HOW WE CAME TO HOMESCHOOLING
We were one of those families that swore we would never homeschool. Looking back, we can’t even remember why we were against it. Maybe it was the myth that homeschoolers are weird. Maybe it was because we thought our children needed more socialization than homeschoolers had. There are a slew of myths that I could run through to decipher why homeschooling wasn’t for us. That’s just it though: they are myths. And of course that’s easy to say now that we have been homeschooling for a while.
My own little “office” area that now ceases to exist.
How exactly did we come to homeschool? Like many families, we were thrown into it when COVID hit and the schools shut down. Keeping our son home that first year was a no brainer for us personally. I was already staying home with our youngest and it would be easy enough to have them both home together. There was always the idea that he could participate in our district’s online learning program. We didn’t see our kindergartener doing well with sitting at a computer all day. Our only other option was to teach him ourselves. Luckily, I was never afraid or questioned if we could do it. My degree was in Early Childhood Education. Teaching came natural to me. I was also excited to have our own little classroom at home!
Our first year homeschooling looked very different than it does now. Even though we homeschooled that first year, we didn’t plan to do it for more than one year. Because of that, we stuck to a rigid schedule and curriculum that was closer to a public school setting. I wanted to make sure that our son would be able to jump right back into school the following year. It was still fun, exciting, and full of hands-on on learning. And we loved every moment of it!
Back in our first school room when it was called Upstairs Elementary.
Our second year was a different story. We enrolled our son back in public school for first grade. We immediately had mixed feelings after our meet the teacher night. Yet we still sent our son to school for the first day. All was well until our son came home. He already had an assignment he needed to work on. Albeit fun, it was still homework nonetheless. He quickly realized public school wasn’t all the he remembered. We will never forget our conversation at dinner that evening. He asked, “when do I get to spend time with my family?” After our brief conversation, he responded, “well, I don’t want to go to school then.” And that was that. The decision had been made. We pulled him from school, enrolled with a SC Homeschool Association, and went on a field trip the next day!
I can’t advise that we did the right thing in pulling him before our association paperwork went through to the district. It is probably not the correct way to do things in hindsight. We had been here before though. We didn’t have to research anything. We knew the requirements. We know which curriculum we would go with. We knew we could jump right in right away. The next day we ordered curriculum, started our state’s required 180 days, and enjoyed every minute of it.
Homeschooling is now our life. We never question going back to public school. Although we do still ask our children their opinions every year. We find it good to re-evaluate everyone’s feelings as we feel it is a team effort. Some days aren’t always easy, but we wouldn’t want it any other way!