This week on Homeschool Highschool Podcast: Emphasizing Relationships with Your Teens, Interview with Connie Albers.

We are so excited this week to be joined by a special friend, Connie Albers. Connie is a homeschool mom and leader, guest on Focus on the Family and author of a parenting book that we love: Parenting Beyond the Rules: Raising Teens with Confidence and Joy.

As you may have noticed, we 7Sisters do not talk often about parenting philosophies. There are several reasons for this:

The lovely thing about Connie’s book, Parenting Beyond the Rules, is that she is not offering a philosophy, simply a discussion about the necessity of emphasizing relationships when raising teens. When we read her book, we felt like she was reading our thoughts. We 7Sisters have always said what our friend and fellow podcaster, Melanie Wilson at Homeschool Sanity, always says: relationship over rules!

Connie Albers
Photo used with permission.

Connie homeschooled her five kids through graduation (including several years of having five teens at the same time). Connie found that her teens rarely jumped out of bed happy and chomping at the bit to do their calculus lessons. But, Connie found a few secrets that helped her and her teens through these years:

She found that when you prioritize relationships through coming to know:

Emphasizing relationships is not easy. It takes longer to walk along beside teens. Concepts and life in general, is harder for adolescents. Teens often doubt themselves. It is easy for them to think they were standing in the wrong lane when smarts were handed out.

You have the job to discover, develop and cultivate the gifts God has given each teen, so that they can be the person God has made them to be (not to be their brother, or mother, or friend).

Teen years are sometimes challenging. They are trying to push back sometimes because they are doing the hard job of growing up. They are trying to find:

Connie’s purpose in writing her book is to encourage parents to truly enjoy the years with your teens. (They are the best years yet!) It discusses:

Strengthening Families with Connie Albers on FB

And check out this interview with Connie on Focus on the Family.

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This week we will discuss: Training Teens to be Civil in an Uncivil World.

Join Sabrina, Kym and Vicki for an important discussion about civility. Our world is increasingly unkind and uncivil. Teens are surrounded by political figures on the news who are crude, rude and unkind. Social media is full of ugly, unkind behavior. Civility seems to be going out of style.

This is so contradictory to the love of Christ and the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness and self-control. There is no room for unkindness there. If we are wise, we will train our teens to be civil in this uncivil world.

Because we are all broken, so we can have compassion on other broken people.

When we operate in incivility we tend to emotionally eat each other up. Remember the book Millions of Cats? A peasant with a million cats found that they were a cranky and jealous bunch who got into such a big fight that they ate each other up. Here’s a video of that classic book.

Teens do not come to these skills on their own. They need parents to:

Here’s another Homeschool Highschool Podcast episode on training your teens to become cultural influencers.

Or check out this post where teens explain how 7Sisters Great Christian Writers course was powerful for their character development.

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This week on Homeschool Highschool Podcast: Engaging Teens in Science, Interview with Kristin Moon.

Many of us homeschool moms are not thrilled at the thought of high school level science! To tell the truth, many of our teens are not thrilled, either. That’s why we invited our friend, Kristin Moon, of Kristin Moon Science, to help us with ideas for getting our teens engaged in science.

Dr. Kristin Moon is a microbiologist, but just as important, a homeschool mom. (She’s also from Vicki’s hometown, Gainesville, Florida, but that’s beside the point.) Kristin loves to help homeschoolers:

She shares her love of science at her website in her blogs, online courses, live classes and more!

Photo used with permission

Kristin has homeschooled her two sons since the beginning. She had not planned to homeschool but was inspired by the other homeschoolers in her church (and her love of learning alongside her children) to homeschool all the way through. Kristin found that homeschooling high school years have been the most fun of all.

Both Kristin’s teens have some learning difficulties with dyslexia or ADHD. She has been able to tailor her curriculum to allow them to run ahead in areas of their giftedness and interests (like math and science) and take their time in areas of struggle. Now both boys are taking college classes and doing well. (One son in at at state university and one still in homeschool high school while taking dual enrollment courses.)

Kristin learned the love of science while in college. When she was in her freshman Biology class, she learned about the beauty of the way DNA works. She was so inspired that she chose Microbiology as her major. She went onto graduate school for a PhD in molecular biology and specialized in viruses. She wanted to have a research career. That is, until she found out how much she loved being a mom and teaching her own kids.

As the word got out in her local homeschool community that there was a scientist in their midst, Kristin had the opportunity to start teaching science in local homeschool co-ops. She loves inspiring intimidated homeschool high schoolers to engage in science! Kristen has become a science ambassador of sorts!

