Schooling for the Stays: A Q&A

A Q&A About the Schooling Right Now

Well, as most of you know, we’ve been homeschooling for the past six years. As it comes time that so many of my homeschooling and public school friends back in the States are starting up their school routines, it seemed like I should probably eventually just mention what we’re up to. And... drum roll, please... the three older kids are going to formal school this year!

WHAT?!? you ask. Okay, maybe that’s just me. I had to do a lot of thinking and praying and just taking deep breaths about this. It’s... different. And now for a Q&A.

Where?

A private Steiner/Waldorf school. The educational philosophy meshes with mine surprisingly well, and they do all sorts of awesome things.

Why?

Look, there are a lot of mixed up feelings about this, but I’ll try to sort some of them out. First, the facts: I had happily been planning on continuing to homeschool in Australia and had already connected a little with the homeschool community here. Then I kept on seeing Facebook stuff about the Steiner school here, and it looked honestly amazing. When we came here, there was an open house at Steiner about two weeks later, so we went to check it out.

It’s beautiful. The grounds are lovely and relaxing, the playgrounds are awesome, there’s sticks and dirt and rocks, there’s a garden and just... Well, we went and looked and I sort of teared up because I could tell it would be great, and I didn’t want to do it. The kids were excited about the possibility of another new adventure, of course, and they loved the grounds and met the teachers as well. So, to make a long story short, we signed up! They’ve been in school for term 3 for about a month now.

What’s cool about Steiner?

It’s very hippie. They have gardening, sewing, crocheting/knitting, music (the girls are doing violin, and there’s also recorder and lots of singing), morning tea (just a small snacktime in midmorning), time outside, bushwalks, festivals, etc. They do their lessons by writing their notes in big blank books and illustrating them, and the books are rather lovely in the end. The dress code doesn’t allow for branded clothing or images from movies and TV, etc. They have to wear wide-brimmed hats outside (the girls have worn them elsewhere, and many people recognize them as Steiner kids). Lunches have to be healthy, no packages and processed stuff (okay, this is honestly a pro—healthy!—and a con—eek! no bags of crisps or granola bars). It’s a very slow, rhythm-focused sort of school. Pretty much in philosophy it’s a lot of what I love about homeschooling, but I’m not doing any of it. The kindy area (and the teacher!) is so happy and soothing it makes me feel a little teary sometimes. :)

How are the kids liking it?

The kids are doing really well there so far. They love it and are having a new, very different experience. The 11yo went on a five-day class camp to Uluru and King’s Canyon, with camel and bike riding and hiking and all sorts of fun. She is also learning that the entire school day, every weekday, is tiring. She is handling it very well, though, and adjusting nicely. She got cast as Julius Caesar for their class play, and I’m definitely looking forward to seeing her get stabbed by all her classmates (as is she!).

The 8yo’s camp is coming up (a shorter camp), and she’s excited too, though a little nervous. She is my little creative dreamer, and I was worried that this transition would be hard on her. But her teacher is a lovely woman who understands that all kids have different strengths, and she’s made the 8yo feel at home and help her adjust. It’s lovely to see.

The 5yo has 3.5 days per week, and his teacher (as I already mentioned) is so fantastic. She reminds me a lot of a teacher he had at our homeschool co-op (Mary Kate, we love you!). So chill, so loving and right there with the kids, so focused in on them. Totally unflappable and really kind and just wanting to be supportive of the kids. The whole kindy area is enclosed with a fence to keep it protected and so no one can accidentally wander off, etc. There’s a huge play area with plants and buildings that you can climb in and a huge sandpit and stuff to garden and hammocks and... etc. It’s really lovely. The kids all bring a piece of fruit in the morning that gets cut up for snacks they can graze on when they’re hungry. They each have their own teacup for water. They have weekly breadmaking and a weekly vegetable soup (where the kids all bring vegetables and they make the soup). A weekly bushwalk. Lots of stories and playtime and some sewing. He is really enjoying it and seems happy to be going, and he gives me a giant hug when I come to pick him up.

This leaves me and the 3yo alone most days, which I confess is kinda hard. We’ve done errands a number of times, and we’ve done tons of baking together—more than I normally do. So there are advantages (the baking, the focused attention), but it’s also harder because I’m so used to having other kids helping to entertain him. It has been years and years since I’ve tried to do this with just one kid! It is not my favorite.

And how are you?

