Homeschooling - the studies just keep getting better and better!

Homeschooling Statistics: from this link

2003--1,096,000 estimated homeschool children K-12, a 29% increase from 1999 which showed
850,000 students (general population increased only 1%) (NCES)

2007-2008--2.0 to 2.5 million homeschooled students K-12 (NHERI)

Home education grows about 5-12% per year (NHERI)

Most important reasons for homeschooling: (NCES) 31% environment of other schools 30% religious/moral 16% dissatisfaction with academic instruction at other schools

Rate of families who homeschool: (NCES)
White 2.7%Black1.3%Hispanic .7%
Rates are higher in families with three or more children in two parent households with only one parent in the labor force. (NCES)

HS families who used sources from the following: public library 78%hs catalog, published or individual specialist 77%retail bookstore or other store 69%non-homeschooling education publisher 60%distance media 41%(NCES)

Average income of the homeschooling family is $52,000. (HSLDA)

Cost to homeschool varies. In 1996, a national survey found one could homeschool for $546. Michal Farris, chairman and general counsel of HSLDA, states that his family home educates for approximately $200 per year for curriculum materials. (HSLDA)

"No meaningful difference was found among home school students when classified by gender. Significantly, there was also no difference found according to whether or not a parent was certified to teach." (SADC)

Children who are homeschooled "... may be more socially mature and have better leadership skills than other children ..." - Richard G. Medlin, Ph.D. (NHERI)

Recent studies demonstrate that 98% of home taught children are involved in two or more social/community beyond the home each week, including such things as 4-H, Bible Clubs, Scouts, Ballet Classes, Music Lessons, Sports, Field Trips and Sunday School. (Answers)

The Galloway-Sutton Study, which examines five success indicators, showed home schooled children (with the exception of the psychomotor) excelling above other students in the academic, cognitive, spiritual and affective-social categories. (Answers)

ACT: (2002 and 2003) homeschool average was 22.5, national average was 20.8.SAT ( 2002) homeschool average was 1092, national average, 1020. (HSLDA)

On average, homeschool students, grades 1–4, perform one grade level above their public and private school counterparts. The achievement gap grows in grade 5; by 8th grade the average home school student performs four grades higher than the national average. (SADC)

Students who have been home schooled their entire academic lives have the highest scholastic achievement. The difference is more pronounced during the higher grades; students who home school throughout high school continue to flourish while in that environment. (SADC)

Kate Grossman, Chicago Sun-Times reported noted, "The number of homeschoolers receiving National Merit Scholarships has increased more than 500 percent: from 21 in 1995 to 129 in 2003." (HSLDA)

Dr. Michael Donahue, Director of Admissions for Indiana University - Purdue University, has spent the last several years researching home-schooled students.
"The home school group has about a 3.0 GPA their freshman year," Donahue said. "In the entire freshman class, the GPA is between a 2.3 and a 2.4. They are well prepared. They're self starters. Faculty, in general, enjoy having them in class because they know how to do things independently." (Answers)

More than 74% of home schooled adults 18-24 years-old have taken college classes as opposed to 46% of the general population. (HSLDA)

Dr. Gary Knowles, the University of Michigan, studied home educated adults.
"None were unemployed and none were on welfare, 94% said home education prepared them to be independent persons, 79% said it helped them interact with individuals from different levels of society, and they strongly supported the home education method." (NHERI)

Homeschooling statistics show 71% of home taught adults participate in at least one on-going community service/37% of similar general population. (HSLDA)
95% said they were glad they were home educated. 82% planned to home school their children. (HSLDA)

Homeschooling statistics, however useful, are but a shadow of true homeschooling. The full story is apparent only in the committed families who have lovingly chosen to educated their children at home.

The wicked snares of the devil

The Saint Michael Prayer used to be said after every Mass, by the whole church. In the Traditional Latin Mass, it still is.

Do we need "protection from wickedness" MORE or LESS now? After Mass, for that 15 minutes that Christ is never closer is a time for prayer! (<--link)

On Sunday April 24th 1994, Pope John Paul II recommended this prayer be used by all Catholics as a prayer for the Church when he said:

'"May prayer strengthen us for the spiritual battle we are told about in the Letter to the Ephesians: 'Draw strength from the Lord and from His mighty power' (Ephesians 6:10). The Book of Revelation refers to this same battle, recalling before our eyes the image of St. Michael the Archangel (Revelation 12:7). Pope Leo XIII certainly had a very vivid recollection of this scene when, at the end of the last century, he introduced a special prayer to St. Michael throughout the Church. Although this prayer is no longer recited at the end of Mass, I ask everyone not to forget it and to recite it to obtain help in the battle against forces of darkness and against the spirit of this world."'

