It is five weeks into our district's first quarter. I spent the summer feverishly making plans for history and science, and, to a lesser degree, English and math. I've done it this way for two years now, ever since I was expecting our seventh child and considered that some structure in our "schooling" might be a good thing as we adjusted to a new addition to our family. Built into this "structure" was permission to deviate from the plans should something better come along. So, I planned, in order to have some "road map" to help us (me?) get back on track after said deviation. Needless to say, there were relatively few deviations.
So, why did I continue in this mode of schoolishness once we had settled into some semblance of a routine with child number seven? Perhaps because I was mistaken that now that the older kids were of jr. high/high school age, that a more natural approach to learning was no longer suitable. That carried into my summer planning, now that it seemed necessary (to me) to have things that were "transcript-worthy" for my oldest. Oh, yes, I was still in control of the curriculum, so I wasn't like those "school-at-home" folks. Or was I???
Six weeks ago it started to dawn on me how much our "schooling" had changed when I went for the "portfolio review" with the assessor we've gone to since beginning our home education journey. It was a good review, with much discussion on how things have gone, how the kids learn best (with rabbit trails on Howard Gardner and Multiple Intelligences, as well as the book Math Doesn't Suck), and an examination on goals in general and the various ways in which they can be achieved. In short, it helped me to see that my plans, while "transcript-worthy", were possibly not the most suitable means for my children to learn "for real."
This was confirmed by the kids when, three weeks into the quarter, I started to hear heavy sighs from the high schooler, "this is stupid" from the jr. high student, and "do I have to do 'x'" by my middle schooler. Where was the joy, the natural curiosity that my children used to have (they still do)? I was killing it with my good-intentioned plans, so I've backed off and have let them lead the way.
The middle schooler who was hating the grammar we were doing, is getting great joy from playing Mad-Libs with anyone who will play (this she discovered on her own). The high schooler oddly ran with the assigned reading of Don Quixote and watched Man of La Mancha last week, noting how "messed up" the sequence of events were in the movie when compared to the portion of the book she read. She found out about the movie from a friend on the deviant ART community where she's been a member for years (which is also where she shares her art and fan fiction, so I know she's productive). The Jr. High kid is putting his energy into the two classes he is taking at the local school and honing his athletic skills. The elementary kids are continuing on their natural learning journeys. One has been tending tadpoles he caught at his brother's football practice, another is perfecting his reading skills in various self-directed ways, and the other is just starting on her reading journey. The toddler is curious and is doing the things that toddlers do.
I'm looking forward to Friday when the district has a day off and we can choose to do something without being tied to the drop-off/pick-up schedule that we're currently tied to.
