Pep Talk To Self & A Reminder

It is amazing how things break down so quickly. What I am saying is that we are unschoolers.

I am going to use the curriculum's that we have as sources every once in awhile but school at homers we are not.

I do ask myself why every year I seem to go through this - try to be regimented and scheduled in learning? Why is it so hard for me to let go?

I get tired of trying to answer the questions-
"What kind of testing is done to make sure your child is up to par?"
"Where does your child stand in comparison to kids in school?"
"What are their weaknesses and strengths in comparison to school kids?"
"Are you sure they are learning what they are supposed to?"
and so on.

My faith founders every September but by October we are back to our natural groove.

Today we were driving in the car and Monkey asks out of the blue "Mom, how do we know atoms exist?" My reply was that I didn't know but dad would be a great person to ask that question or we can look it up when we get home or sometime this week.

It is moments like these that smack me over the head that we are learning all the time. The most important thing is to ensure that they hold on to the curiosity to learn and the desire to ask questions. Not to make sure that every kid is learning the same thing at the same time. Life is not a race it is a journey with the only beginning and end being birth and death. I do not want my kids or myself to dread any part of their day. That does not mean that they don't have to do things that are difficult but if they are doing something difficult they should have a good reason for doing it. Dreading going to school or schooling at home does not help the learning process for us.

Then there is also the statement "children need structure."

Some structure in life is helpful. Dad goes to work M-F 7ish-5ish. Mom works M-W at night. Friday is homeschool group and we have pizza for dinner. Sunday is church. That is just enough structure for our house. Every day they ask what we are doing that day so they know. Sometimes they ask the night before. That is enough. When people are over structured is it possible that they lose the ability to be flexible, easy going, go with the flow? Could getting used to being over structured cause the anxiety of unstructured time? Are we as adults projecting our discomfort with unstructured time onto our kids? Is it that kids with unstructured time seem a bit adventurous, high energy, creative, uncontrolled and that is difficult for most adults to be around? I don't know but my kids seem to be doing fine.

I find myself going back to my original thoughts about school-
Who invented the standards that the kids are supposed to be meeting by X time in their development?
How is that the same for all kids?
Who decided what kids should know? What information is important?
How is school a good example of socialization?
How does school prepare them for life on the outside?

I am a non-conformist and that in itself goes to the root of unschooling - ASK QUESTIONS. I find it very hard to take anything at face value. I have a great need to ask why? Why is it that way? Why should I do what you say? (asked very politely of course) Why should I do that? Why does everyone do it? Why isn't anyone else asking why?

The path of non-conformity does make it more difficult and it is a choice I make and it is not for everyone but it is right for me. I choose to be accountable for my kid's education I can blame no one else if something goes not "wrong" because I cut this path. I cannot blame a bad teacher or the school system.

Accountability is not an easy package to carry and it can be even harder when one is swimming upstream. I am very lucky to have wonderful supportive families walking next to me on their path that they are cutting. And I like to picture us all tromping along singing Supertramps "The Logical Song".