Person of the week

God Bless Burt Brady and God Bless our soldiers!

Watch this link.

Natural History Museum

Like a Night at The Museum, it all came alive to us...animals, mummies, dinosaurs!

The man on the street

What are your thoughts? Bail Out or Guillotine?

Montessori sorting

Our youngest had a lot of fun this week sorting.

This 4 year old was less distracting to her brothers, the older students, as she happily practiced necessary skills under the guise of fun! :)

Sometimes she sorted by color.Sometimes she sorted by shapes.

Each time she went from left to right (pre-reading skills) and "tonged" (pre-writing skills)to strengthen small motor skills.

I was a Montessori kid, and loved it!

I'd really love to see your pre-school ideas. :)

A spectacular saint on behavior at Mass

What a gift the Latin Mass has been to us!

We began attending three years ago and fell head over heels for it. Such peace, a marked difference in the quietness and reverence. We have made strong friendships with these like-minded Catholics who honor the history of the church in the Extraordinary form of Mass. After Mass each Sunday we could talk together for hours.

This morning, I found a blog that I will look forward to following, Give Him Your Heart. There I read the following letter from Padre Pio, whose feast day was celebrated this week. He is a saint with a strong connection to our family as we have read a lot about him, venerated his bloody glove and then he "chose" our family more than once as our saint for the year.

Here's part of it...

"EXTRAORDINARY LETTER FROM ST. PADRE PIO DESCRIBED PROPER WAY OF SAYING THE MASS

In order to avoid irreverence and imperfections in the house of God, in church -- which the Divine Master calls the "house of prayer" -- I exhort you in the Lord to practice the following:

Enter the church in silence and with great respect, considering yourself unworthy to appear before the Lord's Majesty. Among other pious considerations, remember that our soul is the temple of God and, as such, we must keep it pure and spotless before God and his angels.
Let us blush for having given access to the devil and his snares many times (with his enticements to the world, his pomp, his calling to the flesh) by not being able to keep our hearts pure and our bodies chaste; for having allowed our enemies to insinuate themselves into our hearts, thus desecrating the temple of God which we became through holy Baptism.

Then take Holy Water and make the Sign of the Cross carefully and slowly. As soon as you are before God in the Blessed Sacrament, devoutly genuflect. Once you have found your place, kneel down and render the tribute of your presence and devotion to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. Confide all your needs to Him along with those of others. Speak to Him with filial abandonment, give free rein to your heart, and give Him complete freedom to work in you as He thinks best.

When assisting at Holy Mass and the sacred functions, be very composed when standing up, kneeling down, and sitting, and carry out every religious act with the greatest devotion. Be modest in your glances; don't turn your head here and there to see who enters and leaves. Don't laugh, out of reverence for this holy place and also out of respect for those who are near you. Try not to speak to anybody, except when charity or strict necessity requests this.

If you pray with others, say the words of the prayer distinctly, observe the pauses well, and never hurry.

In short, behave in such a way that all present are edified by it and, through you, are urged to glorify and love the heavenly Father.

On leaving the church, you should be recollected and calm. Firstly take your leave of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament; ask his forgiveness for the shortcomings committed in his Divine presence and do not leave him without asking for and having received his paternal blessing.

Once you are outside the church, be as every follower of the Nazarene should be. Above all, be extremely modest in everything, as this is the virtue which, more than any other, reveals the affections of the heart. Nothing represents an object more faithfully or clearly than a mirror. In the same way, nothing more widely represents the good or bad qualities of a soul than the greater or lesser regulation of the exterior, as when one appears more or less modest. You must be modest in speech, modest in laughter, modest in your bearing, modest in walking. All this must be practiced, not out of vanity in order to display one's self, nor out of hypocrisy in order to appear to be good to the eyes of others, but rather, for the internal virtue of modesty, which regulates the external workings of the body.

Therefore, be humble of heart, circumspect in words, prudent in your resolutions. Always be sparing in your speech, assiduous in good reading, attentive in your work, modest in your conversation. Don't be disgusting to anybody but be benevolent towards all and respectful towards your elders. May any sinister glance be far from you, may no daring word escape your lips, may you never carry out any immodest or somewhat free action; never a rather free action or a petulant tone of voice. In short let your whole exterior be a vivid image of the composure of your soul.

Always keep the modesty of the Divine Master before your eyes, as an example; this Master who, according to the words of the Apostle to the Corinthians, placing the modesty of Jesus Christ on an equal footing with meekness, which was his one particular virtue and almost his characteristic: "Now I Paul myself beseech you, by the mildness and modesty of Christ" [Douay-Rheims, 2 Corinthians 10:1], and according to such a perfect model reform all your external operations, which should be faithful reflections revealing the affections of your interior.