As Kristin always says: Anyone can love science, they just haven’t learned what they love about it yet!

With her local homeschool co-op friends and online, Kristin does some DNA detective work:

Then she gives them instructions on extracting DNA at home with fruit and rubbing alcohol and also on their own cheek cells. She shows them how to examine the DNA, so that they can get engaged in understanding themselves and the way God made them.

Sometimes parents worry that if they do too much *discovery science* that their high schoolers will not have time to complete their textbooks. That might be so. Do you ever remember completing a science text when you were in high school? We believe that completing the entire textbook might not be the number one priority (in fact, the homeschool umbrella school that the 7Sisters’ teens have attended only requires 3/4 completion of the texts). Here are Vicki and Kristin’s thoughts:

Got more questions? More curiosity?

Also check out this fun freebie on creating family pedigrees!

Join Vicki and Kristin for inspiration and encouragement! Have some fun with science!

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This week on HSHSP: We Don’t Mom-Shame at Homeschool Highschool Podcast.

Join Vicki and Sabrina, together in the same room for this week’s episode! It’s been a while since they have found the time to get together, what with Sabrina traveling so much. Hey, if you need an inspiring speaker with a gripping story, contact her.

In this episode of Homeschool Highschool Podcast, we are talking about *mom-shaming*. In short: we don’t mom-shame!

Mom-shaming is easy to fall into: When life isn’t working out how we want it to, it is easy to project our frustrations onto other (whether we know we are doing it or not). Then we begin to judge. Then we begin to correct others (whether they asked for it or not). Then we begin to fix others (whether they asked for it or not). That’s mom-shaming.

Mom-shaming is especially easy when we are on social media, because the barriers to slow us down are so low. That’s sad because when we mom-shame, we create a culture of fear.

We don’t mom-shame at 7Sisters or here on HSHSP.

We don’t mom-shame! With age we 7Sisters have learned a thing or two about grace and patience over the years (whether we asked God to teach us that or not). All our homeschoolers have graduated and we found that they all have different:

We could tailor their academics and extracurriculars into a box that some friend, some speaker or some publisher says we should use.

But tailoring our many kinds of kids into another person’s box is a destructive strategy.

Instead, we recommend that you look at each child. Ask yourself:

In the early days of homeschooling, there were a few big voices (opinionated thought leaders who sometimes said that homeschooling needed to happen THEIR way). Now that we have the internet, there are not just a few big voices. Rather, there are many voices and a some of them will say THIS is the way to homeschool. They sometimes imply the ominous: If you don’t homeschool OUR way, you are dooming your kids!

The real truth is: Our kids and our families are on a journey of growth and discovery. Each journey is different. We need to be sensitive to the needs of each of our homeschoolers. That’s why we don’t mom-shame.

This is why 7SistersHomeschool.com’s curriculum exists. It is adaptable, no-busywork to fit many homeschoolers’ needs. However, we know that it will not fit everyone because there’s not ONE right way to do homeschooling! (So, we have a money-back guarantee.) To help adapt curriculum to needs: In each text or literature/writing guide, there are instructions on how to adapt to various goals and abilities. Also check out the syllabus available for many of the texts.

We want you to feel more confident as you grow in God’s work in you and your homeschoolers.

Check us out at 7SistersHomeschool.com

Join Vicki and Sabrina for encouragement and support and NO mom-shaming!

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This week on HSHSP: How to Get Your Homeschool Organized, Interview with Tatiana Adurias.

Our friend, Tatiana Adurias from Purposeful Motherhood, joins us for a discussion about teaching homeschoolers organizational skills. Tatiana is the mother of six homeschoolers ages….through college graduation. She has learned by necessity the necessity of an organized homeschool. Here are some of her experiences.

Tatiana began homeschooling when her oldest son was in third grade. He asked to homeschool! Tatiana, at that time, was finishing her teaching credentials so was not excited about that! However, circumstances made homeschooling important in his third grade second semester. Tatiana gave in and started homeschooling him and his younger sister. She felt unprepared and did not enjoy the experience. So back to school he went next fall.

When Tatiana’s son was in sixth grade he came back to her and asked to homeschool again. He explained to her that he was more mature now and could manage himself better. He also researched homeschooling, created a powerpoint presentation with twenty-five reasons he should homeschool and gave a speech about it to his parents. Tatiana respected his requests and began to get started.

Tatiana is very authentic. She explained that the first three years were rough for several reasons, but they kept learning together. Before she knew it, she was homeschooling comfortably and had all her children learning at home!

