Indigo Home Learners

 

Statement of Purpose

Indigo Home Learners are united by the desire to provide a positive and open-minded homeschooling community for our children.

Who We Are

We welcome everyone to our group that is willing to be open-minded and allow others to be who they are without judgment. Within Indigo we welcome people of all religions, races, family makeup, sexual orientation, homeschooling methods and curricula. We do not like to say we are a secular group because for many homeschooling families their faith is a large reason for homeschooling. We as parents accept the opportunity and responsibility to teach our own children about differences and the appreciation of them.

Having said this, we want you to understand that our focus is not on religion or politics, but simply homeschooling and supporting the homeschooling families that are members of our group with friends, fun and good times.

WHAT WE DO

Indigo Home Learners is both a local support group and an online yahoo group. For our support group members, we provide the following to support your homeschooling efforts: a community of friends for parents and children through weekly park days, organized field trips provided by our members, Halloween and other holiday parties, End of the Year BBQ and pool party, Welcome Back BBQ at the park for the entire family, Scholastic book orders, information about homeschooling or educational opportunities around the valley, monthly planning pow-wows to be held at the park, newsletters, yearbooks and large group events such as Academic Fair, Arts Festival, summer time activities, Girl Scouts, once a year large group out-of-town field trip, and Learning Cafés at the park. Our members are encouraged to participate in planning activities for the group. In order to avoid conflicts we ask that you check the calendar on yahoo before scheduling an event to avoid having more than one event in addition to park day in a week. We want your event to have the attendance it deserves!

WEEKLY PARK DAYS

Park days are held each Friday (September through May) from 1-3 p.m. at Fletcher Heights Park. It is located at 8135 W. Lone Cactus Drive in Peoria, which is near Deer Valley Road and 81st Ave inside the Fletcher Heights community. Click here for a map to the park.

YAHOO GROUP AND WEBSITE

Yahoo Groups We have established a free Yahoo group for members. Since we are all busy with our homeschooling endeavors, we have some simple, common sense guidelines to keep the group postings on topic - they'll be sent to you when you join the group. Invites to events that you are personally holding is allowed. If you are going to put an invite on the Yahoo, please be mindful of how you word it so it doesn't look or sound like spam. If you would like to invite the support of group members, you might want to do this through a personal email instead. If an invite comes through the Yahoo and you are not interested, use the power of the delete button.

If at any time there is an issue on Yahoo where things become explosive and damaging to Indigo, the moderators will call or email those involved. If you continue to be explosive, we will moderate you until things calm down. We want to protect the whole from hurt feelings, misunderstandings and generally unkind behaviors.

Indigo has this website to help support your homeschooling efforts. On this website you will see this page as well as other homeschooling resources. Indigo will receive a percentage of all Amazon purchases made through our website link. We also have Paypal to pay memberships and for large events. Also on the web page you will see a member only page. In there is a day in the life of homeschooler within Indigo. There is also a member business directory that you may choose to be listed on. We like to support our members in all ways possible.

WHO CAN JOIN THE SUPPORT GROUP?

We welcome anyone who is willing to abide by our statement of purpose and code of conduct. However, before you are able to join Indigo you must attend 4 park days on trial basis. This will allow us to get to know you and you to get to know us.

MEMBERSHIP OBLIGATIONS

We are a cooperative support group. We ask that each member actively contribute to the support group, knowing that you get support by giving support. Your contribution can consist of planning an event, assisting with an event, contributing materials or knowledge to an activity or event. We recognize that each person's level of contribution may be different, so please don't be concerned - your contribution will be welcomed and appreciated!

Our $25 annual dues (prorated to $15 for members who join after January 31) will be used to pay for room or ramada rentals for block parties, the Arts Festival, and Academic Fair, paper products and drinks for these events, copying of newsletters and member packets and our membership directory.

BENEFITS OF MEMBERSHIP IN THE SUPPORT GROUP

STEPS TO MEMBERSHIP IN THE SUPPORT GROUP

  1. Meeting and visiting with a member of the Advisory at park day.
  2. Attending 4 park days.
  3. Carefully reading this information sheet, and indicating (by signing the membership application) your agreement to abide by the code of conduct, statement of who we are, and statement of purpose.
  4. Completing a membership application that includes a liability waiver.
  5. Payment of annual dues ($25; prorated to $15 for members who join after January 31)

Upon approval you will begin to receive our monthly newsletters, a member directory distributed at park days, and full access to IHL support group activities.

PARENTAL CODE OF CONDUCT

We ask that all our members - parents and children alike - use the Golden Rule ("Do unto others as you would have them do unto you") in their interactions with other members. Should a member continually fail to abide by this code of conduct, he or she will be asked to meet privately with the Advisory to discuss this issue.

MEMBERS OF THE ADVISORY

The Advisory is comprised of three veteran members of IHL. Their duties include: acting as public contacts on behalf of IHL; creating, maintaining or delegating group information services such as monthly newsletters, membership directory, online group/website, etc; maintaining a group calendar; organizing the block parties; managing membership and more.

The Advisory consists of:

SOME WORDS OF WISDOM FROM ROBERT FULGHUM

Excerpted from the book "All I Really Need to Know I Learned In Kindergarten."
(and yes, it might be homeschool kindergarten, but we all know these things)

Share everything. Play Fair. Don't hit people. Put things back where you found them. Clean up your own mess. Don't take things that aren't yours. Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody... Live a balanced life- learn some and think some and draw some and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some... And it is still true, no matter how old you are - when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands, and stick together.

[back to top]