How has having children with learning disabilities affected school?

One is the way that we are affected by the learning disabilities is the way in which we school. My kiddos that can’t read still want to learn. I don’t want them to be denied the history and the science that they love. So we group many classes together. We do history as one big read aloud and adventure as a group. Younger ones do not work on a time-line but the older ones (3rd grade and up) must prepare the picture while mom reads the history. You will then add your item to your own timeline.

We have done science work as a group also with mom doing most of the reading aloud. Everyone has their own notebook. Each must copy notes off the board and add to their books. Mom helps to create the notes by writing the high lights on the chalk board. Hopefully this is also helping to prepare them with note taking on lectures. These science binders where the notes are stored are fun. They make the science touchable.

Most of our subjects are done as a group. This does not included the high school students. I feel that high school needs to be more independent. This is when the child is preparing for college work. It is truly when the student needs to take over the learning process. It isn't hard because the foundation has been set.

The other way the learning disabilities have affected us is not as positive of an observation. Having the non-readers come along really seeded doubt in me. I worried so much that I was failing them by not putting them in school to learn how to read. By becoming friends with moms in similar situations I gained the confidence that I needed to persevere. I have found that we need to maintain a little more privacy in how we home school. More privacy in where each child is or isn't. I will not reveal in present terms where exactly we are or are not.

My in-laws do not like that we home school and they would often use the non-readers as reasons to try to push school. I can not even begin to tell you the number of family “fights” that have started by outside family trying to convince us, our friends and even our priest to force us to send the kids to school. We have even had legal issues threatened. That makes us very nervous.

I know that each of the children are learning. They grow in their knowledge and ability every day. I am thankful that we have been in Texas where the law has been on our side. Showing progression is not that difficult but it can look bad if you just compare a child with learning issues to the public school peer. The true peers with learning issues often have very low self esteem but on paper look like they are doing so much better. I know that we are better off but it does require me to be a little more private about where the non-readers truly are in their scholastic endeavors.