Well, there are lots of good things about this, but I’d be lying if I said I was thrilled about all of it. A lot of my negative feelings on the subject are wrapped in insecurities—did I do well enough with homeschooling? am I doing the right thing now? are others going to perceive this as giving up? or will they assume I have suddenly realized that homeschooling was a mistake? Blah blah blah, I could go on for hours about this. But the point is that there are lots of things I worry about, some stupid, some legit. The feelings, they are legion.

Also, I really don’t like being on the daily school schedule (though even that has its benefits—consistency in bedtime and getting up, which is a thing I’ve always struggled with). And having to prepare lunches every. single. day. is pretty much the worst thing ever (I’m only mostly kidding). And did I mention how much I dislike being on someone else’s schedule. Look, I know that’s normal for a lot of the working population of the world. But still, yuck. I almost blew a gasket the other day when I had to call my kid in sick. I am realizing more and more that I have a streak of rebellion, and I think it’s getting wider.

Did I do well enough at homeschooling?

Yes.

Am I doing the right thing now?

Yes.

Are others going to perceive this as giving up?

Maybe. But are they right? No.

Have I suddenly realized that homeschooling was a mistake?

This is possibly one of the things I hate most about the change—the idea that my friends who always thought I was crazy to do it will suddenly believe they were right. I mean, I realize this is stupid to be so worried over what people think, but there it is.

The fact is that NO, homeschooling was not a mistake. It was the right decision until now, just as Steiner is the right decision for the moment. Truthfully, my suspicion is that once this adventure is over, homeschooling will be the right decision again. (Yes, even in high school.) I think that’s the place they’ll do the best in the long run, both for themselves and for others.

Truthfully, I think that doing school for a while like this is going to give them a new appreciation for homeschooling. They knew intellectually, but not yet viscerally, about how much free time they really have always had to pursue their own interests. How little time they had to spend on formal “school” in order to finish all the work that was needed for their grade levels—or more. Now they’re learning it by experience. Both girls have mentioned that it’s so much harder to do all the things they want to do now. So we focus in on what different experiences and learning they’re getting right now—new things they hadn’t done before.

Truthfully, I may be wrong about what the future holds. I was wrong about homeschooling here, for now, so I could be wrong again. Maybe we’ll do... *tries to say the words, gasps* ... public school? (Look, I’m not trying to spit on all my friends who public school. I’m just saying it realllllly isn’t for me, and I’d rather not do it for my kids.) Maybe more private school. Maybe it will be a different style of school altogether. But I’m crossing my fingers and praying for homeschool again.

What will you do next?

Um, oops. I already answered that question above.

Time for another serious moment?

Yes.

I’m still having a lot of ups and downs about school, honestly. I see all the fun new opportunities that they have, and I’m happy about it. I see all the things that they’re missing out on, and I’m sad about it. I get asked what school my kids are in, and it just about kills me that I can just name a school instead of saying, “Oh, we homeschool.” I had no idea how much of my identity had been tied to homeschooling until I voluntarily relinquished it. It has, honestly, left a gaping hole. I’m still figuring out how to fill that and how to leave room for change in the future. The old adage about “the one constant is change,” blah blah blah... I’ve never been great with change, so I’m stretching those muscles and trying some new things. It’s hard, and I miss who I was. But I’ve always really liked Elastigirl, so maybe this is my chance to learn to be more stretchy.

But honestly, don’t you just love having everyone gone from home?

Ummm, the 3yo is still home. So it doesn’t really count. (And no, not really.)

Summary statement?

Change and flexibility and growth: good. Having to pack daily lunches: bad. Outsourcing lunch packing to children: good. Never getting to pack crisps or juice boxes: bad and good. Learning to make healthy muffins and yogurt and whole wheat bread: good.

Net effect of learning to change and do something new: grudgingly good.

Um, homeschool stuff...

So, it turns out that the easiest way that I could think of to quickly get a few photos organized and easily accessible on my phone for my homeschool review was to put them in a blog post. So this for me, guys, not really for you.

And without further ado, some random photos.

Art.

And now PE.

And science.

And other.

Week #2 Review

Week #2 Review

Hey, look at that! Two weeks in a row! Again, in no way is this going to continue. Stop your crazy thinking right there.

This week has been a bit more ho-hum overall, but here are a few highlights.

The most fun thing is that Brice attended a pre-release party for the Magic: The Gathering Ixalan set. He got to go at midnight and play cards for four hours-ish and just have fun.

