Homeschool, Unbound

We started phonics when my son was three. It was successful in that he read words at three, but not successful because he did so reluctantly. When he began resisting books altogether, I dropped the push to read even though I knew he could read if I forced it. A couple of years later, he picked up a basic reader and read the whole thing in my lap. The day before he wasn’t reading and nothing new happened in our lives, but apparently something magical happened in his brain, and he was willingly reading. He’s had his nose stuck in a book ever since. I walked away from that experience unable to shake the questions: What if his moment for reading was meant to happen at seven? Would he have endured a year or two of pressure that created a world of anxiety around reading instead? Would he have missed out on this love of reading altogether?

After my son’s first semester of second grade, my husband and I found ourselves with a list of cons about my son’s public school experience that greatly outweighed the pros. Both of us experienced a mix of homeschool, private and public school growing up. We felt that the homeschool years were the ones we were most ourselves and grew in well-roundedness that enriched our lives even into adulthood. We didn’t struggle with stereotypical worries about homeschooled kids, as our experience showed us homeschool could mean freedom, not isolation. We took the plunge.

I found the first year adjusting to homeschool, after time spent in the traditional model of school, to be a little like the newborn year. Suddenly my child was with me all day everyday again; that seven or eight-hour window of solitude and uninterrupted work wasn’t mine anymore. Some people questioned our decision out loud. I tried to be an expert, but I was truly just winging it some days – a lot of days. My little angel wasn’t as easy to teach as I thought he would be. I struggled with not living up to the fairytale image of homeschooling I had concocted in my head. It was just an awkward year. In addition to the personal struggle, I fell straight into repeating some of the issues we set out to avoid. I tried to replicate the standard school experience at home. We drowned in workbooks, lesson plans, disconnected ideas, and an exhausting schedule of disjointed programs for “socialization” as we made the public school our standard of comparison. My son wasn’t thrilled to wake up to a new homeschool day as I’d hoped, and I had missed my ambitious mark of inspiring lifelong learning in my seven-yearold.

I needed to reset, but I wasn’t finding clarity by diving further into education theory. Looking back, there were a few main ideas that set us on the path to a restful place where confidence grows and learning happens.

12131415First, we began with prose not pros. Trying to change the educational philosophy as a reset point would have added even more stress to our day. We started instead with lots of books. We were no longer limited six subjects; we probably learned about fifty! We found that a series of beautifully illustrated informational books was much more inviting than a third grade textbook. It sparked a new interest in learning, and a starting point.

We also looked to the longed-for benefits to shape our schedule. Why not begin planning with the items on the “pros” list that brought us to homeschool instead of trying to do a better job at everything on the cons list? We wanted freedom of schedule, so we planned a couple vacations in the season where most families are in school, the rates are cheaper, and the lines aren’t so long. I didn’t want to nag my kid off to school five days a week, so we worked on a peaceful morning routine. I wanted to see my son outdoors more, so he enrolled in a wilderness program, and we joined a nature outing group that his little sisters can attend. Some of the rewards of homeschooling can be enjoyed up front!

One year, we did the bare minimum in way of core subjects for a period. I took the advice of a seasoned homeschool mom and professional teacher and took a year of rest. We condensed structured curriculum to three hours of our day and filled the rest of the time with only what my son wanted to learn. I made things available to him and learned what he gravitates towards. I found my son at the piano at least five times a day. I found him lost in library books for hours. I now find him taking French lessons on apps and asking for presents like a portable chess set and wood puzzles, because he wants to challenge himself. What kids gravitate towards easily become the areas that teach endurance and lead to confidence.

My objective changed, and my goal became a well-rounded human, not a high scoring student. The walls containing school at home fell away. We found science in the forest and math at the grocery store. He began discussing literature with my friends at random, and the pressure to force discussion questions left me. The real life lessons, though, mean even more to me. My son is home as we raise his newborn and toddler sisters, and this teaches him more about parenting and child development than a classroom ever could. His involvement in wilderness school has gifted him adventure skills and character lessons. Today during school hours, he jumped into a freezing lake with his friends and ran back to warm up next to a bonfire built with a fire kit they made themselves. He learned more about himself through that exercise than passing a test. Learning becomes a way of life in homeschool.

Finally, I learned to check my ego at the door. This year, we enrolled my seventh grader in a rigorous classical homeschool program where he attends a class twice a week in an environment of engaged students with a qualified teacher. He was ready for a challenge and craved regular time with other students at the same time that we added a new baby to our family. I’ve found that homeschooling is individualized, and gone are the days where it meant you were an island if you don’t want to be!

I certainly can’t boast that we started a superstar curriculum series and stuck with it for six years. Or that we have perfectly decorated a school room and find ourselves smiling at the school table at eight in the morning after a lovely family breakfast and full night’s sleep. I find those families to be in the minority of homeschoolers (and I wonder if those minority homeschoolers are fibbing just a little). I did find that those magical light bulb moments I first experienced with my son as he read in my lap happen many times over in a child’s education, in their own time. Homeschool is an invitation for these discoveries to occur in a restful setting and an opportunity to savor them with my children. And that, my friends, is the good stuff.

Words and Photography by Jennifer Townshend