Vicki really appreciates Tatiana’s honesty. Homeschooling is not all easy, not every day goes smoothly, but when we are determined to grow together, homeschooling is a beautiful thing!

What shifted for Tatiana so that she loved homeschooling? She began to actually see the benefits. She saw her son’s ability to:

Tatiana’s most strenuous three years homeschooling were the years she was educating all six kids, with three in high school down to kindergarten. What helped?

Check out Tatiana Adurias’ encouraging website Purposeful Motherhood.

You can find her on Facebook at Purposeful Motherhood!

Tatiana will soon be releasing a short course for homeschooling mothers and middle schoolers! It is a five-day questionnaire guide for preparing college-bound middle schoolers for high school. Sign up for her mailing list for release date!

For more excellent tips on getting yourself organized, check out our friend Melanie Wilson of Homeschool Sanity Podcast’s episodes on organized homeschooling life.

Join Vicki and Tatiana for this encouraging discussion on how to get your homeschool organized.

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This week on Homeschool Highschool Podcast: How to Create Honors Credits on Homeschool Transcript.

Vicki shares how to create a powerful transcript by building Honors credits. She explains the method called “leveling up” that her family and the homeschool umbrella school that all the 7Sisters’ homeschoolers have graduated from. Check out this Homeschool Highschool Podcast episode that explains the concept of “Levels”.

If you have homeschool high schoolers who are headed for college, it is likely they will need to show rigor on the homeschool transcript. How do you handle creating courses with rigor and showing them on the transcript?

It is hard work. A teen working on a Level 5 Honors credit will be doing about double the Level 3 College Prep.

7Sisters textbooks and Literature Study Guides include instructions (with Literature Study Guides the instructions vary by age and grade). Listen to this HSHSP episode for tips on using the levels feature of 7Sisters curriculum.

Textbook average or college prep.

For more information on Carnegie credits check out this post.

Textbook average or college prep.

Remember, homeschool high schoolers are doing double credits BUT on transcript they only receive 1 credit. College admissions officers LOVE these Honors credits.

Search Honors credit at 7Sisters for more ideas.

When teens develop interest they feel engaged and proud of themselves. It gives them a nice expertise in an area and creates a powerful transcript. When the Honors credit is in an area of their choice, they can use this expertise in a college admissions interview.

The post How to Create Honors Credits on Homeschool Transcript appeared first on Ultimate Homeschool Podcast Network.

Can you homeschool lots of kids? Yes, you can! Here are tips for homeschooling multiple ages in this interview with Tiffany Jefferson.

Tiffany Jefferson is a happily married homeschool mom of 10 children (7 sons and 2 daughters, ranging from ages 22 to newborn). Tiffany loves being a mom and always tells her kids she would gladly do it over again.

Tiffany and her husband started homeschooling after her oldest three children were in public school. When her third child and first daughter entered first grade, they began to have doubts. Her daughter was bright and curious. They saw the classroom system being a discouragement for her. Thinking that they wanted to build, not stifle, their daughter’s inquisitiveness, they began to explore the idea of homeschooling.

Photo used by permission.

Fortunately, there were a couple of homeschooling families at her church. They helped them comply with state homeschool laws. They helped Tiffany learn the ropes and even gave them homeschool curriculum to explore as the figured out what would be best fit for their kids. (This was nice for the first year: NO curriculum decisions that first year.)  Tiffany and her husband felt so blessed and encouraged.

When she started homeschooling, they started with just that one daughter, whose needs would be best met at home. Of course, it was not always an easy adventure. Tiffany tells about the time she told her husband, “I feel like I’m giving up all my free time!”

And being a truth-teller, her husband replied, “You are.”

But what a great investment of her time!

The first year there were tears and struggles but the priceless joy of watching her daughter’s gains. They learned to pray at tough times and set things aside for the day, pause and do something else. She learned to give herself permission to hit the pause button; she found she not have to finish every lesson, every day.

The second year, Tiffany and her husband brought her oldest two sons home for their education. Eventually, she was homeschooling kids from high school ages down to kindergarten.

When her oldest son was a high school senior, Tiffany was experiencing a difficult pregnancy. She was on bedrest, but the structure they had implemented helped the family’s homeschool to carry on.

When her oldest teen graduated from homeschool high school, it was exciting for him. He knew what he wanted after graduation, so he developed his own system for college choice and application. They also looked to their local umbrella school’s advisor for guidance and a list of deadlines to work on. (What are umbrella schools? Check out this HSHSP episode.)

