Many families choose to meet state assessment requirements by having a certified teacher review their child's work. This can be a fun opportunity for parents and children to look back at all they have explored and accomplished over the past year and reflect on highlights and growth. Rebecca enjoys meeting with families and hearing about their many interesting learning experiences. She is open to a variety of different approaches to learning at home, including unschooling, and her assessment process is nonjudgmental and informal, yet thorough. She is also happy to offer impressions and suggestions when parents request this.

Typical Assessment Procedure:

1. Contact Rebecca to schedule. It is advisable to do this at least 4 weeks before you hope to meet. In 2011, assessment appointments will be available between June 6th and August 18th (although earlier may be possible). Plan to set aside about 1 hour per child, although sometimes the review does not take this long. Rebecca can meet with you at her home in Plainfield, in Montpelier, or at another mutually convenient location.

2. If you submitted a curriculum outline to the Home Study office for the current homeschool year, please send this to Rebecca by post or email about a week before your assessment meeting. Don't worry if you didn't follow it exactly! You are also welcome (but not expected) to send any written summaries or other documentation you choose to share in advance.

3. Rebecca will spend about an hour with you and your child, looking over work samples and documentation and discussing your child's learning activities. No formal testing will take place and Rebecca is committed to keeping the process non-threatening for children and parents alike. Sometimes children or parents are nervous in anticipation of the meeting.  Please try to think of this as an opportunity to share what you have been doing with an interested person.  Rebecca approaches the assessment with the assumption that the child has made progress, so the focus is on looking at and discussing examples of that progress, some of which will then be documented on the state form.  In order to meet the state requirements, she may ask questions to confirm that your child progressed in each area of the minimum course of study (e.g. What was new that you learned/did this year? What did you get better at?). Occasionally, if documentation doesn’t show a child’s current level of basic skills, Rebecca may ask him/her to read aloud, write briefly, or do a few math problems. Usually this is not necessary and the assessment takes the form of a conversation and “show and tell”. Sometimes children enjoy reading aloud, playing a musical instrument, or in other ways demonstrating what they’ve learned. Please bring the following to your assessment meeting:

• Your child
• Some of the following (as applicable): projects, artwork, photos, writing samples, journals, brochures from field trips, books used, skill practice, parent notes on learning activities, etc.
• If possible: a list of some or all of the books your child has read and/or listened to this year, samples of math and writing work from different times in the homeschool year (these don’t need to be formal if you unschool)
• A book your child is currently reading or has read recently, which s/he would be comfortable reading aloud
• Information about any identified disability and the adaptations made to address it

4. Within two or three weeks of meeting with you, Rebecca will fill out the form required by the Home Study office or write an official letter and send it to you to include with your new enrollment paperwork. If she has any questions about your child’s progress, she will address these with you before completing the form/letter so that you can discuss the situation further together. The form/letter will mention some of the documentation Rebecca saw during the assessment and some of the other things your child did this year, including a few details about what your child learned in each area of the minimum course of study.