Happy Wednesday, friends! Today I am starting a short series of posts from guest authors who have volunteered to share their thoughts on homeschooling. The first post in the series is from Ashley. Please extend to her a warm SortaCrunchy welcome!
My first inclination when sitting down to write
what I want to share about homeschooling was to find some inspirational quote
about the beauty of educating children and proceed from there.
Instead I decided to just be real and to the point. :)
I am by no means an expert on the topic. I have been homeschooling my oldest daughter (age 7) for three years, and my second daughter (age 4.5) will be joining in next fall.
My “decision” to home school my children wasn't really a decision . I was home schooled from the age of eight through high school, so for me, homeschooling wasn't a question. It was a given in my mind, like potty-training or French braiding my girls' hair...homeschooling was just the natural thing to do.
As you can probably guess, my experience being home schooled was extremely positive. I enjoyed the flexibility time-wise, and the freedom it gave me to move through the work at my own pace. My parents kept my sisters and I very involved with other kids through a local home school group and also through church activities, so I never felt isolated. I was also able to enroll in classes at the local community college at the age of sixteen, where I completed all of my more advanced math and sciences.
Homeschooling my own children has been a lot of fun, but also very challenging. My oldest daughter's personality is extremely opposite of mine, so I have had to be flexible and learn how to teach her in the way that works best for her. At first we had a lot of hard days, but once I learned what she needed things went better. Now I feel really thankful for the opportunity it's given me to grow and change.
As far as the things that draw me to homeschooling, there are many. The thing I love the most is the ability to cater the curriculum and schedule specifically to the needs of my children. I'm also so blessed that my kids can be taught everything from a biblical perspective.
Another appeal is that I can give my kids one on one instruction every day. My daughter tends to be a bit fidgety and “day-dreamy”, so I feel that at home she's able to retain more because I can help her stay focused.
We also enjoy the fact that all of the “schoolwork” can easily be finished in a couple of hours. We then have the rest of the day for outside activities, cooking and outings with friends.
The family aspect of homeschooling is another plus. Though my oldest is the only one officially “doing school”, everyone gets to be involved, and the younger ones are learning from their big sister, which is fun to see. An added bonus for our family is the ability to plan our days around my husband's work schedule, which does not include weekends off.
For us, homeschooling is just a perfect fit.
However, I don't want to leave the impression that homeschooling my kids is just easy breezy and no big deal. We have our great days where it's lots of fun and everything goes smoothly. But we also have really hard days when everything goes wrong and everybody (including mom) ends up crying at some point.
A”typical” day usually involves one or two discussions about obedience while trying to complete our work. It also usually involves multiple interruptions by younger siblings and a huge mess (thank you two year old) to clean up by the time all our work is finished.
Just like any other decision you make as a parent, I think it requires a lot of prayer and if it's something that God leads you to do, He'll sustain you through it. I know it's not for everyone, but it's a huge blessing in my life.
Ashley blogs about life, faith, and loving her family at One Ordinary Day.
