Ave Maria Catholic Homeschool Special Ed/K-8 JMJ

Welcome to an Online Catholic Community/Homeschool Service

Consultation

Consultation appointments by phone or Zoom separate and apart from the package homeschool services are available. I am a Special Ed and K-8 teacher in Wisconsin who has also homeschooled my 8 children and reintroduced them into Catholic high schools where they graduated with GPAs from 3.7-4.0 I know what schools teach at every K-8 grade level and about what and how to teach in a homeschool situation. I am also familiar with Special Education in schools. Consultation appointments by phone or Zoom are $40.00 up to an hour. $20.00 up to a half an hour.

Please email me at bcelestin@avemariacatholichomeschool.com to introduce me to your questions and schedule an appointment.

Ave Maria Catholic Homeschool Services

START DATE: August 2024

Due to the comprehensive level of personal service I will be offering, AMCH is limited to 21 families on a first-come, first-served basis. Regardless, I will be maintaining an AMCH waiting list contingent upon hiring other teacher/consultants.

Mission Statement: To enable parents to successfully homeschool their children via readily-available professional, consultation, comprehensive Special Ed or K-8 Regular Ed Traditional Catholic curriculum, tutor sessions, and opportunities to socialize with the AMCH Catholic online community.

Hello! Welcome to all! I am a traditional Catholic and licensed Wisconsin teacher for K-8 and Special Ed classrooms. I have also homeschooled my 8 children and successfully reintroduced them into Catholic high schools. In high school, my children earned 3.7-4.0 GPAs. My goal is to empower parents to teach their own Special Ed or K-8 children through the intercession of Mary to Jesus via expert, personalized, online, phone, and email service. At AMCH, I will not be consigning services to a confusing array of staff. You will be assigned a professional Special Ed or K-8 teacher/consultant who will be easily accessible and responsible with you for all aspects of your children’s homeschool education. Resume, credentials, and references are available upon request.

SERVICES OFFERED

All services are optional. AMCH is here to assist you with your homeschool vision for your family. Choose the services that will empower you to efficiently and comfortably homeschool your child.

Free Tuition

There will be a drawing to determine the one family who will have free tuition. Furthermore, in anticipation of hiring other teacher/consultants, free tuition will be awarded to one family per every 21 families enrolled. This full scholarship will be retained by the same family for as long as they remain with AMCH unless they decide to forfeit it. If the award is resubmitted, another lottery will ensue to determine the next beneficiary from the same teacher’s group. If you wish to add your family’s name to the tuition raffle, please indicate your interest on the AMCH application. If you feel you can easily pay tuition, please prayerfully consider whether or not to add your family’s name.

Informal Academic IEPs (Individualized Education Programs) OR Regular Ed program and Certificates of Accomplishment AND/OR Report Card for Special Education Students

You can homeschool your Special Ed child! As you are the parent, God will provide you with all you need to be successful! Standards for Special Education students in the homeschool environment can be addressed in an informal IEP (Individualized Education Program) which will describe concrete goals for your child for the semester. These goals will be determined after the teacher conducts formal and informal assessments and the parents complete an info form, and a Zoom interview with the teacher.

However, depending on what is discovered through assessment, an IEP may not be the way to go. Because AMCH pupils are permitted to move through the curriculum at their own pace, it may be best for your child to advance through the Regular Ed program even if it’s at a very slow pace and/or with assistive devices. Furthermore, if testing reveals disparate levels of subject skill, it may be appropriate for your student to straddle grades. Hence, the grade level of your child may be ignored in favor of an IEP, loosely set as in the straddling grades scenario, or firmly set as in the progressing through the Regular Ed program approach.

Generally, for Special Education (really for any education at all but notably for Special Ed) the goal is continual improvement starting from wherever your child is now. It’s about noticing and praising small improvements and instilling a love for academics and pride in achievement in your child. Doing this will permanently and positively affect the outcome of your child’s future scholastic and life goals!

Another service offered by AMCH for children with learning difficulties is a Certificate of Accomplishment which can be requested for various realized objectives, e.g., obtaining a grade level for a certain subject, finishing a reader, or knowing addition to 10 or 20. In any case, regardless of whether or not your child moves up a grade in any subject, a Certificate of Accomplishment for improving and working towards goals will be sent out annually to all Special Ed students.

