Week One Verdict

The results are in: we survived our first week of home school.

I feel a little bit like I did after my first week of motherhood. A little dazed. And a little confused why people tend to forget to tell you how much work it is. I mean really, at what point of my many conversations with many people about home schooling do they forget to say, "Yes, I love home schooling my children, but it is a lot of work." Ok, maybe my wonderful friends said that in other ways, maybe I wasn't listening, or maybe it was just left out because they now know what the heck they are doing and it's not so much work any more. Kinda like mothering.

It's the adjustment phase. Not only to I have to implement someone else's prewritten curriculum, but I have to figure out how to fit it in, what order to do what in with which kid, what will motivate them to finish that stinkin' page of vocabulary exercises that should have taken 4 minutes but for some reason that little bump on the ceiling is much more amusing to stare at for an ungodly amount of time. And, of course, what to do with a little 3-year old gem who is hiding behind the door laughing or pretending to be a frog on the school room table or asking me for his 10th snack that morning. Ha! It's kind of like figuring out how to eat, grocery shop, or even use the bathroom when your newborn is requiring every bit of your attention with crying, nursing, or pooping.

These are the moments when I stop and think, "This is a lot of work."

But for some reason, I plug on. I did have two more children, afterall, so the work must've gotten lighter after the "adjustment phase." And I will continue to home school my children even though I have been dreaming about lesson plans for 7 days now.

We have had some fun, I have to say! Ok, we only did 2 of my 5 "Fun First Week of School" ideas, but that's like almost half (pat myself on the back). We went on a scavenger hunt, played in a bucket of rice, made little autobiographies, made stained glass art with melting crayons and wax paper. If you include the "academic" stuff, we hammered out 5 days of Math and Language Arts, stuck animals to a blow-up globe, learned about the earth, learned a few new Spanish words, got our feet wet with the Metric System, and sketched a self-portrait for art. I'd say it was a great week for education in the Mayers' household!

Michelle was happy to find new places to do school work, like doing her math in her brother's little yellow Tonka dumptruck. Or reading under the table. Hey, it beats a desk.

Jacob is working his way up for his first prize on our incentive chart.

Dominic started pre-school at his cousin's house once a week. He learned songs, practiced cutting, and "coloring fast."

I'll give a shout out to my home schooling friends - I never knew how much work you guys had to do for this whole thing, so hats off to you! I'm looking forward to getting passed this learning curve and making it look easy like you! (Ok, not easy, but manageable).