On top of living tiny we also homeschool our children. I am sure some of you are saying “I could never do that”. Well let me give you some encouragement. I NEVER thought I would homeschool my kids. Even early in my faith I just never counted it a possibility. But over time and eventually having kids my heart softened to the thought of it and I started doing research. Here are a few things I realized.
- You do NOT have to be a professor. The curriculum I use give a weekly play by play to follow and for me that is exactly what I needed. There are MANY MANY options.
- Talk to other homeschool moms who have figured it out. Seriously, their information has been invaluable.
- Trial and error is a big part of the process. Not all of my children learn the same way or are interested in the same things (crazy right?). My 10 year old loves to learn about history. My 9 year old loves art and music. and my 6 year old well he prefers to be outside catching frogs and bugs. I had to learn to adapt to their learning style and that took some time. Oh and did I mention it changes??? yeah, so every year is a bit different.
- Look for local Coops in your area. Find a coop that all of my kids love to go to and have made many great friends has been a homeschool lifesaver. One day a week the kids go to a homeschool coop where they get to participate in gym, science, history, music, art, and many other things they love. They have also made some great like minded friends there.
- Sometimes you will want to quit. Its OK!! there are days when I just say “that’s it! I am done, lets find a school”. Mostly these are the days of endless whining over multiplication or spelling. combined with lack of sleep or the hangry monster creeping in. I have learned mental health days for both me and my kids are not going to break their future. In fact teaching them that self care is important is something I struggle with and need reminding of. I often see that even on the days we take for self care we end up learning a lot.
- Don’t let other’s make you feel bad about your journey. People can be opinionated and sometimes they are unable to keep those opinions to themselves. I used to get discouraged and second guess myself and our choices for our family. Heck if I’m being honest I still let people get in my head. But then I watch my kids. I watch as they can read books, Lots of books. I watch as they don’t want to choose the digital watch at the store but the “one with all the numbers”. I listen as my 10 year old spouts off fact after fact about WWI and WWII. That’s when I realize…We did that together. I helped them pursue things they love to learn about and they absorbed it.
- Outside learning and playdates are still learning!! I once thought that learning meant sitting at a table all day and treating them like they were in “public school”. I was literally doing the complete opposite of how I wanted them to learn. So when we got to Nature journaling and learning the parts of the plant I put the books down and we went outside. When we were learning life cycles we found tadpoles and frogs, caterpillar and butterflies, birds nests. Its really cool to get hands on learning.
- You can homeschool anywhere! There are times when our schedule gets busy. An example is when my daughter was doing gymnastics. We needed to be there for the homeschool class which was in the early afternoon. Sometimes my 10 year old would take his sweet time with his school and not finish it. Often I would just pack everyone up and by the time we would get home everyone was too tired to continue school. Then one day I packed up our books along with the kids. Sometimes they would complete it in the car, other times we would work on it at the gym during gymnastics. This taught them that it would need to get done one way or another.
- Motivation is a KEY to success. This is not only for you but for the kids as well. I need to motivate myself to keep on track. I do this sometimes by giving myself a break every 6 weeks if we stay on track. The kids also like this idea but their motivation must come daily. They can’t see the 6 week mark like I can. So instead I have used many different methods. I started when they were little with M&M’s on each problem they need to work on. This was great until they got a bit older. Now its electronics. And yes I am totally the Electronic bad guy. Sometimes its really really hard. I mean they are a built in babysitter. Luckily they are very motivated to get them for their “hour a day”.
- There will be time you won’t understand how to teach something. I would recommend if you are having a hard time with a subject to let others do the work for you. For example I am not great at teaching music. I have friends who are great teachers of music but they have their own schedules and it is often tough to find time. I have used many avenues to either learn what I don’t know, or have someone else teach it. Outschool.com is a great place to find supplemental support for a multitude of subjects. Youtube.com is also a great recourse for teaching specific things.
Alright so I gave you a few pointers. Let me give you something else, The gift of a friend. If you are unsure about homeschool and just need a friend I am here for you. You can feel free to email me any questions or just concerns. I don’t know everything but I will support and guide anyway I can. Hthr62084@yahoo.com.
Thanks for tuning in on todays post. I hope you have a blessed day.