For possible complementary services for your special needs homeschooler from your school district and a summary of important education and federal laws in the US which protect you and your children, please click on the Special Ed Addendum URL on this website.

Record Keeping

When you homeschool, it is essential to keep accurate records of each child’s academic progress as well as attendance. Documenting your child’s academic process would mean copying and sending certain chapter checkups, tests, and/or other work to AMCH. This can be done by taking pictures/video or scanning written assignments and delivering them through email via your phone or computer. AMCH will then grade and store these electronic files while parents will be responsible for maintaining an original work sample folder and a record of homeschool attendance.

Furthermore, parents will need to make note of field trips, extra-curricular activities, classes, clubs, awards, trophies, or special honors. This can be done by simply making a log of the names of the activities or awards and their dates of completion as the year proceeds. At the end of the year, an electronic copy of the list should be sent to AMCH and the original copy filed at home. Moreover, as AMCH will be keeping electronic files of your student’s Certificate of Accomplishments, parents should also include them in their work sample folders at home.

AMCH Curriculum/Assignment Submission Timetable

AMCH curriculum consists of the following subjects: Religion, Math, Writing (Grammar, Style, Expository, Persuasive, Narrative, Descriptive, and Research Paper), Reading (Comprehension, Analysis, Synthesis), Poetry, Classical Music Appreciation, Science (No Evolution), History (American and World), Geography, Art (Art Appreciation, Projects), Handwriting, Typing, and PE/Health.

Note: These are the subjects overall. Not all subjects will be assigned to all grades.

I have taught using many and varied curriculums and am familiar with numerous more which is the reason why AMCH does not promote a homogenous syllabus. With a mind to Catholic scholarship, beauty, and discipline, I am free to choose the best books and programs from all sources and pass that advantage on to you. Also, AMCH is a child-centered homeschool service; if you find curriculum or alternate means of testing that is more expedient for your child, adjustments in AMCH materials and procedures can be made via Zoom/phone meeting or email with your teacher consultant.

Furthermore, there will be an Assignment Submission Timetable to aid you in handing in all pertinent work for a particular grade within ten months which is the usual “year” of school attendance. However, please note that the Assignment Submission Timetable is there to help you keep a good pace of learning at home: you are not required to follow it. Instead, in order for your child to be promoted to the next grade, all work for that grade must be completed and submitted. In this case, it will be the parent’s responsibility to indicate to the teacher/consultant when all work for a certain grade has been submitted.

Lesson Plan by Request

To begin with and to put your mind at ease, most of the lessons in the AMCH workbooks or other forms of curriculum are self-explanatory and easy to follow.

Other lessons lend themselves to helping children to become independent learners by having little written explanations of concepts and directions for follow-up exercises. It is important for children to attempt to read, understand, and do the written exercises on their own. Apart from the fact that independence builds confidence, reading and understanding directions and concepts is an essential skill for modern life in America.

Furthermore, if there is a lesson that should be taught by mom or dad, it doesn’t have to be formal. I believe the creativity and ingenuity of parents, who know their children better than anyone else on the planet, will naturally guide them to scan the material, devise an unwritten strategy of instruction, and successfully teach their children on the fly.

Keep this in mind: Teach your child in the simplest way possible how to do the exercise, making sure to explain what words go with what concepts and offering lots of examples. For instance: “This is a noun. A noun is a person, place, or thing. Here is a person noun-mayor. Here is a place noun-school. Here is a thing noun-toy. Now, you tell me a person noun, a place noun, and a thing noun.”

Also, somewhere in the directions will be action words. Underline them for your child. For example, “Circle all the nouns.” You would want to underline circle and make sure your child knows that it is an action word that tells them exactly what to do. This is also an example of metacognition which refers to teaching your child how to learn and study. Metacognition is important to bring to homeschooling.

In essence, not all lesson plans have to be painstakingly written down. Sometimes writing lesson plans can even be detrimental as people tend to connect to the lesson plan more than to the children they are teaching and lose the forest for the trees. Lesson plans may also prove odious for children who would just rather master the skill quickly and finish their work early. Moreover, curriculum timetables will and need only contain some essential teaching instructions.

