Education is a Life

This has been an interesting term as we have gotten used to days without a "teacher's manual". It has taken a bit of time to find a schedule that suits our family but we are getting there.

I remember when we first started homeschooling my older two children and I thought everything had to be just so. I converted our small bedroom into a little one room schoolhouse complete with train alphabet around the ceiling and desks. (I think I even had a pointer!) My, how the days have changed. We tend to be a bit more relaxed around here. Now the kids do their readings sprawled about on the floor, as they are cooking lunch, or wherever they may be. The atmosphere has changed from the pressure of me having to drill them with information to them being interested and finding out those things on their own. It took me awhile to learn and we have had many curriculum switches and tweaks over the years but I am very grateful for those lessons that I learned in the beginning.

I can feel the shift in the morning. It is almost like putting on a work uniform. I get into "teacher mode" and my tone becomes a bit more professional. "No honey, no we can't play right now, LATIN ROOTS!" as I hurry my children down their checklist for the day. The name of the game is Getting It Done. Fun things are set aside and the work begins.

Homeschooling can be all encompassing. Some days I am working on their schooling from the time I wake until they are put into bed. Since the switch to a Charlotte Mason method there are narrations. Some times endless narrations! In those days, it was worksheets. Oftentimes I wouldn't be able to find the exact form that I was needing and that left me designing my own into the evening hours. Long after the kids would be done for the day I would be on the computer looking up interesting graphics and making tables, trying to build the ultimate tool to drive the lesson home.

We want the best for our kids and homeschooling can be a lot of pressure. If they are not prepared for this world (socially, emotionally, or academically) there is no one to look at but us. Sometimes the weight of it all can take its toll on our attitudes. I get cranky when I am overwhelmed. When I get cranky, everything falls apart. Children are great at being little mirrors. When my attitude sours I see it in my kids first. Play turns into fighting. Tattling (oh the tattling!), snarky comments and quick tempers abound.

The problem with homeschooling is that it can be all encompassing. If we allow it, it can take cuddle time reading a favorite story and turn it into vocabulary drill and what kind of life is that? Homeschool moms don't get to clock out at the end of the day. We are in the throws of building a life. I am with my children almost every moment of every day and when they are grown, I want them to remember me as a mom that was also their teacher -- not a teacher primarily. I don't want to be so drawn into the "next thing" that I miss all of the life in the moment. Our children are growing and memories are being made despite that checklist.

 I give myself permission to choose to be a mom first. I give us permission to enjoy the journey. Practice saying yes to some of the fun things (even if they don't seem like much fun at the time).
Make cookies.
Play the board game.
Give them 15 more minutes.
Read the book. Again.
Color. Build. Play.
Learn something new together.

Let us build a life that includes learning as a benefit to an already full existence.

Morning Time

One of the things that has been lacking in our homeschool day is our morning time. We started out very well when my children were younger but, over the last year, morning time (or morning meeting) has fallen by the wayside. It is such an important tool that we can implement that can change the tone of our day within just a few minutes.

This is the time that I go over my older children's schedules for the day with them and plan when I will have individual time with each. They both have their own clipboard with term assignments to be checked off daily. By year 4, they are responsible for making sure that their work is completed and narrations are given before any free time is allowed. It is important for our daily schedules (and my sanity!) to know when I will hear narrations to keep from interrupting me as I am working or reading to the younger children. Once interrupted, it is hard to get them settled back down again and back on track.

 Morning meeting is also when we typically tackle our group subjects. I spread these subjects throughout the week on my daily checklist. This makes is simple for me and keeps me from letting some of our feast from falling through the cracks. I am excited to get started again and add a bit more structure to our mornings.

You can get my Morning Meeting checklist here. Enjoy!

In the Out of Doors: Learning to See

It is a beautiful fall morning.

The air is crisp and chill; filled with the promise of beautiful foliage in the coming days. Fall is the season I love to breathe in and be outside. It inspires me to go walking with the kids in boots and sweaters and see the artwork that God has created for us.

In Mason's first book, Home Education, she speaks quite a bit about getting children outside. She says, "Never be indoors when you can rightly be without." Those words pricked my conscience. Often we get so caught up in the things that we "have to do" that we miss out on the really important things that Mason intended to be in our everyday journey. The 6 hours outdoors can be daunting when there is so much else beckoning our attention but it is needed for our sanity and our children's.

Too much stuffy indoor air clouds our brains. I know you have experienced it. Cabin fever.

We are nearing the end of our first term and I must admit our time outside has been lacking. However, a true Charlotte Mason education depends on getting our hands dirty, experiencing our world with our five senses, and digging deep into the world that our Father has so lovingly created for us. Painting and drawing and observing the details of His love in everything around us brings us closer to God and to our home around us. However, even more so, she wanted us to spend hours in the outdoors. Formal nature studies have their place but we should also be basking in the fresh air and sunshine and informally getting to know the world around us personally.

 

In the Zen of Seeing,  Fredrick Franck writes," In this 20th century, to stop rushing around, to sit quietly on the grass, to switch off the world and come back to the earth, to allow the eye to see a willow, a bush, a cloud, a leaf... I have learned that what I have not drawn I have rarely seen."

There is the heart of it. We are teaching our children to see. What an important trait to instill in our youth! To be knowledgeable about the things around them. To have natural curiosity. To have a sense of wonder and amazement. All of the things that we try hard to teach and encourage in their schoolwork but can not be found in books, no matter how living that they are. But, they can be found in nature!

I can tell the difference when we have been cooped up too long. Tempers flair and attitudes sour (and that is just me!). The fighting and complaining become almost unbearable. It is amazing to me how much all of that can improve with just a bit of unstructured time in a field or meadow.

So, what doe this look like? Anything you want it to be. As often as the weather allows, we like to do our readings outside. Whither it be out in our local park or just on our own back yard. Nature study doesn't have to be in a forest! There is nature wherever you are. We live smack in the middle of the city and there is always something to take note of.

My y0 kids run wild in the empty spaces of the local park playing at knights with sticks or tag running in the open (sometimes chasing the stray goose). At this tender age, just being away from distraction outside is nature study enough. How often has a sweet chubby hand brought me a flower or fuzzy caterpillar? They are learning to see!

My older children lay out in the grass with their daily lists and books. Nature has a way of making its way in. A busy chattering squirrel. A colorful spider. Clouds overhead. What lovely distractions!

It doesn't have to be as complicated as we tend to make it. Nature journaling and looking up specimens in field guides are a wonderful tool but they can also cause us to miss the forest for the  trees.  Just get outside and get some fresh air. Take the books outside. Sometimes it will
lead to a formal nature study and sometimes not but, whichever the case, it does us all a world of good.