The most exciting and life-changing thing for our family is that all four children love to sleep together—and Ammon slept through the entire night three of the last four nights (the other night, he only woke once, briefly, and once I settled him down, he went back to sleep). This really is life-changing stuff. For a lot of reasons, none of our children have easily slept for long stretches as babies. And that has been fine, up to a point, but we’re so happy to see that he is growing to love sleeping with the siblings.*

We also rearranged a lot of furniture! You know how much I love rearranging furniture! This time it was in the conservatory (which is just our fancy and completely incorrect name for the third bedroom). This is where the kids have taken to sleeping, but it was just jammed with junk and furniture (ever since we had to move everything out of the living room and I discovered how much happier I was with very little stuff in the living room). But now it’s looking much better.

Also, I hung curtain set #3 of 4. And it turns out my DIY skills are even worse than I realized. It was not my favorite experience ever, and it’s possible I cried. But hey, at least I did my math right when deciding spacing of curtain clips. And also, it’s done. Now onto set #4...

We’re doing a 31-day read-aloud challenge where Coriel, Addra, and I each read aloud for ten minutes. It has been good motivation and practice for Addra—I can already see that she is improving in her skills. She’s our little daydreamer, though; she’d definitely prefer to be read to instead of doing the reading. Still, she’s doing great. (Coriel and I don’t actually need the practice, but it’s a good reminder to me to actually spend time reading picture books with the boys instead of just listening to longer books with the kids.)

Brice and I are both learning Italian using Duolingo. He’s way ahead of me. I’m still back here saying things like, “Io scrivo un libro” (at least it’s semi-true?).

We started up co-op again. It was good and fun to be back. There were also martial arts, babysitting, and a branch potluck. Overall, a nice week. I feel so very blessed to have this life that we live. Even when things are rough, we have each other’s love and the love of the Lord, so I’d say the balance is strongly on the side of life being awesome.

P.S. No pics at the moment. Because reasons.

* This whole topic of sleep is maybe something I’ll write about in greater detail at some point, though I’m likely to offend or annoy or cause eye-rolling in probably every single person who reads it, so ... maybe not?

Beast Academy

 You know what I love? When we get Coriel's next few math books in the mail and we are both so excited to open them up and start reading.

As in, "Hey, Coriel, are you excited about these?"

And Coriel jumps up and down. "Yes yes yes!"

As an avowed math nerd in yesteryear, this makes my heart happy.

Thanks, Beast Academy.

Read Around the World: Baltimore, Maryland

This summer we’ve been reading around the world along with this blog. It’s been fun to read stories set in other cultures and learn some interesting new facts! Here were some of my favorites (in no particular order):

Throw Your Tooth on the Roof, by Selby Beeler (nonfic). What do children around the world do when they lose a tooth?

What the World Eats, by Faith D’Aluisio (nonfic). So fascinating! Photos of what various families around the world eat and how much it costs. The disparities and variety is incredible.

Biblioburro, by Jeanette Winter (nonfic). A former teacher decides to bring books to tiny, remote villages in Colombia.

Seeds of Change: Wangari’s Gift to the World, by Jen Cullerton Johnson (nonfic). Planting trees and help Kenya. The power of a single woman.

A Little Book of Sloth, by Lucy Cooke (nonfic, sort of). Holy adorableness, Batman! Learn real stuff about sloths and look at adorable pictures of sloths and pretty much fall into a sloth-cuteness coma. Seriously.

Diary of a Wombat, by Jackie French (fic). Featuring the cutest wombat sleeping poses ever.

The Seven Chinese Sisters, by Kathy Tucker (fic). Same concept as the Five Chinese Brothers, except for fewer (no) gruesome executions.

The Empty Pot, by Demi (fic). A legend about how a wise emperor chose his heir.

The Problem with Chickens, by Bruce McMillan (fic). How a small Icelandic village keeps eggs.

As part of the journey, everyone who wants to gets to add their own little “Growing Up Around the World” entry. So here’s ours!

– Tell us about your family.

There are six of us: Mom, Dad, and four kiddos ages 8 years to 3 months. We all love to read and love hanging out together.

– Tell us about where you live and how long you’ve lived there.

We live in Maryland, just about ten minutes south of Baltimore. We’ve been here six years now. Before that, we lived in Utah.

– What do you think is unique and special about living where you do?

Fireflies! We love fireflies.

Also, duckpin bowling. It’s a lot like regular bowling, with ten pins and a ball, but the ball is smaller and lighter, without finger holes. Also, you get three throws instead of two, the pins are smaller, and the pins are not reset in between throws.

– What languages are spoken there? If it’s different from English, can you help us learn a few common phrases?

Pretty much English, although our church group also has several families from the Philippines.

– What are some traditional foods there?