However, if you feel that you require a written lesson plan to aid your children in acquiring a difficult concept or make the information special or accessible for your child, you can request to write one with me on Zoom for your weekly consultation or have me write one for you instead of scheduling a weekly consultation. All lesson plans that we write together or that teachers write for parents will be sorted by grade and subject on the AMCH website under AMCH Lesson Plans. In this way, the AMCH community will organically begin to create a wonderful resource for inspiring and helping parents to homeschool their children more effectively, as needed, rather than be bogged down with unnecessary daily lesson plans.

Assessment: Diagnostic (initial), Formative (ongoing), and Summative (end of year)

Following acceptance of your family application, we’ll be conducting diagnostic or initial assessments in the following areas: reading, writing, math, and spelling. Some of this testing will be done in your home with you and some online with the teacher in Zoom sessions. Please note that from August 16th to September15th, your consultation and tutor sessions may be taken up with these assessments. These diagnostics, along with comments and suggestions by the parents, will determine the grade level of students. My primary responsibility is to place children where they will learn, grow, and be successful. Please don’t worry if your child is “behind”. There will be time and strategies within the course of the year, summer, or years following to “catch-up” if you or your child are motivated to do so. In any case, the most important emphasis for learning is that you both feel capable and enjoy your journey in education together!

Formative or ongoing assessments will be conducted throughout the year, as I will be monitoring student progress in conjunction with parents and intervening accordingly. We may decide to switch curriculum, behavior management plans, and/or teaching strategies. In order to solidify and streamline the monitoring process, when you send your child’s work samples, you may also email me with any issues you have encountered. Furthermore, as online tutoring will be an option, you may elect to have me help your child with an especially difficult concept or activity. Also, re-dos (which can count as a tutor session, if you like) are important if a child’s grade on a certain assignment falls below 80%. In my experience, children will begin to pay attention and do their very best if they know that they will have to do an exercise over again. Therefore, it is my advice to revisit concepts or material that your child did not understand or did not pay attention to the first time, so that you send only work that is 80% or higher. Also, if he/she has had to redo an exercise or test more than 2 times after you have gone over the material twice, please contact me, as it may be time to adjust education programs or plans.

Finally, summative assessments will be administered at the end of 5 months and 10 months of your child’s homeschool start date if you have been following the submission dates of the school itinerary. If not, your child will have his summative assessments when he/she has finished the halfway point and then the end point of assignment submissions for his/her current grade.

Summative assessments are like midterms and finals and will provide information on whether or not your student should move on to the next section of the curriculum or the next grade. However, since I will be reviewing student progress carefully and interceding throughout the year, summative assessments should not yield unwanted surprises, but rather confirm your child’s already established level of learning.

Regardless, the main emphasis in education should be the excitement and motivation for learning that you and your child create together as opposed to focusing on grades alone. Passion for learning produces academic excellence! If you love school and learning and share this with your child, he/she will excel within his/her own style and level of learning as a matter of course!

Assistance with Initial Set-up of Homeschool Environment

On the AMCH website, I will be sharing important general information about the set-up of your homeschool. However, it’s essential to recognize that one man’s perfect set-up is another man’s stumbling block. For example, tradition tells us that if students sit at a table and do their work, they are more likely to be alert and successful in their studies. This was not the case for my own children, especially when doing independent assignments with minimal writing. They preferred to sit in a comfortable spot, like in their bed, or lying down on the floor with pillows. This made them happy, and I found that they were more focused when they were happy. Also, I was able to use “casual homeschooling” as a reward if they continued to focus on their work, otherwise they would have to sit at the table for their assignments. Nonetheless, I know from chats with other homeschool moms that this strategy doesn’t work for all families.

In order to be successful at homeschooling, environment and study habits are very important to consider. In the interest of helping you to accommodate your family’s situation, there will be a questionnaire available on the AMCH website. Your answers to the survey will guide you in making your homeschool surroundings a perfect complement to your family’s unique modus operandi.

Daily Personal Email Guidance

All families enrolled may email me once a day with any one question that I will answer within 24 hours. I recognize that sometimes you may need a succinct and careful answer that you will have the option of reviewing or perhaps just a quick, short answer without having to talk over the phone or consult on Zoom. Email answers will be limited to one paragraph or less.

