I was nervous to start our first day of home school. I had butterflies in my stomach. I was tense. Could I teach kids at different learning levels at the same time? How would that not be distracting? Could I cover a variety of subjects all by myself? A good amount of freedom can be found in home-schooling and yet, I still put myself in a box. A box of other people’s unmentioned standards. The pressure from these imaginary home-school rule makers left me feeling ill-equipped. Then it hit me one afternoon, the only person putting unrealistic pressure on our home-school journey was me. No one was yelling at me to get it all perfect. It was my own thoughts that were skewing the view.
Honestly, my kids were so ready to absorb this time together. We were in need of connection after a crazy summer. In those first weeks of schooling we had some bumps in learning style, but I allowed us to pivot to a better method. We were using our new found home-school freedom! I started to see them thrive and we all found a groove in our Monday through Friday schedule. They have different motivators and I began making sure to use what I was learning from them. I had to make room for their voices in this process too.
My kids are blossoming now. I keep reminding myself that this is a special year for us all. That the freedom and time we have to dive into subjects might not always be available to us. We go head strong into the topics that they love and we work through the ones that challenge them. When my oldest sighs and gets discouraged at having to erase a wrong answer I usually reply, “They have an eraser at the end of every pencil for a reason, we all make mistakes. No one is perfect”.
We’ve had conversations about grace and how important it is to give grace to ourselves too. We have talked about failure and how it’s usually through our mistakes that we tend to learn the most. I have touted my amazing skills with erasers…and it’s only because I’ve had a lot of practice with them. Our breaks in the school day include jumping jacks, outside time, a snack, silly songs, learning games on the tablet, and free play. We have time for them to build forts, set up their own grocery store, play with play-doh, enjoy kinetic sand, and explore water coloring. We use a lot of these toys on this list during our play times!
I know that I’m not going to regret this one-on-one time with my kids. Other bumps in our home-school journey will come our way, I’m sure of it. The days are not perfect, but we get to do them together. And if I told you that doubts didn’t still come my way, I’d be lying. They do, but I know what I’ve been called to do and I will not back down from this task.
I try to remind myself that they won’t always be little. They won’t always want to jump in my lap every time I sit down to catch my breath before we tackle the next part of our day. This time is precious, tough, a challenge, a blessing, and a wild ride. To all who are in the home-school journey as well, I pray that God would continue to fill your cup. That you would find encouragement when you need it and that His unending grace and love would cover your family this season.
Sincerely,
Erin aka Coffee Mama Bear
