choosing curriculum

Since we're using Switched on Schoolhouse as our basis for curriculum, we'll be ordering ahead to get a bit of a discount. Their website is abysmally difficult to navigate for ordering, but the phone support is always wonderful. Choosing curriculum is always a mix and match affair with a bit of scheduled work (SOS, which the kids can do on computer) and a lot of other stuff we call learning from life experience.

digging

I wonder what he is thinking as he digs. This son of mine has dug many holes in his life. When he was younger, we used to send him out with a shovel when he’d gotten into trouble to work off his energy. Some days it seemed he dug nearly to China. When he got older, he assumed other tasks. When the septic tank needed to be dug up so it could be drained, he stepped in with a shovel and dug through the hardened driveway. When the plumbing in the house backed up, he dug up the cleanout and dealt with the problem while his younger siblings ran around holding their noses.

Ed was the one who usually buried the chickens when they met an untimely end, but I never really hung around for that. The day he buried the family dog, I didn’t know how or if he would make it through, but he dug steadily, and his tears were absorbed by the fresh dirt before anyone could notice.

But today, my son was digging for me. He was the one who found the cat who had been my baby before the babies came along. Peanut had longed to be an outside cat, and that worked out fine as soon as we moved out to the country. Over the years, the children had taken her place in the house, but she was independent enough not to mind too much.

My son didn’t want me to look at her and tried to protect me when he found her. “Mom, you can’t be here,” he said, blocking the entrance to the shed with his body. But I reminded him that seeing her there was better than thinking the coyotes had gotten her. She had died in a warm, comfy spot.

I took the shovel out front, and then my son came and gently removed it from my hand and began to dig a deep, deep hole. We stood in the unexpected rain and I watched this boy who is becoming a man and I wondered what he was thinking as he dug another hole.

Last minute

I'm as bad as the kids!

I tell them to pace themselves, not to leave everything to the last minute, but tonight I found myself up against a few deadlines and writing furiously to get everything completed as promised.

Tomorrow we will scramble to get all the assignments together since we save that for Monday. We assign a full week of work at the beginning of the week. We set up a few guidelines as to how that has to come together, but for the most part, the older kids regulate their work flow pretty well. When they don't, we get to say things like, "I give rides to kids who are caught up." That usually takes care of any additional procrastination.

Sometime in this next week we have to fit in time to build a fence for the goats. There has to be a math lesson in there somewhere. :)

Planning and supervising a child’s educational future is an enormous undertaking. Nearly 7 years ago, our family embraced the challenge of homeschooling, and now 5 of our 8 great kids are school age.

We are often asked why we homeschool—the query came again just this past weekend—and it is a hard question to answer. What started as a makeshift solution to a temporary problem turned into a lifestyle change that strengthened our family bond. Along the way we learned that reasons to homeschool are as diverse as families themselves.

So here we are, at the end of our 7th year, and I get a lot of questions about why, about how-to, and, of course the enduring, "are you out of your mind?" And the answers are because it just feels right, anyway we can, and yes.

For those of you who read my column in the Appeal Democrat, welcome to a more informal look--and occasional rant--at homeschooling life. I'll be posting a link to my website soon, and I am hoping to get my email newsletter in the works now that the school year is drawing to a close and I have a bit more time on my hands. Until then, happy homeschooling!