Choosing a Homeschool Philosophy

When we lived in Missouri about half of my friend group was made up of Homeschool parents. I greatly enjoyed watching these friends parent and teach their children. I learned so much about gentle parenting, bringing learning into daily life and homeschool in general.

So when I first decided to homeschool I was familiar with a few different styles because those are ones my friends use. I knew about Unschooling, Waldorf, and Inquiry based learning. I had sent my children to Montessori, Forest and Reggio Emilia preschools so I was familiar with those philosophies in a school setting and knew they could be converted to a home school environment. Based on this prior knowledge I was planning on using a Montessori based learning style.

Then I joined some groups and started hearing all these words I had never heard before.

Charlotte Mason

Classical

Unit Studies

Traditional

Thomas Jefferson.

I'm sure I am forgetting a few. Each time I came across a new philosophy I would start to research and I usually found aspects of the philosophy that resonated with me. My confusion and anxiety started to spike. Making this decision seemed so huge. This is what was going to guide me and help me make future decisions. It would have rules and outlines and when I became lost I could come back to my philosophy. I decided this was the most important decision I needed to make.

Luckily I found a quiz! I love taking quizes. What Hogwarts house are you? What dog breed is your soul mate? What is your love language? If there is a quiz I want to take it. Even those silly quizzes with lots of ads (Buzzfeed I'm looking at you). I found this quiz from Eclectic Homeschooler. She has a more recent quiz with project based and reggio based philosophies added, you can find it here. This was great! Someone else was going to make this decision for me.

Unfortunately, my scores for all of the philosophies were about the same. I took the second test and its results were about the same. That is when I realized that there isn't a scoring system. I don't get in trouble if I have a room set up as a reggio emilia/montessori inspired play space and then do a Unit or Project style lesson. Then focus on learning about Cheetahs because my son wants to learn about them followed by a week of hiking and outdoor exploring. We can pick the parts of the philosophies that work for us and leave off the parts that don't work for us. As long as my children are happy, healthy, learning and thriving we are succeeding. This will be trial and error and what works for one child may not work for another.

So I am doing my own thing and this realization was so freeing. Do you have a homeschool style or philosophy that you follow?

De-Schooling

Running into the gulf on our beach vacation

We started quarantine on March 13th and decisions about the next school year had to be made by April 1. We had lots of serious conversations. Pro/con lists were made. We discussed each child separately and what we felt was best for them emotionally and with their education. After hours of discussion and research we came to the decision I would be homeschooling Kid 2. I jumped straight in and committed fully to this. I joined all the local homeschool groups on facebook. I started reading blog after blog about curriculum. I watched youtube videos about planners and staying organized. I scoured teachers pay teachers for materials. I created amazon wish lists. Basically if it had to do with homeschooling I joined, watched, read and saved. My type A personality was going to research myself into succeeding at this.

At the same time I stared planning. I created an entire summer reading program for us to do. I picked 6 of our favorite books and I planned 2 weeks of activities based on each book. I had pinterest boards and word documents of activities and excel sheets of materials needed. I had crafts and games and snacks planned based on these books. We were going to read the book 2-3 times a day focusing on a common sight words. Then we would do the activities that were age sorted so each child was involved. We would then focus on the sight word doing salt writing, play-dough stamping, body shapes, chalk writing, etc. Finishing the day with another read of the book. The whole time I was planning this program, researching curriculum and trying to find local social groups I was also assisting my oldest with her distance learning which involved 8 zoom meetings a week and 12-16 lessons/activities.

Do you feel tired yet? I'm exhausted just typing it out.

Then we got to May and I realized that we all needed a break. Mostly I needed a break. I had started to retreat from my family. I was spending hours reading instead of sleeping. My patience was gone and I was snapping at my children more. I am an extreme introvert. Staying home is my happy place. Unfortunately with quarantine everyone is home with you. I am used to having my children on me/needing me 24hrs a day most days. Kid3 is still nursing and does not sleep through the night but I had gotten to my breaking point. My anxiety was through the roof and my brain decided the best way to deal with everything was to just do nothing. I was counting down the days to the end of the school year. It was then I realized we didn't need an amazing summer reading program. What we needed was as close to a normal summer as we could get.

They created a water park by putting the hose on the slide

I then decided we needed to fully embrace a period of de-schooling. De-schooling is a transition period where the child and the adult remove the perceptions of what school is supposed to look like and find a new school normal for the family. Our de-schooling is a little different from the typical because Kid1 will be attending school starting in August. I created 2 goals for our summer.

        -Have fun!