Never forget this Divine model. Try to see a certain lovable majesty in His Presence, a certain pleasant authority in his manner of speaking, a certain pleasant dignity in walking, in contemplating, speaking, conversing; a certain sweet serenity of face."

Challenging words to ponder, to aspire to! Padre Pio only said the Traditional Latin Mass.

group hug

One of the beauties of homeschooling....

When your just turned 4 year old decides she wants to write her full name a couple of times and her big brothers all explode the room with yeahs and surround her and mother/teacher in group hugs that turn into a cave of close, giggling faces.

That's an image I'm printing in the memory bank!

Where did the $ sign symbol come from?

This, a question from my 11 year old son.

Here's some more theories.

No thanks, I already have a Messiah.

This is not the sun rising.

The sun is not white.

This is the moon.

A crescent moon? Like the ones atop every mosque?

A trip to the farm

We had an incredible day on a nearby farm. We rode peddle cars, pet and fed farm animals, launched corn cobs and fired sling shots, and bounced and played in hay tunnels and corn mazes all with 8 of our homeschooling families. What a field trip to start the year!

All her works...and all her empty promises....

I hope Father Euteneuer doesn't mind my making him a "guest blogger" so often. You see, I've seen him speak and he is as electric in person as he is in writing!

God bless him for his fearless honesty, he has The Truth behind him and Lord have mercy on the false idols, who would make us their merchandise.

"Oprah and All Her Works and All Her Empty Promises
Of late I am increasingly frightened by something I see happening in our culture: it is the seeming superficial-ization of everything in American life to the point of absurdity and deception. The prime culprit of course is the ubiquitous mass media (especially 24-hour cable programming and the internet) and its constant dumbing down of the American consciousness to the lowest common denominator of the most tantalizing sound bites and images. The other bad boy is the interminable chatter/commentary by clever cultural sharpshooters: it's so bad sometimes that it makes me wonder if we can actually pull ourselves out of our co-dependence upon charlatans. What makes my priest's heart so heavy is that I think our society is going down the path of deep spiritual degradation, and it doesn't look like this trend will be ending any time soon. Certainly not in an election season.

Case in point: Oprah. Our country's richest woman is easily one of the most spiritually bankrupt people in America and also one of the most shockingly popular. How does a New Age con artist like Oprah get so many people to literally adore her? She did not make $260 million last year by feeding people solid food. She deals in fads, feelings and frauds - it's that simple - and apparently she is very effective at convincing people to follow her well-packaged crock of nonsense. Of a recent political speech, she admitted fawningly that she had "cried her eyelashes off" when she heard it, and I am sure her crocodile tears were persuasive to her vast audience. For people schooled in the truth, the reaction would be very different: I saw the same speech and could barely keep myself from throwing up, but they don't pay me $260 million a year.

When asked why she refused to interview her anointed one's political opponent, she balked and got caught in a nasty public relations double-bind which is what usually happens to people who play games with their own popularity. Her refusal would have been easier to swallow if she had just said simply that she didn't like the other candidate and didn't want her on the show; that we can accept! But then again, basic honesty is probably above Oprah's pay grade. The truth is that Oprah has put her social clout to partisan political use, and when she was called on to be fair, she just couldn't admit that she was playing the political hack.

I do think Oprah's menace is fundamentally spiritual though, and that it feeds off the growing spiritual superficiality of the American populace. Its treachery is not to be underestimated. Oprah not only believes in but forcefully advocates pernicious New Age trends like Helen Schucman's A Course In Miracles and Eckhart Tolle's terrible esoteric movement that is trampling down Christian values and opening up a spiritual vacuum in the hearts of millions as we speak. Having the life sucked out of our souls by spiritually bankrupt "celebrities" is a slow spiritual death, to put it mildly. However, Oprah is just the worst case scenario of what is reaching epidemic proportions in a personality-obsessed, spiritually infantile and media-saturated culture. The most popular show in American prime-time is not called "American Idol" for nothing: we are literally becoming a nation of idol-worshippers.

What can we do about all the deceptive cultural garbage clamoring to fill our vulnerable souls? Well, the Church has always had the answer and never ceases to instruct us in the discipline that will bring our souls down that "narrow way" of Christ. We are to "reject Satan and all his works and all his empty promises" - that would include all his idols too. We are to consume the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth and say "yes" when we mean "yes" and "no" when we mean "no." As Jesus said, "everything else is from the devil."