Hmmm . . .  people here do seem to like fried chicken a lot. We’re close enough to the South in the USA that there’s a fair amount of “Southern food,” which usually involves frying things. :)

This was the street about three days after this
year's huge snowstorm. Good for sledding.

– Tell us about the climate where you live.

Hot and humid in the summers, cold in the winters. There can be huge snowstorms occasionally, but usually it’s just small snowstorms. Last year there was one big snowstorm over a weekend that shut down all the public schools for a whole week!

– What does school look like for the majority of kids where you live?

Pretty standard American school system—school in the morning and early afternoon, lunch break, recess, all that jazz.

– What does school look like for your family?

When possible, we like to start the day (after breakfast and such) with reading aloud together. We currently have one independent reader (the 8yo), but she likes to be read to as well, for our read-aloud time. The 5yo and 2yo love to be read to endlessly, and sometimes it’s a battle between the 2yo’s picture books and everything we’re actually reading for school. We start with scriptures and maybe some scripture-related videos. Then we usually have a couple of picture books related to what we’re studying during the week—history, musicians and artists, science, etc. Then we read a couple of chapters of a longer book. This is our favorite and most organized time of the day.

The rest of the official “school” portion is a mix of doing math (hooray for Beast Academy!) and language arts for the 8yo and 5yo while appeasing the 2yo and feeding or holding the 3mo. Usually we have one day that has the big science project on it and one day that has a bigger music or art project. Also, we have two co-ops during the regular school year.

The non-school portion of the day is whatever the kids are excited about. There’s tons of pretending games (for pretty much every book the 8yo reads, they end up playing a game where they’re children of the main characters), ooooooodles of books, playing with blocks, playing in the backyard, some TV, lots of drawing, etc.

– Are there any special festivals or traditions you’d like to tell us about related to where you live?

There probably are, but we haven’t done them yet. One great thing about this area, though, is lots of historical stuff. For example, Fort McHenry, which inspired the writing of our national anthem, is here. Baltimore is also home to Edgar Allen Poe!

Chasing the last fireflies of the year.

– If you ever had to move away from where you live, what do you think you’d miss most?

FIREFLIES! I cannot say enough good things about fireflies.

– Do you have a favorite book that takes place in your region/country?

Not so far. We’ll have to try to find one! Although the Mercy Watson books by Kate DiCamillo, set just generally in the South, are some favorites—they’re about a pig who loves toast “with a great deal of butter on it.”

Homeschooling Objection #1: But I need time to myself.

Well, it’s been a while. I blame it on . . . there are too many things I would like to blame this on. Mostly I’ve just been entirely unmotivated to do anything with the blog (and/or anything else). But I’m trying to get off my butt at least a bit again, so here we go.

I thought I’d start up my thoughts on homeschooling again by going through some of the objections that I have had or that other people have mentioned to me about homeschooling. Now that I’ve been doing it for about half the school year, I will also be inserting things I’ve discovered along the way. Probably nothing will be profound, but I think it may help me sort some things out, clarify what I think is great and not-so-great about homeschooling, and help me come to some thoughts about our plan for next year (no, I don’t know yet if we’ll homeschool next year; I’m leaning that way, but pregnancy has majorly thrown me for a loop, and I’m still trying to adjust to the idea of homeschooling with a newborn). Also, I hope that if I have any friends who are trying to decide for themselves, I might give a good idea or thought or two. Maybe.

So, as part of the process of deciding to homeschool, several questions and objections arose. I thought I’d start with an easy one: “I can’t homeschool because I am really looking forward to having some time to get stuff done around the house (or write my novel, or catch up on my soap operas, or whatever).”

There are a couple reasons this was a pretty easy one to deal with, and I didn’t even realize the most obvious reason until Coriel went to half-day, three-day-a-week preschool last year. The most obvious reason? I didn’t have time to myself. I still had my younger child on hand. And actually, now that I had only one kid, I had more work taking care of her than I did when I had two at home. Why? Because they entertain each other. In fact, at the very moment that I am writing this, they are in their room digging through some pile of toys (it sounds like the plastic food, maybe?), and thoroughly having fun. Without my help at all. When it was just me and Addra, she needed a bit more of my attention. Sure, she still sometimes played on her own, but it didn’t last as long. I couldn’t sit down for an extended writing session, for example. Or, um . . . a nap.

Okay, so maybe when all my children are of school age, perhaps I will suddenly start seeing this objection in a new light. Until then, two at home actually is much easier than one. That’s just the way it is for us. (I’ll talk more in future times about how I admit that my kids are super easy-to-homeschool folk; I realize that many kids aren’t.)

