My daughter, three years ago at age 12, felt that she could go at a faster pace on her own, so she asked to be home-schooled. We were really nervous at first b

My daughter, three years ago at age 12, felt that she could go at a faster pace on her own, so she asked to be home-schooled. We were really nervous at first but it's been great and agency is the reason. She still takes math at school but that's usually her only class. Otherwise she's doing things. She's gone to Florence (with us) to take art classes there. (She wants to be an artist or author.) That first year she made a video game (#17 here https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2018-01-02 https://news.ycombinator.com/front?day=2018-01-02), and this last year she wrote an 80,000 word crime novel. If she can get the kind of score on the SAT that she's getting on practice tests, she has a good chance of going to one of the schools that she wants. (Her early application choice is Yale.) She's doing things and that gives her meaning to what she's learning. It's not just words on a page but something that she sees value in knowing. We get a lot of eye-rolls when we say she's home-schooled but for her, it's been a game changer. And agency is a big part of that.