Evaluating Our Year – Am I doing enough?

Many times I hear homeschool mothers say, “I just don’t know if we did enough this year.” or “How do you know if your children are learning everything they should be?” In our state, we are required to get yearly evaluations, with a certified teacher, and that is it. It’s not a hard requirement. What I’m more concerned about at the end of the year is their work ethic and character development. And, let’s not forget me and my progress as a teacher/mom. What have I learned? What do I need to work on?

When I found this book, Evaluating for Excellence: A Handbook for Evaluating Student Progress, in 2004, I didn’t know what a gold mine I had hit. This book is better then year-end evaluations and it helps me plan our following year more effectively. It is full of tools to evaluate your children and yourself and it tells you how to use them. My favorite one is the Character Qualities Review. It has qualities listed such as: attentiveness, brotherly love, contentment, courtesy, cooperation etc… You evaluate your child by checking off weak, improving, satisfactory and excellent. When you place 2 or 3 years worth of this evaluation side by side you can really get a picture of the type of character your child is heading towards. It tells you where to put your focus.

My other favorite assessment is the Educator’s Diagnostic Assessment. Before I fill this out, I have to say out loud to myself “Be honest, Brenda.” It has these types of things to evaluate yourself: confidence to teach my students, organizing the school environment, disciplining myself to complete school work, finding enjoyment in home schooling, managing my home so I can school. Are you kicking yourself yet? This can be the painful part. But, very helpful.

I do not use all of the assessments in the book, I have just picked a few that are important to me and I have started to add some more as the years progress. Some others that I use are:

Student Inventory (overall assessment of every subject)
Diagnostic Writing Checklist (to track writing progress)
Family’s Approved Book list
Reading Genres
Physical education
Student Assignment Sheet (I use this for chores)

Some others that are in the book are:

Student writing sample
Handwriting assessment
Math skills checklist
Research project evaluation
Public speaking evaluation
Individualized educational program

Taking the time to do these sort of things several times, or even just once a year takes the mystery out of “Am I doing enough?” It gives me confidence in schooling my children, knowing where I am going to have to spend my energy for each child. And, where I need to work on self improvement.

Brenda blogs at Ties that Bind Us about her homeschooling journey with 5 children.

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