The other reason why this objection was easy for me to dismiss is simply that making educational choices for my kids probably shouldn’t rest solely on how much “me” time I want.* As much as I want it to, the world continues to not revolve around me.

That’s all for today, folks. I’ll just leave you with a link to this article that I think has some interesting things to say but that I also don’t necessarily agree with entirely.

*Note: Of course this works in both directions. Just because homeschooling is easier for me sometimes—because they entertain each other—is also not a good reason to make this decision. But it is definitely a perk.

We Now Return You (Briefly) to the Topic of Homeschooling

Okay, here's the thing. I have been thinking a ton about the next several homeschooling-related posts I want to write. I haven't forgotten about it at all. I have lots of thoughts I want to get down just to clarify for myself and to share with anyone else who might be interested. The problem, however, is a complete and total lack of motivation. Ugh. I would like to blame it on this (and frankly, I think it's probably fair to lay some of the blame there), but plenty of people still manage to get things done even when they feel bleh. So . . . whatever.

Anyway, that was not the point of this post. The point was that even though I've been thinking about the homeschooling stuff, I haven't been writing it up. And then, just today, someone shared this video with me, and I thought, "I must pass this on." Here is a teenage boy doing a TED Talk about what he thinks education should be about. In the last few minutes he gets into his curriculum (and wow! is he epic or what?), but the first half or so talks about education and such as a whole.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: I am sure that homeschooling isn't a great solution for everyone. But even if homeschooling doesn't interest you at all, I think the idea behind this boy's talk is fantastic food for thought and should perhaps affect the way we go about teaching our children, both formally and informally.

Okay, here you go:

Why We're Homeschooling, part 2

Her last day of preschool

In which I ponder the liberating possibility that all parents mess up their children.*

Read Part 1 here.

In thinking about homeschooling, there were a few things that came to mind as the Big Questions. One was this: Am I going to mess up my children if I homeschool them?

This is a question that can become an attack on homeschooling from sort of a more public level: “You people are messing up your kids by not sending them to public school with everyone else, you’re depriving them of opportunities and socialization, la la la.” I didn’t mean it that way, though. I meant it on a much more personal, intimate level. Am I personally going to really mess up my kids—give them emotional baggage, forget to teach them important things, make their lives occasionally squirmy and frustrated?

The answer: Yes.

Here is what I think. (And keep in mind that for this discussion, I’m purposely excluding the topic of parents who are actively abusive, neglectful, or in some other way awful. I’m talking only about parents who are generally doing a good job, trying hard, and loving their children.) We all mess up our kids.

We all prepare them to launch out into the world with the best we can give them. We stick a PBJ and a bag of carrots in their life backpacks with a little happy love note written on the napkin. We stuff their school books in there too, maybe a blankie or a stuffed animal to help them feel loved. But then there’s the other stuff we stick in their life backpacks. Those times we didn’t answer their questions because we were too tired or grumpy, the time they overheard us calling them ungrateful in a moment of anger. The way we wanted to read instead of interacting, a haunting certainty that they could be playing their sports or their instruments far better than they were. We stick that stuff in there too, no matter how hard we try not to, no matter how awesome we are as parents.

And hey, even those “perfect” parents can give us baggage. I think I may actually be grateful that I never saw my mom that way. So when my own kids came along, okay, I wasn’t as well prepared as I would have liked. But when I first got angry or tired or sad and had to run in my room to hide, at least I didn’t say to myself, “My mom never would have done that. I must be a terrible person. I will never be as good as she is.” I wasn’t constantly trying to live up to an impossible model of supposed perfection.

Okay, bottom line. We are all of us imperfect people (even the perfect ones). We will make mistakes. They will affect our children, sometimes in unexpected ways. Our children will have to learn to deal with that. Dealing with other people’s mistakes is part of life. The good news, though, is that despite the fact that our parents messed us up, most of us are reasonably well-adjusted individuals, living reasonably decent lives. So there’s hope for our own kids.

For me, this was a very liberating step both in the journey toward homeschooling and in the overall journey of parenting. I was being paralyzed by indecision because I was sure I had to make the absolutely perfect decision, that there was one thing I could do that would make everything else correct. This was, in a word, spazzy. I will do some good stuff and some less good. But in the end, trying something and working at it will be better than just sitting around feeling guilty and worried while I can’t decide.

So there you go: Homeschooling Decision Part 2: Accept that no matter what I decide, I won’t be perfect. And that’s perfectly okay.

*And no, you do not need to be a curmudgeon about this. I am at least sort of kidding. Ish.