        -Work on our emotional/mental health

We have not been perfect, there has been a lot more screen time this year than previous summers. That is my way of detaching when I would normally have playdates and camp days to give myself a break. I have leaned into this and realized that my children will be ok if they get "too much" screen time. Also what is too much?

For our Have Fun goal we have been going to the pool, decorating cookies, eating ice cream. running through the sprinkler, making forts, riding bikes and having dance parties. We also went on a socially distanced family vacation to the beach. It was a wonderful reset for the whole family.

Swimming in the pool

The second goal is a little more structured and geared towards Kid1. Her anxiety has been steadily ramping up. The normal coping mechanisms we have used in the past have not been as helpful lately. So we refocused and started some new things. We have the Peloton app and we created an account for her. She has been doing the meditations daily, sometimes several times a day. She also started doing the yoga classes.

Kid1 doing yoga among the toys

I also purchased the Camp Slumberkins set. Slumberkins is a company that creates items to help early emotional learning. They have stories that help little ones learn social emotional skills. You can also purchase stuffed animals that star in these stories. We have collected a few slumberkins over the last year and my kids love them and the stories. Kid1 will grab the book that relates to an emotion she is feeling if she needs some assistance. In June they released their camp slumberkins program for pre-order. It consisted of 1 large bigfoot stuffed animal and 4 small animal friends. Bigfoot is all about self esteem and the program has him meeting a new friend each week to learn a new lesson about self esteem. Each lesson/friend has 12 activities to go with the lesson. Ours arrived yesterday so we will be starting our 4 weeks on Monday. Unfortunately they are sold out of the program but you can follow on social media for activities to use. I will post through our camp journey on what we do, how it works for us and ways to do this without the actual materials since they are no longer available.

Picture from website of Camp Slumberkins

Did you deschool your kids? What did you do during your deschooling period?

"If its a boy, you should red shirt him"

I didn't understand how intense the conversation about delaying kindergarten was until I was pregnant with my first child. We were due in September and the state we grew up in, and where most of our family still lived at the time, the birthday cut off was the last day of September. We started telling family we were pregnant in the first trimester. We heard the typical responses you would expect:

"Congratulations!"

"We are so happy for you!"

"Wow you are pretty young" (I was 24)

"How long have you been married?" (2 years at that point)

But the one that surprised us the most. Especially because it was said multiple times in the first conversation with people was:

"If it is a boy, You should Red Shirt him"

I was blown away and uncomfortable with this. I laughed it off and then was so relieved when we moved to Missouri when I was 28 weeks pregnant. Missouri's age cut off was August 1. I wasn't going to have to make this decision that apparently could "ruin my child's future". The state did it for me. Yay!

We eventually moved to Georgia before my oldest started Kindergarten. The cut off for Georgia is later than Missouri but my oldest still missed it by 16 days so I still didn't need to make this decision yet.

Then she started Kindergarten and I realized that this was not the kindergarten I attended in the 90s. There was no play centers. Rest time was 15 minutes and stopped after the first month. Students had a 15 minute snack and walk in the morning and a 20 minute recess after lunch. Besides that these 5 and 6 year olds were expected to sit still and pay attention all day. We lucked out and got the only "old school" teacher who fought the school to allow the students to have a 15 minute Centers time which had to include stem related toys, she got the doll house approved because it helps build interpersonal skills with role playing. Basically kindergarten has turned into what 1st grade used to be. I watched my daughter who loved preschool, who role played school at home, who was happy and bright and used to cry on days she didn't have school turn into a child who cried when it was time to leave for school. She came home and had meltdowns everyday for 3 months. It was because she was tired and had worked so hard all day to "be good and sit still" that all the the emotions and built up tension exploded. Sometimes it exploded on the walk home in front of the rest of our neighborhood. My cute, skipping, dancing little girl with pigtails turned into a fire breathing dragon. The same thing happened when we started first grade, I call it the school adjustment period. lots of big emotions and change of routines. First grade was better and the adjustment was much shorter, only 2 weeks.

Very early into Kindergarten year I realized that I would be delaying Kindergarten for both of my boys. I am not delaying because they are boys. I am delaying because I want them to be kids for a little bit longer. I want them to have an extra year to spend the day jumping in puddles or building towers of blocks. Kid 3 has a birthday at the end of July. School here starts August 1 so delaying him is considered normal and the school recommends it when you are registering for kindergarten. But Kid 2 has a birthday in May. He turned 5 last week. We get mixed responses when this is brought up. But our decision is not just based on the Kindergarten year. We are looking ahead to middle school when emotions are volatile and puberty is in full swing. Being a bit older than his peers may help this transition time. We are looking to high school when peer pressure influences most things and being a bit older might lend some maturity to his decisions. We are looking at graduation and the continuing on to independence either at college or some other path. Having that extra year at home will hopefully give him confidence to land on his feet when he is on his own. 

