A Mid-Year Evaluation

This is our last week of homeschooling before Christmas Break.  It is usually at this time that I take a few days to decide what has worked for us, what hasn't, and how or if I can remedy the things that aren't working.  It is also when I begin to think about the coming year.  The best chance I have for buying curriculum is at tax return time, which is in February or March, and I usually want to have some idea what I'm doing long before that so I can order and plan.

WHAT IS WORKING
I can honestly say that this year has, for the most part, gone smoothly for Laura.  Though I hated to do it, I switched Laura to a spiral-based math program a few weeks into the new school year.  She promptly took off and is doing very well in math.  She has lost that lost look and is gaining confidence in her skills for the first time in years.

Laura has also become very independent in her work.  She usually only needs me for the read alouds and maybe a question here and there.  She has her planner that I make out, and she just checks things off as she goes.

As for Megan, she has learned a lot in the time since we began doing preschool with her.  She knows all her letters, and is picking up quickly on the sounds those letters make.  She loves the fingerplays we do and is improving greatly with her fine motor skills.

WHAT ISN'T WORKING
This is the hard part... being honest with myself.  Truthfully, most of the issues I am having in our homeschool come from time stresses and boredom.  I only have two children that are homeschooling this year.  I don't know how others with many children homeschooling get it all done!  We've had the addition of my step-daughter full time into our home.  This is a blessing, but the situation demands a lot of attention, even if she is in public school.  My oldest daughter has also had a LOT of health issues this past year, most connected to her type 1 diabetes. She nearly died this past summer, and has struggled since then. She is living at home.  She has had to quit her job due to her health, and is trying to focus on college and getting stronger.  

With all this going on, I am happy Laura has developed a good deal of independence in her studies.  This is a vital skill.  However, there have been a couple of problems.  First, Megan misses out more often than not.  While this isn't a great concern cause she is only four, this has to change.  She will be old enough for Kindergarten in the fall.  I cannot have her left behind cause I have to put other things first.  That isn't responsible of me.

I have also noticed in both girls an air of boredom.  They both, even Megan, have a kind of attitude about school that says they are tolerating it.  Megan is very much a hands-on girl.  She also LOVES to be read to, and we haven't been able to do that as much as I want.

The last issue I am having is just a preference thing.  I have noticed that, with the way we are doing school, it's like we are in different places.  There is a large age gap between Laura and Megan.  With that seven years between them, they don't do much together.  They will never be close in age, but they can still be close.  I am looking to schedule in more time for things like Laura reading to Megan, doing activities together sporadically, and even field trips together.  (I have been horrible about planning field trips.)  I don't like the way we are "doing school" because, even if we aren't using text books, it still feels like "school".  There's no deep love of learning developing.  It's not a matter of pushing through the subjects we don't like... it's all gotten to be routine only broken up by a fun story or two here and there.  Oh, we enjoy some of the projects that we take the time to do.  Laura likes her science activities.  But, there just seems to be something missing. 

We aren't praying together, learning the Bible together, or doing much of anything together.  It's all separate and age segregated... like public school.  I'm jumping from kid to housework to kid, trying to get this box checked and that lesson covered.  Laura is off on her own, doing her own thing.   Megan is playing, waiting for Mom to "do school" with her, or we squeeze in an activity or lesson here and there.

REMEDYING THINGS AND PLANS FOR NEXT YEAR

Some of these issues are up to me to fix.  Sometimes life happens faster than I can adjust, and just trying to roll with the punches hasn't worked.  I also have an image in my head of how I think God wants our homeschool to work when mixed with our lives, and I haven't had the courage to allow for that to happen.  I've let fear run my school, taking baby steps to break from the public school mentality, but no giant leaps.

Isn't learning supposed to be an adventure?  Yeah, well, most often the adventure has been rather dull.  We've focused on bookwork to the exclusion of anything resembling a life of learning.  While we've transitioned to mostly 'living' books, we've been a little too preoccupied with just checking off the boxes in our list of things to do.  We've not done field trips.  We've not included much into our schooling other than curriculum.  We've not had a whole lot of fun.  The most fun Laura has had was when she studied volcanoes last year, and she made, painted, and blew up a volcano with her dad.  That wasn't even a part of our curriculum, but was a Christmas present that I threw in!

I get tired of taking pictures of my children simply reading or doing some photocopied worksheet.

All of this isn't really just a curriculum problem, but more a problem in how I've implemented our school.  I know God should come first, yet I've put bookwork ahead of everything.  Laura is reading and studying the Bible on her own, which is great, but she isn't ever in an place where we are sharing the Bible lessons or devotions.  This kind of goes for every area of our schooling.

Then, in the midst of noticing things, I came to the realization that our finances are going to take a drastic hit in the next year.  It seems like we had just started to recover from my husband's two years of unemployment and cut hours.  This wouldn't ordinarily change our homeschool because we buy supplies and curriculum with tax returns, but now our tax return has many places to go to prepare our family for the cut in income that will happen. (Attempting to become debt-free as much as possible.) Purchasing a homeschool curriculum that would run into well over a grand (closer to $1500) for two children may not be feasible.  And yet, I jumped around so much with Laura in the beginning that I hate to do that again.

Obviously, as we prepare for the holidays, I have several things to consider and pray about.  But, as He always does, I have full confidence that God will guide and direct me in our homeschool path.