For all you parents out there who may be considering HOMESCHOOLING, here is a review based on an orientation we attended, conducted by one of the newest homeschool providers in the Philippines: Homeschool of Asia Pacific or HAP. Their website is at http://homeschoolofasiapacific.com.
It's a relatively new homeschool and hubby and I were able to attend the free orientation about a month ago at Eastwood Cybermall. The directress, Mrs. Bev Alarcon, and her husband have been homeschooling for about 3 years. At the live orientation, there were about 4 other couples present with us, and one single lady who was attending in her aunt's behalf. There was also a fellow Catholic mom (I'm not sure if the other parents there were all Catholics), Liza, who has been homeschooling her kids for EIGHT years, using the Catholic Heritage Curricula or CHC from the US. (You can read about Liza's homeschooling journey at their multiply site: http://hofach.multiply.com/).
Anyway, Mrs. Bev's live orientation was quite informative and there was time for question and answer afterwards. Prior to the orientation, each couple/person there (except us, she seemed to have overlooked us) had the chance to introduce themselves and share why they were considering homeschooling. A lot of the parents cited stress on their children as the main reason. Some even had their kids undergo psychiatric care because of the stress they got in school! Gosh, kids these days!
On our part, we came away from the orientation further affirmed of our conviction to homeschool. Although hubby and I did not decide to use HAP as our homeschool provider (I have emailed Mrs. Bev some questions that I preferred to ask her privately and am still waiting for her reply) at least we know that we have other options aside from Bo's Catholic Filipino Academy or CFA. Actually, Mrs. Bev had shared that they had previously homeschooled with CFA but found some regulations that were not agreeable with her and her hubby. As for us, we also went to CFA's office (about a week or two before we attended HAP's Orientation) to inquire about their curriculum. The next parents' orientation is scheduled for next school year, so we were advised to purchase the DVD of the orientation for P50.00. (I'll blog about it in a separate post). Anyway, we were also advised to enroll Tim next year, when he has already turned 4 (on October 10 this year).
Currently, hubby and I are still deciding on WHEN exactly to start and WHAT MATERIALS we will be using.
If you are interested to know more about homeschooling, specifically with Homeschool of Asia Pacific (HAP), you can check out this SlideShare Presentation that Mrs. Bev uploaded online (she is a web developer too, so the HAP website is VERY informative):
View more presentations from Bev Alarcon.