Now the oldest has graduated from college. Two of her kids are in college. The rest are high school, middle school, elementary school or younger. SO many homeschoolers in a family full of grace!

If you would like to contact Tiffany Jefferson for consulting, visit her at her website Finish With Joy.

Like her Facebook page Finish With Joy and her Instagram profile.

Tiffany is a blogger, speaker and entrepreneur.  As founder of The Homeschool Helper, she uses over a decade of homeschool experience to equip parents with the tools to succeed in their homeschool journey.  As a mentor to mothers, she’s passionate about teaching women how to honor their husbands and create peaceful home environments. You can find her encouraging women, sharing Scriptural truths and helpful tips at her blog Finish with Joy, on Facebook and Instagram.

The post How to Homeschool Multiple Ages at Once (with Tiffany Jefferson) appeared first on Ultimate Homeschool Podcast Network.

This week on HSHSP Ep 192: Keeping Up With Homeschool Paperwork, Interview with Ann Karako.

We are joined again this week by our friend, Ann Karako, of Annie and Everything. We are talking about PAPERWORK!

Who LOVES paperwork…Crickets…crickets…That’s right. Most homeschool moms do not love paperwork.

Ever felt overwhelmed with the tons of paperwork in your homeschool? It is a necessary part of education, but not much fun to keep up with!

Vicki shares that during her years of being homeschool advisor, she sometimes found overwhelmed moms bringing in boxes of unsorted paperwork to their mid-year reviews because they got overwhelmed and gave up. Vicki and the mom would sort and grade, then develop a system that would hopefully work for that mom to help her keep up!

Ann encourages us that she’s felt been there, done that. For instance, her daughter needed a GPA for sports recently. There was some scrambling to pull it together but it got done.

Did you hear that? Maybe I’ll share it again:

Photo used with permission

When you have a huge pile, you might find things get lost along the way. That is not helpful when concepts build on one another (such as math). You do not want this to happen!

Join Vicki and Ann for fun and encouragement about PAPERWORK!

And check out Ann’s encouragement at:

Want more encouragement on homeschool organization? Check out these posts from 7SistersHomeschool.com

And this episode of Homeschool Highschool Podcast: Homeschool Organization.

The post Keeping Up With Homeschool Paperwork, Interview with Ann Karako appeared first on Ultimate Homeschool Podcast Network.

This week on HSHSP Ep 189: The Importance of Homeschool Community, Interview with Ann Karako.

Vicki is excited this week to be joined by an old digital friend, Ann Karako. Many homeschoolers are familiar with Ann. She is the popular homeschool blogger at Annie and Everything and many of us homeschooling high school parents are involved in her HUGE Facebook community: It’s Not That Hard to Homeschool High School!

Ann and her husband have five kids, who have homeschooled all the way from pre-kindergarten. She dropped her fourth homeschool graduate off for freshman semester at college this September, so she just has one more high schooler to go!

They started homeschooling their kids in the beginning because of the inspiration of their kids’ babysitters who were homeschoolers. These teens were such great role models for their kids that they wanted to give their children a similar formative experience. Homeschoolers are the best advertisement for homeschooling!

Now entering their 21st year of homeschooling, Ann is grateful for each year!

Ann has also spent her homeschool years investing in the homeschool community. Community formation is Ann’s calling. Ann found that when she started homeschooling the middle school years, her homeschool support system was thinning because many parents were intimidated by the thought of homeschooling the higher grades. By high school, Ann had only a couple of homeschooling high school family/friends.

Photo used with permission

Ann knew that the high school years are marvelous for homeschooling, but they could also be challenging with paperwork, credits and hormones to deal with. She knows we need the homeschool mom support more than ever.

Vicki and Ann both found that homeschooling in community helped so much in:

As she was facing those homeschooling high school years, she woke up one morning and decided to find a digital community for herself. Thus, she started It’s Not That Hard to Homeschool High School. There are tens of thousands of moms in the group who ask questions and share advice on:

Ann does not put us with “YOU SHOULD’s”. She does not allow that in her facebook group because she knows there’s not ONE right way to homeschool high school. (Have you ever heard that from the 7Sisters, too?) She encourages everyone to give advice without “shoulds”. This attitude keeps the conversation leaning into mentoring, encouragement and support for moms who are homeschooling high school (and available 24/7).

Vicki tells Ann about the Homeschool Highschool Podcast interview with Misty Bailey, who shared about how to not be afraid to homeschool high school. Misty told Vicki that her main inspiration for homeschooling her teens was Ann Karako.

