ADD diagnosis, and new baby, can I still homeschool?

[Jessica]

[Ramona]

If I were you, I'd keep him out of institutional school no matter what. Since I feel that way, I'd do whatever I had to do to keep homeschooling:

I might go on "summer vacation" from now until I catch up on my sleep.

I might let him do whatever he wants for the next several weeks or months and just call it unschooling, or a unit study on new babies.

I might try to find activities in the community that I could take him to where he could get some structure with me and the baby sitting in the back, like story hour at the public library or crafts at the community center or co-op classes with other homeschooling families.

I might try to set up a schedule of friends who'd love to come over 2 days a week to take care of the baby for 90 minutes while I do his lessons.

I'm sure there are other possibilities too.

Ramona

[Elei]

Hi Jessica,

I know the ADHD problem, my 9 year old has it too and my 6 year old probably as well, I'm tired of diagnosis though and we didn't get an oficial one for the youngest.

Sometimes it is also hard for me to believe that: when they play, they learn. I'm a teacher haha, and they've washed my brain telling me I have to "teach" them things.

But for example right now they are playing with a "car track" (or whatever you call that) and I do think they are learning. I got him a "screw and nail closet thing" with all little drawers. He'll have to write the names on all the drawers for his different treasures: stones, shells, bones, feathers, ...... He'll be sweet with that for a while sorting everything out. We got him a microscope and he's "observing" everything in the house.

We're thinking of organizing a table for him in the basement where he can just take apart old radios, or just anything broken, take it apart and look at it, put things back together or build new things.

So maybe you can do something like that, I know they need the structure, but at least mine when he's interested in something he can be "learning on his own": with books from the library, just any books, let him choose, taking old stuff apart, sorting out the nature stuff he got from a field trip you did with the baby. You have a lot of nice science packs for children: make your own volcano, camera, minerals,.... telescopes and microscopes. Prepare a space for him, if you are lucky a separate room or a space in the garage or basement, somewhere you don't see it a lot and that can get messy and dirty. Just let him explore, invent, build and take apart, make a mess and clean it up when the baby is two years old.

There are also some very educational computergames which are mostely very atractive for ADHD children. He can play the game with headphones and if the baby is sleeping at that moment you get some rest for yourself, the same for educational DVD or video.

Take it as a few months "break" with some "educational toys". You might be amazed how much he learned from exploring some things on his own. Trying to be independent without momy is also a big lesson for him. Do give him some special atention every now and then, he needs that. A bedtime story (mine loves that) just for him, listen to his latest "discovery", a special meal for him......

Good luck with it.
Elei.