Tutoring

You may use a tutor session for any of your child’s academic needs; however, you may use only one of your two consultation hours per week towards tutoring.

State Homeschool Statutes

Homeschooling is legal in all 50 states. Each state has different homeschooling regulations. If you are road schoolers, you need to follow the homeschooling laws from the state in which you have your driver’s license/vehicle registrations. Below is the link to the homeschooling statutes for all 50 states. For your state regulations, click on the link and then change Wisconsin in the address bar to the name of your state or search the web for “homeschooling laws [your state].” In most places, it’s simply a matter of filing an Intent to Homeschool form with your school district.

https://www.time4learning.com/homeschooling/wisconsin/laws-requirements.html

If you wish to double check your state’s homeschool practices, go to the Homeschool Legal Defense Association. Although I don’t anticipate a need, AMCH curriculum can be personalized to accommodate the differences in state regulations.

For important information regarding state homeschool statutes for Special Ed students, please click on the Special Ed Addendum URL on this website.

Behavior Management Techniques/Personalized Plans

When you homeschool. it is very important that your children do the work you say to do when you ask them to do it. There’s nothing more discouraging to a parent and a child than a continual tug of war over when and how you homeschool. Although there are many parents for whom behavior management plans aren’t necessary, some homeschoolers may find that it’s exactly what they need in order to succeed at teaching as separate from parenting their own children. On the AMCH website, I will discuss several different techniques, but if you find you need more help than that, you can plan a consultation to write up a personalized plan.

What is a behavior management plan? Basically, it is a chart and/or written plan that assigns rewards or consequences to the completion of blocks of work or specific actions, activities, and/or assignments. Rewards and consequences are generally customized to suit the needs of your student. In order to provide further backing for your family and your child’s commitment to adjusting negative behavior, plans can be signed by you, your child, and/or your teacher/consultant.

Twice Weekly Sessions Via Zoom/Phone

Every week each family may schedule two Zoom and/or phone sessions for consultation on any topic related to homeschooling with parent, child, or both, or tutoring with just your child. Please note that only one of the consultation sessions may be taken up with tutoring, re-dos, or requested assessments with your child. Furthermore, a single consultation or tutor session may take up to 1 hour, if needed or desired. Moreover, neither consultations nor tutoring meet-ups may be banked but must take place within the current week. Also, sessions will need to be scheduled weekly by parents who require them on that week. There will be 42 time slots available in order to allow two sessions per family; the time slots will be available on a first-come, first-served basis. The schedule will be cleared each Friday afternoon at around 5pm Central time.

As AMCH is based in Wisconsin, all time slots listed will be in Central time. Here are the time zones and their relation to each other: Pacific time is 2 hours behind Central, Mountain time is 1 hour behind Central, Eastern time is 1 hour ahead of Central. If it’s more complicated for you than that, there is a way to easily find the time in your city and state in comparison to the time in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The following is an example of what to write into the address bar of your Google web browser:

“If it’s 1pm in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, what time is it in Sacramento, California?” By simply inserting the desired Milwaukee-Wisconsin-time and your city and state in the latter half of the sentence, you can make this question your own.

Process for Reentry into Brick and Mortar Catholic Schools

When your student graduates from AMCH in 8th grade or is otherwise going on to another school, AMCH will smooth the way by creating transcripts, writing references, and/or helping to send other important paperwork to the school to which your child is applying.

Modes of In-Person Social Networking for Homeschool Children and Adults

In every state, you can enroll in Catholic homeschool and social/networking associations. Primarily, it is important that your children gain an established sense of being part of a larger Catholic community and have opportunities to socialize with other children. Needless to say, your parish is a good place to start! There are probably other homeschooling families in your church community that you can meet up with for prayer, daily Mass, socializing at the park, field trips to interesting places in your area, or science projects in common, to a name a few activities. There will also be chances for children to serve Our Lord by perhaps singing in the choir, being an altar server, collecting used clothing for the poor, etc. The AMCH website will maintain a list of other specific ways to become involved in your Catholic community.