Ann’s influence was available because she is determined to invest in other homeschooling families. As Ann learned about things that worked in homeschooling her high schoolers, she shared what she learned in her popular website, Annie and Everything. Ann tells the story of doing her high school research (which included researching the public school requirements and feeling intimidated and irritated. Her husband reminded her that they are homeschoolers so they don’t HAVE to do high school like the public schools. Ann has been determined to share this: do what is right for your teens).

Ann reminds us the only thing you absolutely must do is follow your state homeschool law!

HUGS for homeschooling high school. Help Understanding Grace Strength. This is Ann’s online paid membership community ($10/month). It is for Christian homeschooling moms of teens. She will discussing Christian parenting, homeschooling and curriculum in a safe setting where moms do not need to calm down their *Jesus talk*. There  daily discussions and monthly themes and live get togethers. Ann is spending daily live-time there now.

Ann also has two books about homeschooling high school:

Join Vicki and Ann for this encouraging discussion on homeschooling community for homeschool moms.

The Star Is Coming Back To Theaters for a Limited Time!

Experience The Star again December 7 and 8 in select theaters!

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This week on HSHSP Ep 188: Mentoring Relationships for Homeschool Moms, Interview with Jamie Erickson.

We are joined today with popular author and fellow podcaster Jamie Erickson of the Mom to Mom Podcast and the Unlikely Homeschool blog. We are talking about the importance of mentoring for homeschool moms.

Jamie is married to her high school sweetheart. Her husband was homeschooled and wanted to homeschool their kids. It took some convincing but once they started homeschooling, she has known it is the best way to educate her kids. (As Vicki says: A mom’s mind plans her way but God directs her paths.)

Jamie’s first homeschooling mentor was her mother-in-law, who was a pioneer in homeschooling in her area. (Jamie knows that supportive mother-in-laws are often an exception to other’s experiences.)

Jamie grew up in a home where only her mom was a Christian, which had some challenges. She met her husband at in college in Florida, married him and moved back to his home state of Minnesota. While it was the frozen north to her, she found warm women who knew how to bring a new person into the fold. These women were mentors, further down the path of life, who reached behind and lifted her up.

She experienced a poignant mentoring moment when she was pregnant with her fourth child and had a home full of very young children. She was sitting at a women’s church meeting, the youngest one there. The leader asked if there were any prayer requests. She was tired and was going to ask for prayer about it but tears of exhaustion came out first. These gracious women encircled her, prayed, then followed up with meals and babysitters so she could take a nap.

Jamie remembers seeking out moms who still had homeschool high schoolers or had graduated their teens and asked for a mentoring session. They brought bags of curriculum and lots of encouragement and advice. These events really encouraged Jamie.

However, these events were not common. Jamie knew that if she had a hunger for mentoring, there were others who felt the same need for support in their homeschool journey:

So she began teaching about mentoring and encouraging other homeschool moms to mentor. She advises that homeschool moms:

Jamie’s family made the decision, when her oldest was young, that they would work to find mentoring relationships for her. One way Jamie has found mentors for her daughter is through volunteer work. (We all know how important service is to our homeschool high schoolers’ personal development AND their transcripts. Check out this Homeschool Highschool Podcast episode with information on service hours for your teens.)

She and her daughter have been volunteering at a mother-daughter weekend at a local Bible camp for years. Through that experience, her daughter started actually working there. Out of that, natural mentoring relationships with young college-aged women have formed. It has been amazingly powerful for them.

Also joining a homeschool co-op has been important to her high school daughter’s life. The homeschool moms have been role models and mentors for her in “big, lavish ways”.

Have you had a co-op experience? If not, do you want to start one? Check out this authoritative guide from 7SistersHomeschool.com on co-oping and these HSHSP episodes: How to Start a Co-op Teens Will Like.

Jamie has recently published a mentoring book for homeschool moms: Homeschool Bravely: How to Squash Doubt, Trust God and Teach Your Child with Confidence.

This book is not a how-to book, it is a book of hugs around moms’ necks, encouragement and the heart of where her encouragement comes from (Christ). Check it out at HomeschoolBravely.com and read the first chapter there.

Jamie’s podcast is Mom to Mom (hosted by Jamie, Kate Battestelli and September McCarthy). These seasoned homeschool moms have sixteen kids ranging in age from thirty to 6 years of age. Jamie started the podcast because she wanted a mentoring podcast with seasoned homeschool moms (which these moms certainly are). It is a podcast for every season of mothering.

Want to connect with Jamie Erickson, check out the Unlikely Homeschool, Mom to Mom podcast and grab her book!

Join Vicki and Jamie Erickson for this encouraging interview!

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