After reading this post entitled, Homeschool Hubbub: Am I Qualified to Teach? Dani left this comment…
This post was so encouraging. However, I have an almost 5 year old, a three year old, and an almost one year old. Is it really possible for me to home school? I really want to, but I’ve gotta tell you I AM SCARED. There are just so many little kids around here. I feel like I can barely go to the bathroom. Scratch that. I can’t go to the bathroom. How can I do this?
I’m gonna venture to say that as the mom of little ones, you may actually find it easier to home school than finding time to go to the bathroom! Really…it’s true.
When you already have umpteen things to do during the day and feel ragged and worn out, it’s hard to see how you could possibly add something like home schooling your children to your day. When in the world would you do it? What will you have to give up in order to home school? Will you have to sacrifice even more sleep to add something else in?
My kids were 5, 2 and 6-months when I first began to home school our oldest son. In two years, we added another baby to the mix. Our lives were busy, crazy and yes…it was hard to find time to go to the bathroom.
And yet, I don’t remember that adding home school to the schedule really threw me off very much. I was hanging out with the kids all day as it was. Now…I just turned some of that time into our school time. We were already reading books together…now we read our “school books”. We were already exploring new things together (because little ones can’t help but do that all day long!). Now I recognized it for what it was…education in it’s finest form.
“Formal” sit-down school time with a child in his/her first few years of school can really take up about thirty minutes to an hour each day…and that’s it. And…it doesn’t have to be consecutive time! School work time can take place in five minute snatches of time all day long.
In fact…the longer I do this home school thing, the more I realize that “formal education” is not always where all the education takes place anyway.
Life is learning…learning is life.
Our kids are learning during all of their waking hours. It is just up to us to help focus their time on learning things that they need to know in life (and about the One who gave us Life).
So, if you choose to home school…will every day be easy? No way. Will you accomplish everything you want to accomplish every day? Nope. Will you have days where you don’t even crack open a book all day long? Yep. Will you occasionally forget what day it is, lose the science book, break your favorite pencil, spill milk on the couch and want to run to your closet to hide and get away from it all? Sure.
But will you get to watch the light bulbs go on in your child’s head when he/she first learns to read? Will you get to watch them as they discover a brand new concept? Will you get to be the one who enjoys their silly little antics all day long? Oh yes.
And some days…sometimes…you will even make it to the bathroom.