AMCH Online Rosary

Every week a Zoom session will be held to say a rosary for all the families at AMCH. What a powerful prayer it will be to the Blessed Mother and statement of faith, hope, and love to have our community’s families come together in this way!

Parents of Special Needs Children Brainstorming/Support Group

This is a group for chatting and sharing about the ups and downs of raising and educating special needs children. It also provides a forum for brainstorming ways to help each other assist, educate, motivate, and/or inspire one another’s children.

Popcorn Zoom /Weekly Family Movie

Once a week there will be an online movie discussion, Popcorn Zoom, on the AMCH movie of the week for one, two, or all three (K-3, 4-6, 7-8) of the groups of students and their parents. Parents and their children will watch the AMCH movie selection in their own home at their leisure and then connect to Popcorn Zoom according to the website schedule. It’s not only fun, but it’s also an opportunity to teach children to begin to discern media and make good choices! We’ll be asking probing questions like: “Why was the movie good or why was it bad? What did the movie teach you? Which virtues did a certain character have? Does God approve of the comedy in this movie, why or why not? What made a certain scene sad? Is that character like Jesus, why or why not? Who do you think was the best actor and why? etc. Parents can also come with discussion questions that they would like their children to answer. There won’t be anything formal or written, but it will be more of an exploration of Catholic values, along with an exercise in discernment and discussion.

Friend Time Social Hour

Every week peers can grab a snack and get together to chat on Zoom. On the AMCH website, there will be a form to join and a fun questionnaire where students can list their interests and goals, personality traits, favorite movies, colors, music etc. AMCH will match your child with other children of the same age or interests who will form a club to be named by the participants. Activities that the club could decide to pursue will be listed on the AMCH website: have a debate, discuss topics of common interest, engage in a competition of sorts, play a game, do a project, or just casually chat. Any project which an online club creates and completes together, i.e., designing a website, writing a play, designing and making saint costumes, doing drawings on a theme for an online art display, building mission churches from sugar cubes, etc., can be submitted and graded. There will be two levels of prizes for receiving an A or B. Also, any creative, charitable, or scholastic work done by the group will be displayed on a special page on the website. On May 1st, there will be a St. Joseph Golden Group Award presented to the best project of the year taking into account grade level, excellence in presentation and creativity.

Shoulder to Lean-on

Moms can help fellow AMCH moms who may need an ear to listen, a shoulder to lean on, some advice, or a sounding board. Moms who volunteer can sign up for 2 half hours or 1 continuous hour in their week when they can be available for support.

Mom’s Tea and Chat Zoom

It’s Mom time. Just a relaxing meet-up for Moms with a once a week sign-up to get to know each other, or it could be a session to discuss the topic of the week that will have something to do with the vocation of motherhood. Bring a cup of tea and have some you time!

Dad’s Man Cave

AMCH Dads can get to know each other through Zoom sessions. There will be a weekly hour of discussing a topic on the vocation of being a father, or just an evening of sharing Dad war stories, sport talk, or whatever.

AMCH Snail Mail Pen Pal Program

AMCH offers a pen pal program for K-8 as well as Special Education students. Pupils may choose a pen pal from a list of other children enrolled in the program or write to some child or relative they may already know and love. This program will encourage practice in writing and relationships with Catholic children of similar interests as well as a sense of patience and pride in handwriting and creative writing skills. Please indicate your interest on the AMCH application form.

Report Cards

Report cards will be emailed to you for the midterm when all work for the halfway point of the year has been turned in and graded and, for the final, will be issued when all work for the current grade has been turned in at the end of your school “year”. However, if either your midterms or your finals happen during the summer, that report will be issued to you in September. End of year report cards should be printed and stored along with the original copies of the work you have sent to AMCH for electronic filing. Grades will be calculated by your teacher/consultant from the scanned or photographed papers that you send for record-keeping throughout the year. However, it would be wise to save, personally grade, and file more workbook pages, writing samples, or projects your child completes over and above what you need to send to AMCH. In this way, teacher/consultants can include more scores if you feel your child’s grade is not representative of his/her work.

Generally, grades are calculated by dividing the number of right answers over the total number of answers: i.e., 9/10=90%.The methods for more complicated forms of grading will be outlined on the AMCH website.

