Question of the Week? Computers in the school room…

Join Christian Homeschoolers Taking a Stand for this week’s Question of the Week linkup!

How do you handle computer use in your homeschool with your children? Do you allow them to have non school related time on the computer? How much? What do they typically do? Also, What subjects do your children do on the computer? If it is a program, which one? Likes/dislikes.

The kiddos each have their own laptop- a Christmas gift a couple of years ago - and they have always had the freedom to play on their computer.  It has Windows Family Safety on it, set pretty high, so we have never had an issue with anything online.  Mostly they prefer games that we have purchased and put on there.  Recently, they have gotten a little more curious about the internet and they are pretty good about double checking with us before they visit any sites (most of them we have to approve anyways).  They each have their own email and they both know my email and  they know that they are supposed to use mine to register for anything - then I will forward stuff to them - or depending on the site, go in and switch it to their email address.  Computers have just been for free time for them in the past.

I guess they really came into play big time the end of last year, when we went through the nursing home/hospitalization/death of my Meme. I sat at Meme’s side pretty much 24/7.  The kiddos were at their other grandparents house during the time Roger was at work and Grandpa had them doing current event reports - typing them up in Word Docs, editing, copy/pasting, attaching, emailing and many other simple beginning computer skills.  They were copy/pasting them and sending them to me in an email, they were also attaching them for me to read.  Having my phone at the hospital allowed for me to be in pretty constant communication with them during the day.

This year, there have been several occasions already that computers have come into play.  First, we are part of TOS Homeschool Review Crew and we are currently reviewing two computer games, with a third one in the near future, through them.  We are also in the middle of another review that is an online community type game. So, even though a couple of the sites may be more play, and less *work*- they are still learning valuable skills through these.

In addition to the learning games that we review and play, they also have a couple of favorite sites - well, I guess the current top favorite is the LDD download from Lego.com. { That has certainly been a carrot this past couple of weeks!} They have also continued with the mini reports and using basic computer skills.  I encourage emails sent to cousins, aunts, grandparents & each other as well.  They are currently in the middle of a Mavis Beacon teaches typing program, that will definitely count for school work. Their piano/voice teacher also has them as part of Music Learning Community, so I count that as school as well.

So, while they do not play a major role in our schooling (yet), the kiddos still usually drag their laptops out at least once a day for some reason or another.  I’m sure as they get a bit older and into more the social sites, like Facebook and who knows what comes next - that there will be a little more supervision during school time computer use, but for now… they are free on their computers…