Athletes Gain Exposure - Russell Monroe's home court was a dusty patch of dirt driveway until a few years ago, when a cement slab was added to go along with the backboard that once served as a counter top. This is the last place you'd expect to find a Division I college basketball player. Add that Monroe is a homeschooler - one of perhaps 1,000 who play organized sports in this state - and his story becomes even more implausible.

MI Governor Granholm Announces Launch of Michigan’s First Statewide Online Summer School - Governor Granholm today announced the launch of Michigan Virtual Summer School, a program developed by Michigan Virtual High School (MVHS) to offer the state’s high school students a more flexible option for participating in summer school courses. The new online summer program gives Michigan’s high schools the opportunity to expand current traditional summer school offerings to more fully address students’ remedial and enrichment needs.

Rice University Launches Knowledge-sharing Website - After four years in development, Connexions officially launched its portal at Rice University at http://cnx.rice.edu/. Unlike MIT's OpenCourseWare and other initiatives by universities to make their own course material freely available online, Connexions offers a single place online where any educator in the world can both post and use knowledge for free.

Best and Worst States for Homeschoolers - Considering homeschooling? You might want to relocate to Alaska, Michigan, Idaho, Texas or Oklahoma. These states, according to the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) have legal environments relatively friendly to  homeschooling. Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, New York, North Dakota and Pennsylvania, on the other hand, impose some of the most restrictive laws on homeschooling families, according to the HSLDA.
 

MI Home Schoolers Do Not Have Right to Play on HS Teams: MI Court of Appeals - Home schooled students do not have a right to play for sports teams of schools in the districts in which they live, a unanimous panel of the Court of Appeals has ruled, rejecting arguments that the policies by schools and a state athletic association violate equal protection and religious freedom rights of the students.

Twenty-Five Activities to Keep Kids' Brains Active in the Hot Summer Sun

Guide to E-Learning 2003 - US News & World Report's guide includes a searchable directory of distance learning courses, certificates, and degrees, as well as articles on current trends in online education.

Teaching Method Lets Little Fingers Master Handwriting - Children in the Colonial School District this year joined hundreds of thousands of students across the country who are learning a way to write that could help them earn better test grades. The program, Handwriting Without Tears, is earning a small but loyal following here. Proponents say it offers a fun approach to writing that taps into the senses with teaching tools such as sponges and wooden shapes to give students an easy grasp of technique and style.

The Michigan Department of Education keeps basic home school counts, but home schools are not required to report to MDE.

• General Home Schools Information page at MDE

• Statistics on home schoolers: 2002-03: 1,738 students

• Home School Exemption rules: The home school family is not required to report to MDE. There are however, forms that non-public and home school families complete and register with MDE. That is how MDE gets its numbers for the count of homeschool students. However, the actual numbers of students/schools could be higher than reported. Data is also available by county.

Concordia Language Villages - A program of Concordia College, Moorhead, Minnesota.  Language immersion experiences for students ages 7-18. 14 different language villages are available. Campers live, eat, learn etc. in a setting that simulates a foreign country. One week and two-week sessions are offered as well as one-month high school and college credit sessions. Credit abroad programs are available. Call 1-800-222-4750.

The Internet: A Free, Public Education? - There's a lot you can learn free on the Internet–if you know where to look. [Source]

Teachers: How to Start a Lesson Plan - What do you do if a district does not have a curriculum guide for your grade level or subject? How do you write a lesson plan? What are the steps in creating a good assignment? [source]
 

FL Home Schooling an Increasingly Popular Alternative for S. Florida Families - These students know their teachers extremely well. They're never late for school. Have no need for cell phones. And, as the very practical 11-year-old Danielle Howard of Delray Beach puts it, "You get out really early, there's no head lice and no school bullies." Unless mischievous siblings count. [source]

MI Watkins Unveils Summer Learning Program - Before a rapt audience of 6, 7 and 8-year-olds, Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Watkins unveiled a new program that could have them doing school work throughout the summer.  Read the MDE Press Release - click here.

Understanding University Success contains the results of a two-year study to determine the knowledge and skills necessary for university success. The 80-page booklet addresses each discipline (English, mathematics, natural sciences, social sciences, second languages and the arts) in a separate chapter that describes the skills, behaviors and attitudes expected of incoming students and lists the content knowledge that helps maximize the probability of success in entry-level university courses.

IL Educational Hip-hop makes learning a rap - When grades plunged at Woodson School on Chicago's south side, administrators grew concerned. Something needed to be done to get the kids interested in learning and maintaining information. That's when the principal met a Columbia College professor who taught her about educational hip hop.

Prepare for Your Career: Participate in an International Exchange Now by Studying Abroad

MI Policy Center Calls for Michigan Home Schoolers to Report - The Michigan Department of Education says there are some 2,500 students being home schooled in the state, but a report released Tuesday by the Education Policy Center at Michigan State University said that number could actually top 100,000. And the authors of the study argued those parents should be required to report to ensure those students are receiving an adequate education.

Ten Myths of Reading Instruction - Learning to read is about as natural as learning to juggle blindfolded while riding a unicycle backwards. In this article, Sebastian Wren details ten common myths of reading instruction.

Education's virtual transformation - Welcome to the new face of public education. Called virtual or cyber charter schools, the programs combine public education, home schooling, virtual education and big business.

Tough Decisions: What if you want to put your kids in school? - Making the decision to homeschool is usually very difficult and requires a well thought out decision.

The way to go for many families: Home schooling - It may not seem like a school setting without the host of classmates and instructors, but for Lee and her family - and dozens of other families in Emmet and Charlevoix counties - home schooling has been the perfect way to educate children with more control and flexibility.
 

OH Akron district's digital school part of growing trend in nation - Maria Harris pulled her three children out of an Akron middle school because she was dissatisfied. But she ultimately decided to stay with Akron.

CA Home-schooling illegal in California? - State tells parents they can't teach their own kids without credentials.

MIRS 7/31/02 - Cyber' Schools — Only A Matter Of Time?

MIRS 8/5/02 - Engler Highlights E-Gov Effort w/Online Curriculum Support for Teachers

Read the article from the series Home Schooling the Student Who Has Special Needs: "How can a parent be an effective teacher?"