Sturdy for Common Things

We Homeschool… There I Said It

It was the day before school started back up after winter break and every twenty minutes I was asking myself: “Am I really going to do this?”

And then we did it. This past January, we decided to homeschool my 5-year old for the remainder of the kindergarten school year. It was both challenging and wonderful all rolled up into one big whirlwind, and it completely changed whatever opinions I had previously about homeschooling. Yet, it’s still a very personal decision that has taken awhile for me to be vocal about.

Each homeschooling family have their own unique reasons for making the decision to homeschool. Our reason was that after several months of kindergarten, our 5-year old was shutting down. “I hate school!” she would cry while getting dressed in the morning. Every single morning was a battle to reassure her. She had gone to preschool every weekday since she was 2 and has always loved school. We assumed that this was going to be a natural transition. Maybe this was a phase? Lots of kids have a rough time starting elementary school, but these outbursts lasted for the entire first semester of kindergarten. Along with tantrums in the morning she exhibited extremes of every emotion when she wasn’t in school. Over winter break she transformed back into the kid she was before starting kindergarten. She whistled to herself in the morning. She was different. She was herself. My partner and I worried. We didn’t want her to lose her inquisitive, creative spirit and above all we didn’t want her to hate learning.

Both my partner and I went to public school. My husband is a public high school math teacher. We are big advocates for public education. So, what this post is not about is public school bashing. I love my daughter’s kindergarten teacher and her elementary school, but it just wasn’t working for her. Academically, she was doing well. She has a lot of friends at school. Maybe it was too overwhelming? Maybe we should have waited until she turned six? Maybe we needed to take a step back and reevaluate? I laid all the maybes on the table one night and decided aloud, “Maybe we try homeschooling.”

She didn’t return to school after winter break. Our days found a quiet rhythm. I enjoyed both children being home and taking on the responsibility of my daughter cultivating her learning. She found the flexibility encouraging. I used her interests and natural transitions of the year as a guide for her learning… OUR learning. Sure there were days that were hard and frustrating, but more often than not our days were filled with playing, creating, exploring, and moving at our own pace.

When we first started homeschooling there were a lot of questions. Have you ever thought about sending your child to a therapist to pinpoint why she doesn’t enjoy school? Doesn’t it drive you crazy to have your kids home all the time? Have you thought about private school? What will happen if you go back to work? Isn’t homeschooling extremely time consuming? Aren’t you worried about socialization? These questions were asked out of genuine curiosity or concern, but here’s the thing– We gave a lot of careful consideration to all these questions for weeks. Lots of reading and researching and reaching out to individuals and in the end we decided it was worth a try. If it didn’t work out, well then it was a good experiment. So far, so good! A lesson I continue to learn time and time again as a parent is that sometimes (actually most times) things don’t go as planned. We’re forced to adapt and improvise. We do our best to find what works best for our kids, for our family, and for ourselves. This is what works for us.

Originally, homeschool was a temporary arrangement and now we’re faced with the decision of “Do we keep going? Are we a homeschool family now?” Regardless of what we decide, I’ll always look back fondly on this time and think to myself.. I can’t believe we did it. Even if it was only for 6 months, we did it.