giving the best of both worlds? / homeschool and progressive school for inigo

i really wanted to homeschool inigo. i have shared enough reasons here why homeschooling is our choice for his early education. but never did i realize that it is really a big and daunting take especially now that i have another kid to take care of. it really takes commitment and discipline and sadly i wasn't blessed with these.

then there's the nagging issue of socialization. critics of homeschooling opined that parents who homeschool their kids deprive them of their chance to socialize with their peers and the life's lessons that go with regular schooling. honestly i succumbed to this and it was a huge factor why jude and i decided to send inigo to a preschool last school year. fortunately, a regular school worked well for him and we saw the big change in the kiddo's socialization skill.

so when the start of school year 2010-2011 was drawing near it was automatic for us to decide to enroll inigo again to another preschool, a progressive preschool to be exact, because i know, even if i wanted to homeschool inigo full-time and rely on our spur-of-the-moment learning activities, i can't. it's our child's development which is at stake.

finding a preschool is another difficult task for us. (geez... i realized nothing is really easy if it involves our kids... and if money is also taken into consideration, hehe). we wanted to stick with his old preschool in legaspi village, which is also a progressive one. but they increased their tuition for this school year and what's already high and expensive becomes more prohibitve for us. the tuition for 2-3x a week schedule is now at whopping php 50-70k for one school year. they have a right though to collect such big amount from the parents because facilities-wise the school is way above standard. but the tuition is really beyond our budget so we had no choice but to transfer inigo.

finally after many phone calls and inquiries and several visits to different schools we enrolled inigo in kids playlab preschool, which is located 3 blocks away from our current address. it's a progressive school, something i really wanted since i knew that their personalized and student-centered, no-rush-for-the-kid approach doesn't clash with my homeschooling principles. it's also important for me that at my kid's age i don't want him to be labeled and ranked among his classmates because it (whether it's favorable or not) might affect his disposition early in life. inigo by the way is attending 2x a week. in between these days i supplement his learning by discussing to him what has just been taught in their school or  any topic which he's interested to learn. i wanted him to realize that learning  may also be done beyond the four corners of their classroom. we call this moments as 'learning time' and i love it when inigo asks me if he can learn. it's like music to my ears. :)

stolen shot by jude of me (in my so drabby outfit, hehe) and inigo during one of our homeschooling sessions

inigo is now into reading. he can now read some words in his dr. seuss' green eggs and ham and hop and pop books. i thought i can defer reading to him until he's five or six years old but after learning the sounds of the letters he enthused to read. he's very good in numbers. more than rote counting one to 100, i taught him to also identify and write the numbers. the chart had been useful though inigo gets bored with charts so the tv channels, elevators, calendars were more helpful.

but it's science which inigo is very interested and eager to learn. he can name most animals and their youngs. he can discuss the solar system and name the planets according to their location from the sun. he can say something about the eruption of volcanoes and what it spew out.

i really have no idea if inigo knows less or more compared to other kids his age since i already stopped having a benchmark or a standard which he should meet. am just happy that he continuously learn and with enthusiasm.

it's enough for me now.