About the Author
Oprah Denies Christ
No salvation outside the Catholic Church
Inspiring new video: The Catholic Vote 2008 by Grassroots Films
Sincerely Yours in Christ,
Rev. Thomas J. Euteneuer,President, Human Life International"

Belly buttons

If you know me, you know what this post is about....

Umbilicaphobia.

A fear of my navel.

I don't touch my own belly button and no one else can.

Not so strange. There are many of us out there.

When my first child was born, at a baby visit my Pediatrician said my son's belly button needed cleaning. Crazy doctor said what?!

I am a respectful, polite person who defers to my doctor's knowlege, but on this occasion I probably shocked him by uncharacteristically telling him, NO! No, I would not be cleaning my son's belly button and furthermore he would... but only AFTER I left the room!

God, in His humor, decided to give me a daughter who LOVES to touch, poke, investigate, maim and tunnel her belly button.

Hold on a second....I'm near faint from what I just wrote. Let me take a few deeps breaths until the room stops spinning.

OK, I'm back.

My beloved, most precious and only daughter derives all COMFORT from what, in turn, turns her mother's stomach! (link)

Here she is...comforting herself....

That's how she sleeps! Is it a sleep switch she's activating?!

That's not right!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Someday we'll look back on this as our dark time....

Some churches are "fighting the good fight." When will people with eyes SEE that "whatever you do to the LEAST of my brothers, you do unto Me?"

Sunset golf

Those incredible, autumn sunsets are starting to happen.

We set up a golf net in the back yard and enjoyed sunset golf tonight.

Do you believe me now?

It's a matter of record. It's been well known on the Internet, yet the media is only lately giving this any time.

Obama endorsed INFANTICIDE...look it up.

Six turns 7

My baby boy, youngest son left 6 behind today.

Like his Dad said when toasting him tonight, "You became Six for me." Perhaps it was because this boy is something else, his own storm of boyhood. Also, the Brother's from the Alliance of the Two Hearts always called him "six". When he was introducing himself to them instead of saying his name, he said, "I'm six." It stuck.

And Six he was.

His Popsy stopped down with the present he and my mother planned on, a set of golf clubs and then the boys were off for 18, followed by mini-golf! He's a natural and says he loves golf best.

For dinner, he chose grilled steaks and corn on the cob with sparkling cider champagne.

St. John Chrysostom, golden-mouthed preacher, pray for my son who now...as his Father also noted in his toast, "has us looking forward to 7." Because when you live as FULL-ON as this boy, YOU define the name, the name doesn't define you!

The Real War on Terror

Father Euteneuer of Human Life international writes....

"There has not been any official war declared on the terrorism of abortion. It is virtually ignored in public discourse and political campaigning, and even when it is dealt with, it is only talked about as something "controversial" and never as a substantive issue or one that needs to be addressed in all its dimensions.

The real story of international terror and extremism is not the story of Islam. It is the story of an industry that makes Islamic terrorists look like a bunch of Boy Scouts. It is not a localized war or one related simply to disputes between countries or conflicting political systems. It is an ideological war, a conflict between fundamental notions of good and evil, decency and depravity. "

Click here for the full article.

As I say on my left side bar for the in utero baby....

They can't defend themselves, the ultimate little "guy" without the protection whales, seals and bald eagles have! They didn't "choose" to be where they are, yet in this active duty over 48,923,992 Americans since Roe v. Wade have lost their lives to the Abortion Indu$try. These devalued little humans are the U.S. "war" casualities of the HOLOCAUST of abortion!.... 48,923,992 DEAD...more than all the war casualites ever, added together...4,000 American lives lost a day...WHAT COMPARES????....50 million soon....

And, PLEASE watch this video at Patch O'Dirt Farm and get the word out!

Can you guess who I am?

I am under 45 years old.

I love the outdoors.

I hunt.

I am a Republican reformer.

I have taken on the Republican Party establishment.

I have many children.

I have a spot on the national ticket as vice president with less than two years in the governor's office.

Did you guess? Oh, come on...TR y (hint)

Who am I? <----link

Breakfast of Champions

This week we began our 3rd homeschooling year. We love it! Family closeness and stress are at very desirable levels as we explore together the curriculum for 8th grade, 6th grade, 2nd grade and 4 year old pre school fun.

God bless your school year. If you homeschool, you may find confirmation in this website as it is always helpful to remember why we love this life!

LIFE, liberty and the pursuit of happiness....in that order

To honor Our Lady

To honor Our Lady, ten of our homeschool families were able to gather and pray a rosary together for our school year around her statue.

Afterwards we shared a meal and birthday cake, even funnel cake made on the spot!

Our Lady Queen of Peace, ora pro nobis and Happy Birthday!

Almost home....

The sun is setting on our beach vacation....it will be good to come home.