We are homeschooling! Please comment with your tips :)

Posts have been sporadic here, mainly because we are homeschooling this year.  We are still waiting (and hoping!) for our house to sell. 

Last month, after 2 months on the market, we felt compelled to make a decision.  We desperately want to move to a better school district.  We had hoped to accomplish this over the summer months, but it became apparent that it wasn't happening.  We filed our Notice of Intent to Homeschool with our school, selected curriculum, and started after Labor Day.  This means that for a good portion of the day, one of the kiddos has my computer.  Our ole Dell Vostro didn't have enough giddyup to run the homeschool curriculum, so I have had to acquiesce the Gateway to my 4th grader. 

So, going forward, I hope to steal the computer back more often once we get our school groove!  It was a hard decision to make.  No neighboring districts (counties, here in Virginia, for the most part) take tuition students.  Both high schools in my county are accredited with warning by the state (and we are assuming will be yet again, based on some press reports), our elementary is also accredited with warning (again, assuming we'll get another warning again this year), and we won't even discuss some of the test scores (recently released).  Our town has agreed to fund the school for the first quarter only, then it's a "we'll see".  There were a lot of cuts to teaching positions to make the budget balance.  There's a lot more to the story, but I think you understand. 

Meanwhile, we'll muscle through and both kids seem to be keeping up with their lessons pretty well.  They are both fast learners.  It's amazing how much you can get through with just two students.

Readers:  If you homeschool yourself, please leave me your best tips!  I have been trying to run a tight ship here, adhering to a schedule of start time at 8 AM and being done by 1-2 PM.