Older Child Adoption and School

When you adopt an older child (meaning school age) what do you do about school? Chances are they may not even know your language when you bring them home.

Here's an idea that just may work and help your bonding process. If you can take some time off work, how about considering homeschooling them. Ideally, you could take the first six months to a year that they are home to do this. When your child first gets home there will be many things they will need to learn. They have the language change, the culture change, and even all new people to get to know and sometimes to even know what a family really is.
I have not adopted an older child so I haven't tried this but I have heard of others who have and it sounded like a good deal to me. After you get the communication thing mastered, you could help them to catch up, if need be, to the grade level they will be entering in the next fall. This would be a great chance to get to know each other better and you can find their talents and interests as you experiment with different subjects and extra curricular subjects/activites, Ex. Art, Woodworking, Sewing, Automotive classes, basketball, tennis, soccer, chess, etc. Let the child choose the subject and see how they do, if they are liking it, then encourage them and see where it goes. Let them try as many different things as they like.
Another thing you could do is to study their country for Social Studies as they may not have learned much about it by living in the orphanage. You could also have them study their new country as they may not know much about it either and this would give them a good handle on where they are now. You may be surprised on how much you would pick up yourself doing this with them. Perhaps if they do know alot about India already, then they could teach you about it and you could get a better handle on where they came from.
I really think this would be a great time for bonding, getting to know your new child and them you, and also good for thier transitioning to a new country , home and school. I think they would really see how much you care for them by going to all this effort to make them feel more at home. You never know, you may both love it so much that you may decide to keep doing it.
If you do take this time to school them, you may want to find some other kids for your child to interact with at other times, especially if there are no other kids in your home.

If you have homeschooled a child who came home at a school age already I would love to hear how it went. Please feel free to leave your comments here.