Anon Homeschooling for gymnastic training regrets and positives?

[Anonymous (0139)]

Have any of you taken your gymnasts out of traditional schooling as early as elementary school to train earlier hours in gymnastics and regretted it later when a child decides to quit gymnastics? Or have most of you had success choosing that path? Looking to hear both sides if possible?

 

[GymCMLA]

We have always homeschooled, so never "taken a kid out of traditional school". Oldest is in college and youngest in middle school. No regrets from an academic or gym standpoint for us, but there are some tradeoffs (school dancer, friends outside of sports/dance, grocery budget (homeschooled gymnasts eat first and second BF, lunch and dinner)) It would be my opinion that I'd not pull a kid form school to homeschool solely for gymnastics training. If that was already on your heart and this is a good reason to give it a try, then that's a different story. The nice thing is that you can return to brick and mortar school and traditional PM gym training if it isn't working / isn't best fit anymore.

 

[Anonymous (bf30)]

Last year was our first year homeschooling, daughter was in 4th grade and had gone to public school until then. We started homeschooling to accommodate her training schedule. For us it has been a very good change. But, I do think each case is very individual. There is a lot to consider! Just know that whatever you decide, it is not permanent. You can always change your mind and go the other route or try something different. Good luck in your decision!

 

[Anonymous (58e4)]

I pulled my daughter out the 20/21 school year because of Covid, she was in 5th grade, and she just never went back. She just started her freshman year and it’s definitely something I worry about. Is she missing out? Will she have regrets?

 

[Anonymous (06bb)]

There are a few homeschool girls that train with my daughter, academically they are fine, socially they struggle especially with larger groups and challenging social situations. Fomo is a very real issue with all of them.

 

[Anonymous (fe5a)]

Elementary school is very young to take such a step if you're only doing it to support their gymnastics career - a career that could very well come to an end within a year or so when she either fails to progress or gets bored or discovers other things in life, as 11-year-old girls are wont to do.

 

[Anonymous (b34a)]

We also got to do a "free test drive" for online (home) school during my daughter's 7th grade year, during COVID. Our public school offered a free year of online school as an option students in our district. Her training schedule was 20 hours a week, 5 days a week. Afterwards, we didn't want to go back to conventional school.

As some have pointed out, it's not a one size fits all solution and I don't think we would have explored this when my daughter was in compulsory levels and the practice schedule was not as strenuous.

We are doing an online program, as opposed to traditional home school. The positive for this is that her mother and I can be fairly hands off, which for us and our situations, is a good thing.

Our daughter is a good self starter (thank goodness she is much better than I was at that age) so this is another aspect that might not fit everyone and every personality type. If grades would have suffered due to not being disciplined enough to do the work on your own, then personally I don't think we would have continued with online schooling. Fortunately we haven't had to worry about this.

Some of the positives:
Mental and physical state is much better as she has much more time for recovery on both. She is able to get more sleep and she can eat when and what she wants. Her stress levels are lower during the day when she's working at her own pace.

Even though she was good at this to begin with, her time management and organization has gotten better. In some ways I think this is a good prep for college, in terms of scheduling your time and disciplining yourself to complete tasks on your own.

Some of the cons:
Missing out on social activities in a public school. Fortunately our daughter has friends at the gym, as well as at church.

Missing out on classes that have "hands on" type instruction. Most notably art and music/choir.

Cost. We are doing online school, so there is tuition cost. Compared to a local private school, it's not a lot. However I know that everyone's situation is different and paying this on top of gymnastics tuition can be even more taxing on the finances.

In summary, for our situation, we are very glad that we made the change to online schooling and if we were to go back knowing what I know now, I would do it again without hesitation.

 

[Anonymous (8af5)]

We also got to do a "free test drive" for online (home) school during my daughter's 7th grade year, during COVID. Our public school offered a free year of online school as an option students in our district. Her training schedule was 20 hours a week, 5 days a week. Afterwards, we didn't want to go back to conventional school.

As some have pointed out, it's not a one size fits all solution and I don't think we would have explored this when my daughter was in compulsory levels and the practice schedule was not as strenuous.

We are doing an online program, as opposed to traditional home school. The positive for this is that her mother and I can be fairly hands off, which for us and our situations, is a good thing.

Our daughter is a good self starter (thank goodness she is much better than I was at that age) so this is another aspect that might not fit everyone and every personality type. If grades would have suffered due to not being disciplined enough to do the work on your own, then personally I don't think we would have continued with online schooling. Fortunately we haven't had to worry about this.

Some of the positives:
Mental and physical state is much better as she has much more time for recovery on both. She is able to get more sleep and she can eat when and what she wants. Her stress levels are lower during the day when she's working at her own pace.

Even though she was good at this to begin with, her time management and organization has gotten better. In some ways I think this is a good prep for college, in terms of scheduling your time and disciplining yourself to complete tasks on your own.

Some of the cons:
Missing out on social activities in a public school. Fortunately our daughter has friends at the gym, as well as at church.

Missing out on classes that have "hands on" type instruction. Most notably art and music/choir.

Cost. We are doing online school, so there is tuition cost. Compared to a local private school, it's not a lot. However I know that everyone's situation is different and paying this on top of gymnastics tuition can be even more taxing on the finances.

In summary, for our situation, we are very glad that we made the change to online schooling and if we were to go back knowing what I know now, I would do it again without hesitation.

In most states, there are free online public school options. In Ohio at least, they even provide laptops for each student. The school my students go to also offers an iPhone so the students can use it as a hotspot and also text their teachers if needed.

If a parent is considering "home schooling" JUST for gymnastics, a free online public school option might be a good option because they would be learning the same core content as the local public schools, so they could return if it was no longer necessary or working.

I "tutor" students who do online school. I put tutor in quotes because I am technically their "Adult Learning Partner." They both have ADHD so they need someone, so they come to my house. I help them come up with their to-do lists for each day so they don't fall behind (as long as they actually do their work). I can log on and check to see where they are in each class to see if they did what they were supposed to do. I am also available to check their work before they submit it if they would like. They're getting older, so I don't have to do as much as I did when they were younger (one of them is in his 10th year and will graduate a year early after falling behind almost every year in at least 1 class ... causing him to have to give up school days off to catch up).