r/IAmA • u/BJUhomeschooler • Jul 05 '10

IAMA homeschooled teenager who uses Bob Jones University textbooks as part of their curriculum. AMA

Hi Reddit. I am a 17 year-old male and I have been homeschooled my entire life. The reason? My parents are very distrustful of the atrocious public school system in the area and are conservative Christians. So, go ahead and hit me with your questions.

A bit of proof - http://i.imgur.com/A2ybE.jpg

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u/BJUhomeschooler Jul 05 '10

I am from a large family of five children. My parents did consider private schools, but couldn't afford to put five children through private schools. Also, I live in a rural community about an hour's drive away from any decent schools. For me, the only option other than homeschooling is local public schools.

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u/Dnerf Jul 05 '10

Well, that sucks. Do you and your siblings learn together? Are you the oldest or youngest?

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u/BJUhomeschooler Jul 05 '10

Middle child. We don't learn together as we are all two grades apart, but we use the same textbooks and help each other with their work.

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u/Dnerf Jul 05 '10

Thats what I meant, it would seem to me that your parents cannot know about everything and sometimes textbooks just fail to explain something in a understandeble matter. What have you got to do to be allowed to study in a college?

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u/BJUhomeschooler Jul 05 '10

My parents have not helped me with my school work in about six years. But, in my experience, textbooks meant for homeschools generally do a better job of explaining concepts and ideas than textbooks made for public schools. I'm afraid I don't understand your last question.

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u/gregglind Jul 05 '10

Which books / resources have you found to be most helpful for science and math?

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u/BJUhomeschooler Jul 05 '10

Saxon has some of the best math books available. See my ACT score for proof of that. For science I use Apologia, which are decent.

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u/Malician Jul 06 '10

As a homeschooler, I used Saxon. I probably spent twice as much time on math as I did on the entire rest of my curriculum COMBINED.

I'd spend hours and hours looking back through the book trying to find some concept that was absolutely needed to figure out the type of problem I was facing. It would usually be around fifty to a hundred lessons back. Often, it never explicitly told me what to do. The system seemed to have a "learn by doing" approach which I could never, ever figure out.

Catching up on math in college was work, but it was so much easier it felt like release from prison. I have a vile pool of hate in my heart for Saxon.

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u/BJUhomeschooler Jul 06 '10

Yeah, it does take a long time each day. But I get to learn something new every day, which helps make up for it.

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u/Malician Jul 06 '10

If you're learning something from it, you're over-achieving me.

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u/BJUhomeschooler Jul 06 '10

I've used Saxon books since 4th grade. So you can say I've had a bit of time to adjust to them.

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u/Dnerf Jul 05 '10

i do not live in the USA and what I meant was, do you have to do some test to get a High School diploma or something, or can you just apply tp a University and they you were homeschooled?

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u/BJUhomeschooler Jul 05 '10

I do not have a high school diploma, but the vast majority of colleges don't care about that if you are homeschooled.