So, I get one more year with my snugly, loving boy. Our home school choice means he will be with me all  day everyday. I am getting more and more excited about this as time goes on. He is the typical middle child and I think this extra year could be the best thing that has ever happened to both him and me.

"I will never home school!"

A funny thing about parenting. If you say you will never do something the Universe will laugh at you and prove you wrong.

"I will never use formula"- Here is a baby that cant latch
"I will never cloth diaper"- Oh you cant breastfeed. Formula and diapers are expensive.
"I will never bedshare"- Here is your second child that will only sleep if held

I learned pretty quick to not make definitive statements about parenting choices. I also became less judgemental about other peoples parenting choices.

I apparently did not learn my lesson completely though. I have said many times over the last 8 years of parenting that I would never homeschool. What is funny is that while I would say it I would flirt with the idea of homeschooling.

I have two big reasons why I didn't want to homeschool. I wasn't making a sweeping uninformed statement. I have so many friends who homeschool and are amazing parents and teachers. I am in awe of their ability and I just could not see myself filling that role.

The first reason was a lack of confidence in myself. There is one large reason but the rest of it is just a self confidence issue. I have always suspected that I have dyslexia. In the last year that suspicion has turned to a knowing, though I have not had a formal test done and I wont. I always knew I had very bad fluency. I love to read and I realized a few years ago that I read every sentence 2-3 times, it is something I automatically do. I now know why I do that. I use the first time to decode the words and then the second time to comprehend. Fantasy books (my favorite type of book) often have made up words that I have not memorized making the process of decoding harder and so I often need 3 times to comprehend. When my oldest started Kindergarten and I started to actively try to help her read things I realized I did not know how to sound out words. I have memorized every word I know. These aspects lead me to not have the confidence to teach my children how to read. If I cant properly sound out words how can I teach them. I have done so much dyslexia research in the last 2 years. I believe my lack of confidence in most things stems from my dyslexia.  My research has taught me small things I do are because of dyslexia, things I thought were normal or just quirks of mine. I also know now that I could outsource that part of learning. If we continue homeschool past this coming school year we will outsource to a Orton-Gillingham tutor.

The second reason is that I am very introverted and have social anxiety. My friends will all be surprised to hear that because I have worked very hard to continually put myself in social situations. But I am most comfortable being in my house and not leaving. This has 2 impacts on a homeschool situation. The first is getting social interaction for your children. I would need to constantly fight my nature to push us to leave the house. We have also moved several times and each time I have to build that network of friends. My friends I have in this city are all moms of kids that were in my daughters kindergarten class. A formal school is an easier way to make friends in a new city. We lived here for over a year before I met these women, most of whom all live within a half mile of my house. I tried so hard to put myself out there in that first year, I went to groups and activities and I was stressed beyond belief the whole time. But something clicked with these women and I am so thankful. I would not have this small village of support if it was not for the public school. The other side of this introverted aspect is that it is very hard to be introverted at home with 3 children all day. I love them dearly but the constant touching and talking is hard to handle. The small break I get when my kids are at school is very helpful for my mental health. All of my children do not go to school at the same time and the youngest is only 1 so I am never truely alone but nap times are the small break I need. I fully subscribe to the fact that I am a better mom when I have a small amount of "me time". That me time will be very hard for me to get when homeschooling which quarantine has shown to me. It is something my husband and I have talked about and we will continue to work on making sure that I get protected "me time" so that I can be a better mom.

These are some pretty deep reasons behind my "I will never homeschool" statement. As with all things we grow as parents and learn how to cope and manage different weaknesses we have. I am still scared that I will not be enough and that I will "mess up" somehow but I feel more prepared now than I would have a few years ago. I am not going to say we are not homeschooling past this year but I will also not say that we will always homeschool. We are going to make school choices each year based on what our children's need are and what is best for the family.

Stuff about me

This is the post about me in case you care about any of this stuff. Im in my early 30s. I met my husband in college and we have been married 10 years and we have 3 kids. I have a bachelors degree in Human Nutrition, Foods and Exercise. I ended up being a personal trainer and fitness instructor after college. It wasn't the plan but it was the job I could get. When my oldest child was born I went part time and was the primary care giver. When my second child turned 6 months old I quit and became a full time stay at home mom.

I am obsessed with coffee. I drink it all day, everyday. I love to read. My favorite genre is Fantasy and science fiction. Though I have been known to fall in the kindle unlimited trashy romance hole.  My main parenting philosophy is Survival! I tend to workout a lot and I live in leggings. Besides that there is not much else that is interesting about me.