I haven’t talked much about homeschooling yet. We started our 7th year about 4 weeks ago. One month of school already completed. The boys are in 5th grade this year. We repeated 2nd grade because of their reading struggles. I say repeated like we actually redid all the work. I suppose a more accurate description is that it took us 2 years to complete second grade.
We did also hold them back a year at Sunday School. They didn’t mesh super great with the class they were in and in 3rd grade they could start acolyting. I didn’t feel like they were ready for that job yet and we didn’t want them to miss a whole year. It has turned out to be one of the very best decisions we have made. They mesh better with the kids in their current class and it gave them time to grow up a bit. When I think about it now I also know they would not be ready for confirmation class this year.
So 5th grade. For me 5th grade was the last year of elementary school. Many of the school districts around us do it a bit differently now. I have friends whose children stay in the elementary school through 6th grade. Other friends go to schools where 5th and 6th grade are in an intermediate school. Our local district follows that model I think. When I think 5th grade I think final year of elementary school. I vividly remember 5th grade. It was the year that wearing a bra was no longer an option. Most of my friends “wore a bra” because it was “cute”. (Insert big eye roll here.)
None of this is why I sat down to write about homeschool though. I wanted to write about it tonight because today turned into quite the meltdown for me.
A brand new curriculum is about to be released and I just found out about it. Of course, I have all of our school materials and we are a month into our year. But I have a master’s degree in curriculum and instruction. I cannot NOT look at curriculum! So I did. And…I fell in love.
The problem is, it is so very different than what we do now. We basically do public school at home. I taught school. I have two degrees in education. My teacher brain does school in one way. We have desks. They have books. We do one subject and then another. I have lists that I check off. I have spelling rules on the wall for them to refer to. School.
Of course we are a bit different too. We do Bible study and some of our course references God and a Christian view point. (This is pretty limited because I have issues with only studying Christian world view. And also science. I taught science. You will not convince me that science is a conjob and that dinosaurs roamed the earth at the beginning of the Bible.) We also don’t do common core math. (Insert another eye roll here.) We also learned cursive, although I hear it is starting to make a comeback to public schools. School doesn’t take us 7-8 hours a day. There are other differences but I think you get the main idea.
This new curriculum though, I don’t know. It speaks to my heart and soul. As I looked it over I started to feel a deep ache that THIS is what school could be. It could be more organic and less structured. I could inspire curiosity and the love of learning. It could be more than turning to the next lesson and crossing off another thing mastered.
It isn’t that I think there is anything wrong with the traditional way of education. It isn’t perfect but it isn’t inherently wrong. We have quite a bit of freedom in Texas as far as homeschooling our children is concerned. And suddenly it feels like maybe I am not make the most of it.
I expressed my stress to Carole and to Nathan. What if I am choosing wrong? What if another way might nurture my children better? What if?
My husband assured me that I am doing the right thing. I looked at him and said, “Says the public school teacher an super organized athletic trainer.” He laughed. Honestly, he will support me no matter the choice. I have that master’s degree that says I know what I am doing, right?
The more I spilled words into long texts and the more I thought everything through, the more it felt like I was going through a mid-point crisis. We are almost half-way through our schooling afterall. And a mid-life crisis is a time when you look frantically around and wonder if you have made the right choices. It feels like I missed my chance. If I subscribe to the public school method of learning we are at the point where it is time for school to become more academic and more intense to prepare them for life beyond graduation. More homework, more tests, more expectations! Elementary years are the soft years for exploration and alternative school choices.
Only, we haven’t chosen public school as our path. We have our reasons, but one of the main reasons is because Nathan and I both strongly disagree with state testing and the educational philosophy that supports it.
My brain has been completely wrapped up in this all afternoon and evening. After dinner a thought occurred to me, “Maybe this isn’t about a new curriculum. Maybe this is about me letting go of my tight grip just a little. Maybe my soul isn’t longing for something new and shiny and different. Maybe it just wants me to relax a bit more and enjoy the journey and my children as they learn and discover.”
I am not sure how to really let go. If I don’t have a plan what will we do? If I don’t follow the plan I do have what will happen? What if we spend an entire morning following rabbit trails as we study a particular state? What if we spend days learning about Abraham Lincoln because they are so very interested in him? What if I try out one month of that curriculum and see how it feels?
Today was a good day of school for us. We accomplished all of the things on my list. We tried a different spanish app because the first one I chose was a bit too frustrating. We worked on our state study. They did math. Our ELA workbook involved reading the Bible story where Jesus calms the storm. We also sat for 30 minutes or more reading history and discussing how pre-civil war United States has quite a bit in common with current day United States. It was good conversation. In science we played with magnets. I left the lab supplies out and they kept coming back over and over all day long and were eager to share what they had discovered with Nathan tonight.
So maybe everything is okay in our little homeschool. Midway through writing this post I looked over at the white board, which has not been erased. The picture caption from the Bible story is still written there in my very best cursive.
“Jesus calms a raging storm.”
Perhaps it is time to learn my own lesson today and let God lead me in the way that he wants me to go. Perhaps my mind is a raging storm because my grip is too tight.
More Than Expected 