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Shifting Priorities

Devona 1 Comment

First, a nod to our new ten-year-old who inspired us to blog. Happy birthday to our sweet O (I’ve made the choice to start using initials in our blog posts and public social accounts because the kids are getting old enough to require that level of privacy). I feel honored to be her mother, and am overjoyed at the young woman she is becoming. You can see some one of her awesome ideas here.

Next, some news about our family and me. Moving to California was a really great choice. We’re all very happy here and thriving. Rob is enjoying his new job (if not so much the commute). Homeschooling has been a great choice as well, and the girls are learning just as quickly as they were in traditional school, but they are getting more sleep and living with less stress and hurriedness. I’m hopeful that as they get older and become more skilled at balancing their own priorities they’ll start learning even more deeply the things which they are most interested in. It’s already happening to some degree, like with From Scratch News, but I can see so much more potential for growth with all the free time homeschooling can provide.

And now for the sad news. Honestly, I’m not sure how public I’ve been with this because of how difficult it was to come to the decision. I’ve decided to take a longer hiatus from doula work. I waited about 6 months after our move to start working, and I was getting some opportunities to work which excited me. Without giving away any private info about my clients, the births were so much harder on my kids and on Rob here in CA than they were in Ohio. Having family to pull together to help out was such a difference in support for us, and without it the kids were really suffering. When O is old enough to be the babysitter for an hour or two, I’ll head back to doula work but in the meantime I need to put my kids and homeschooling first. I spilled a few tears, but it’s time to move on.

So what am I doing instead? Everyone knows I’m too high energy to not have something going on the side. It’s not easy finding work I can do which I can keep in the margins of my first priority which is schooling and raising these girls. But I have a few solutions which are working out well. I’m teaching sewing classes on Friday afternoons while the girls are away at their enrichment classes. I’m building websites for friends here and there which is fun. But I’m most excited about a manuscript I’ve finished for a children’s picture book. I’m in the company of a couple of children’s authors in my kids’ park day (here and here) and it has inspired me to take my own shot at it. I’m in the editing phase but plan to be submitting it to publishers in the coming months. Leads and personal experience is definitely welcome.

When people told me that it would take a year to settle in after a move, I believed them. But what I didn’t expect was that a cross country move wouldn’t just change my location, but it would also change my priorities. A lot of the plans and work I was doing were very location-centric. I haven’t really changed the person I am through moving, but my position in the community has changed by necessity, and so my contribution has changed as well. It’s definitely taken a whole year, and I’m not even sure the transition is complete, but I’m finally more certain of where my spent efforts will have the biggest payoff. When you only have a few hours a week to spend your efforts, a good ROI is a high priority.

 

 

Thoughts on Charter Schools

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We’re three weeks into the school year so far. Not really long enough to know the routine instinctively yet, but long enough to have tested the routine. So far things are going great. The biggest change to our homeschool is that we’ve joined a local public charter school called Vista Oaks, which provides us with curriculum reimbursement for materials which reach the State benchmarks for Common Core and are non-religious. They also provide free and optional on-site Enrichment Days once a week in 4 subjects: Physical Ed., Science, Language Arts, and Art. I signed the girls up for these classes because I could really use the few hours off each week. Another bonus is that they can remember what it’s like to have a teacher, to listen in class, and have classroom friends. At the end of the year everyone over 2nd grade will have to take a standardized test for Common Core. That’s one of our charter school requirements since technically we’re in a public school. I was afraid that this would be a big stumbling block for the girls, but they’ve jumped into the Enrichment classes so smoothly that I’m not as nervous to bring them to the testing. I’m honestly not very concerned about their score as much as I am about protecting their confidence in their ability to learn.

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Since joining the charter, I must admit we’ve sorta abandoned traditional homeschooling and begun a more “alternative school” approach. I am still responsible for math, science, reading, writing and history which is done “at home,” but a lot of this is outsourced to others and reimbursed by the charter. I do spend a lot of time in the car getting here and there. But so far the trade-off is all for the positive. My kids love their classes I’ve found in the community. They’re taking academic co-op classes, engineering classes through Playwell Tek, guitar lessons with a private teacher, gymnastics and swimming. We bring our curriculum along with us and work on the road on our busy days. We see our friends in class and fit afternoons at the park and hikes in between classes.

This balance is kinda the best of both worlds. I feel very in control of the education our girls are receiving. We can give more focus to the subjects which they are drawn to and still have time to get the rest done. The girls are developing very strong friendships with a core group of kids, but still have the opportunity to meet new people in their classes and at neighborhood events. But the pressure to be social is not overlapping with the pressure to learn. We can focus on academics in the comfort of our own home or on the road, in our own time, when we are most likely to be successful. But once a week, they are expected to accommodate the social requirements of being in a classroom. They need to wake up and get dressed. They need to prepare in advance, and fit into a larger community. They need to show respect to their teachers and the other students in their classes. And they are very happy in both settings.

Get stuck? Change the Plan

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This morning ended with most of the living beings in our house in tears. The dog can’t cry, but if he could he would have sobbing because I was really mad. And the dog gets scared when I’m mad. Honestly, I get scared when I’m mad, too. I really value peace in our home, and when I’m mad there isn’t any peace for anyone. Today, there was no peace.

Today’s anger came bubbling out of a long-standing stalemate over math. What could have been done in 20 minutes lasted over an hour and half, mostly while I lectured and the perpetrator hid her head in her lap and sobbed (both real and fake tears). School is hard. And it’s harder when it’s the very beginning of the year. And for one of my kids in particular, it’s hard no matter what; homeschool, or school-school. And it’s hard for me to know that letting a kid play with legos and talk with me about outer-space is what would make a kid happy, but it isn’t what would make a kid grow into a real thinker who can get things done. It’s hard to be the tough guy.

But then I remembered that the nice thing about homeschool is that if we keep getting stuck…. maybe it’s the plan that’s not working. It’s not me that’s the problem. It’s not my kid that the problem. It’s that the plan we have set in motion isn’t achievable. We need a new plan. So, I switched math curriculums today. Just for one kid, and maybe even just for one week. But at least we can move forward. And hopefully tomorrow won’t be so full of tears.