I’ve been analyzing this whole home school thing for quite some time.
Real fears. Real doubts.
I recently attended a meeting at our local library, where an experienced mom named Janet gave an encouraging talk about her home-school journey.
Met with disapproval from concerned family members and friends, people in her life questioned why they would make the decision to go the “un-traditional” route, and homeschool.
Her home-schooled son is now in his third year in Industrial Design at Emily Carr Institute in Vancouver.
Fantastic.
Her testimonial gave me real hope that I wasn’t going to mess my kids up by keeping them home.
I heard a spectrum of curriculum ideas that night – experiences and preferences ranged from structured environments to the more non-structured “unschooling” model.
One of the most helpful nuggets of wisdom I took away from the evening was:
Whether you choose to skip school on hot sunny days in exchange for an expedition outside, or teach your children in a “school room at home” type setting complete with a lunch hour bell, the important thing is to do what works.
We are starting off with Lifepac curriculum from Alpha Omega for our Language Arts & Mathematics, and some supplemented materials for subjects like Science, Social Studies, Art, History and Geography. I can see myself getting carried away with the latter, as those are the areas I am most excited about teaching.
Since we are so new to this, we don’t actually know what works yet.
We’re just new. Getting our feet wet.
Into week two, the boys seem to be loving it right now. It’s too soon to say if we’ll stick to the exact curriculum we are using right now.
We are moving at the end of this month.
I think we might actually take a break from most of school for the road-trip, and do a unit called “Road Trip USA” focusing on geography.
We’ll see.
And that right there is the thing that I love about homeschooling so far. “We’ll see”.
The freedom to add things if we need to, to take things away – or to change it.
In all of this, I’ve found huge comfort in scripture: “And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.” – Philippians 4:19 (nkjv)
Question: Do you homeschool? Have you in the past?
If so, please drop me a line, or leave a comment. My experience chatting and learning from other homeschool parents has been so encouraging and positive. I would love to hear what you’ve tried – what worked, and what didn’t.