Starting Homeschool in 2nd Grade for my ADHD Son

[andarianna]

Hello Everyone,

I have been reading all of your posts and I still can not seem to find anyone that is homeschooling a ADHD child (maybe I missed it). My son is currently enrolled in a special curriculumhere in Odessa, Texas. He has a very structured classroom to contain his behavior.(we tried just regular public school but his behavior was too much for a classrom of 20 or so students). The reason we are deciding to start homeschooling him is that in his program he is not being mentally challenged. He is a very gifted child and I think that he can progress alot further if he is not being held back by this program.

We have talked to his MHMR Caseworker and the psychiatrist that he sees and they are both in agreement that this would be a good step for him. With him being in this program we have to call an ARD meeting and let them know that we plan to take him out of the program. I am just wondering if there is any legal action that can be taken against us for removing him. Will they be all over us because my son has ADHD? Or is it my legal right to teach my son as I see fit?

Also another question I guess I have is this. I live in a small town in Texas. I have looked at the orginizations for homeschoolers here and there pretty much is not anything except for in Lubbock which is alost 2 hours from us. Is there a way to find more stuff for him social wise in this area. My husband's main concern is that he will not be socially dependent. I have to admit with his ADHD he is not socially inclined as it is now and I really do not want to stunt his growth in that aspect in any way.

I don't know. Maybe I am just a bit bumfuzzeled with all the things that I have to look into. Not sure where to turn. I know my mother in law homeschooled one of her daughters for all of her school years. I do not plan on doing that for Corwin. I just want him homeschooled until he reaches Junior High. Also the psychiatrist said that when he reaches that age he should be put back into public school so that he can develop more and by then his ADHD should have calmed down with adolescent.

Another question is if anyone knows if there is financial help to pay for homeschooling? Was just curious...

Any help any of you can provide in this area would be greatly appreciated.

THANKS

[Theodore]

Odessa Royals Homeschool Basketball:
http://www.home-school.com/groups/TX.html

I assume that if there's a homeschool sports team, there's probably a homeschool group as well. If not, you could organize one with the parents.

http://homeschool.meetup.com/cities/us/tx/andrews/
Looks like a number of these people are in Odessa.

As for finding posts from people homeschooling ADHD children, try the forum Search. Searching for ADHD brings up a number of results.

And there are no legal requirements for homeschooling in Texas, special needs or otherwise, other than including reading, spelling, grammar, math, and good citizenship in your curriculum.

http://www.thsc.org/about_us/texlaws.asp
http://www.hslda.org/laws/default.asp?State=TX

[optometristwife]

I ran across your post as I was browsing the site. Just wondering if you have had your child evaluated by an optometrist that tests for learning related vision issues. My husband has seen many children diagnosed ADHD that benefitted from vision therapy. You could look at the website www.covd.org for more info. I applaud your efforts to help your child reach his full potential!

[dannysong]

I think that is a good decision. There is flexibility in learning in home school especially for troubled teens. For teens who are studying at home, they have the freedom to go as fast or as slow as they want when covering academic subjects. Some students benefit from this because they could go fast and do some advanced learning on some subjects, or they could take their time and study more on subjects where they have difficulties learning. This is something you simply cannot do in a traditional classroom that follows a strict and rigid curriculum.