Teaching Tips and Techniques

Over the years, I have learned what works and what doesn’t work when teaching children. Some techniques are reserved for certain children while others are largely effective for all; in like manner, some are subject-specific while others are not. I will share what I know on the AMCH website as well as research other methods that I think will benefit AMCH students. These new strategies will be added to a growing list of homeschooling game plans on an ongoing basis.

Flexibility and Creative Problem Solving

AMCH is, above all, here to help you succeed! If you are having issues with administration, teacher/consultants, services offered, or homeschooling, itself, please contact me. While complications are bound to arise, solutions are plentiful; I am confident that any issue can be satisfactorily resolved through cooperation and prayer.

Discounted Book and Material List

AMCH will maintain a list of stores that are selling AMCH curriculum on sale, along with links to the outlets. We will also maintain a list of fellow homeschool parents who are interested in selling their child’s books from previous years at a discount.

Applications Accepted Year-Round

Your start date for your child’s continuing or first-time education may be at anytime during the year except during AMCH summer or vacation weeks/days. The beauty of homeschooling is that your family has the liberty to begin and end at your own pace according to your personal goals for your child.

Curriculum Timetables/Holy Days of Obligation/ Vacation School Calendar

On the AMCH website, there will be Curriculum Timetables that outline what needs to be done daily if you want your child to finish within the 10 months of a usual school year. These optional timetables are only there to assist you in your endeavors. Also, if you get “behind”, don’t panic. There is always time during the summer and even vacations to get things done.

Most school districts will require 180 days per year of homeschooling, but school districts don’t generally specify how many hours in that day or when your child should advance to the next grade level, nor do they specify what homeschooling should look like. Also, although the requirement is there, school districts don’t usually bother to verify by asking for your attendance records. In all my years of homeschooling, I never had to verify attendance for my K-8 children. Regardless, just to be safe, parents should keep an attendance record, even if it seems unlikely that school districts will change their non-interference policy.

There will also be a school calendar on the website to let you know when services will be suspended for vacation or Holy Days of Obligation. Generally, there will be a short Thanksgiving break and longer Christmas and Easter vacations as well as a summer vacation. Despite this, you may either homeschool during vacations according to your own plan for your children or follow the holiday schedule. Additionally, teacher/consultants will be announcing sick/personal days by 7AM of the same day. It will be the parent’s responsibility to reschedule any Zoom/phone appointments. Email correspondence will be deferred until the teacher becomes available again.

Prayer for AMCH and Your Child’s Personal Academic Success

Each Zoom session, phone call, or email, will begin with a Hail Mary or Our Father and (your child’s saint), pray for us. Also, all teachers will be responsible for praying a decade of the rosary every day for their students and parents.

Registration

In order to register with AMCH, you will need to have a computer, printer, internet service, cell phone with camera (or scanner for your computer), and Zoom. Due to the comprehensive level of personal service I will be offering to families, AMCH is limited to 21 families on a first-come, first-served basis. Regardless, I will be maintaining an AMCH waiting list contingent upon hiring other teacher/consultants.

To apply, please fill out the attached family enrollment form at the bottom of the page and submit. All families will be advised of the status of their application within one week of receipt of submission.

Tuition

There will be a monthly fee of $350 from August to May. Fee does not include books. There will be no payments made during the months of June or July.

Payment

Your first payment of $350. will be due on the 15th of the month of your start date. Payment may be made online at the AMCH website via:

US mail (Send a paper check postmarked by the 15th to the address listed on the website.)

Bill pay via your bank to our bank. (Bank information will be listed on the website.)

VISA/Mastercard (There will be a surcharge of $11.)

After that, payment will be due on the 15th of each succeeding month. However, there will be no payments made nor services offered during the months of June or July which, regardless of your family’s starting date, will be summer vacation for AMCH students and staff. Nonetheless, as there will be a set curriculum, you may decide to continue teaching on your own throughout the summer.

“If I had to sum up homeschooling in one word it would be freedom.” Mary Kay Clark

Contact Information

Bernadette Celestin 414-420-5889 (text or phone) or email me at bcelestin@avemariacatholichomeschool.com

Ave Maria Catholic Homeschool Application Form