We finished our school year May 9th. This year was our best year yet. I’m not entirely sure why because there were
so many days that were more or less “Plan B” days. There were days that didn’t
go according to plan or according to my schedule or the schedule I thought
sounded good…the schedule that looked like a dream come true on paper.
Life rarely goes according to schedule, and one of my goals
is to teach my kids to be flexible, to adapt.
My own personality really, really wants things to go smoothly, according
to MY plan. I like to plan. I like to make lists, and I want to check off
everything on my list.
I want things to go perfectly. But life is not perfect. Things rarely go perfectly.
I worry when the extras don’t fit in or when I only complete
the extras. I worry that we don’t do
enough hands on projects, and on days when we are mostly hands on, I worry we
haven’t had enough structure or bookwork.
I always worry that I haven’t done enough as a mom, as a home educator,
that I haven’t been enough of what I need to be. Have I, gasp,
socialized everyone enough? Or have we been
out and about too much? I have a hard
time finding that happy medium when we’re in the thick of things.
Then, I hear my husband’s voice so many times cheering me
on, telling me that the children are learning a lot more than I think they are…even
when we haven’t checked off every assignment or gone over every little detail. Now that we’re done with our official year, I
can see the big picture of what we’ve learned a little clearer. I am so thankful for this year and the time I’ve
spent with the kids.
Time and time again, I’ve had one or more of the children
begging for another chapter of whichever read aloud we’re doing. I’ve also had them make nonchalant remarks
about the things we’re studying and play games based on the ancient history we’ve
studied. Charades was a good one. One had to act out a historical event, and
the others had to guess which event that was.
I’ve had the kids in the kitchen more…which is a huge
learning curve for me because I don’t really like the mess they make all that much. They are learning a lot of new chores. They’re folding their own laundry and
cleaning their own rooms. They’re
vacuuming and doing the dishes. I’ve always done some chores, but they’re
capable of a lot more than I was giving them credit for. All of this should have started when they were
younger, and I would let them try their hand at things sporadically. But
sometimes I did it all so it would get done right the first time.
Bad idea. Then you have to train them how to do things
they need to know how to do after
they’ve formed so many bad habits. So…chore
lists for everyone. And everyone pitches
in. Period.
Ethan is reading…really, reading. It was a long road to get us to this point,
and there is certainly room for improvement.
But isn’t there always room for improvement for everyone about
something? I am so happy for him. It’s become one of his favorite subjects. Other subjects are going well, but reading is
definitely the highlight of our year for him.
Daniel’s reading is progressing well. He’s reading some every night before bed to
help him sleep. He has a “thing” about
going to sleep. He gets so worried about
being able to sleep, he has a hard time getting to sleep. He’s pretty high strung, so it takes him a
while to wind down. So the fact that he asks for a book to help him relax is a
pretty major deal.
Hannah loves her
school time. She is ready and willing to
do reading, math, handwriting anytime, anywhere. She is the one who begs to have a reading
lesson and then will proceed to ask me for one more. So with her attitude, I think she’s already
doing well. She’s also my little helper
and has a phenomenal attitude regarding chores.
She asks for her own list and gets busy.
Grace was thrilled when we bought her a couple of books for
next year. She, literally, squealed when I brought her books out for her to browse
through. She’s so excited to be at the
big table with the others and even more excited that she has her own
things. It’s a blessing to witness her
enthusiasm.
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