unsolicited

In the spirit of leaving breadcrumbs for my future self, who, if she is anything like me at all is wide-eyed and forgetful, always thinking she is fresh and new to something, I am heaping together some of my thoughts as they live in me today regarding childhood and learning and school. I want to lead with this because I have a sense it may come out as definitive and prescriptive, and by all means use it that way if that works for you, but the intent is my own line in the sand at this moment. I am at the great exhale pause in my life of home education and it is affording me this beautiful space to look both back and ahead and parse through what I have learned thus far, what has worked and what can be discarded, what I want to repeat and where I want to steer anew, pitfalls and peaks, and hopefully a few anecdotes here and there.

So, here we are. Part judgey opinionated mom shit, part what I have learned thus far. As much as I try to stay open, and honestly, I think I do a decent job, I still have some preferences. While mistakes and wrong turns are inevitable, I would love not to repeat too many. Plus, news flash, every kid is different. Lord knows all three of mine are. What works for one by no means works for another and keeping that in mind my hope here is to make the broad brush strokes of patterns, behaviors, and outcomes, that have been true for not just my big kids, but many of the other home educated children that I have had the pleasure to know and observe.

Ok. To begin. I do not understand Unschooling as a philosophy well enough to know if that is our approach or not. It seems like it might be if I am just parsing out the word- we are all conditioned to the compulsory school system from the very beginning and to choose to leave that a good degree of deconditioning needs to take place. I have mused about that a time or two before… However, I do think that some participation in preschool is important and from what I understand is a pretty significant indicator, more so than K-12, of whether or not an individual is going to pursue higher education. This is a really good reason for us to be paying attention to legislation regarding free and affordable preschool options. And yet, not all preschools were built the same and I am incredibly picky here as well. I want a preschool experience that is primarily outdoors and prioritizes open-ended play versus an abundance of narrative-specific (predominantly plastic) toys. Here I like Waldorf or Montessori or Reggio Emilia, and my top choice is going to be something similar to the Forest Preschools that are becoming more and more popular. I especially think that preschool plays an important role for folks who are home-educating more than one kid because it can be extra helpful to have the little one out of the house when it is time to do more focused activities with the olders.

As for kindergarten and the early grades, I tend to think that activities and experiences are the very best way to go. I wouldn’t really stress early reading or writing unless there is an interest or unless you think you might have a neurodivergent learner in which case beginning earlier is probably a good plan. I have dyslexic kids and didn’t really know anything on the front end of that, just kind of figuring that they would learn to read when they were ready and so took a more relaxed Waldorf approach to literacy. In retrospect, I should have started helping them find the tools that they were going to need to support them in learning to read and write because it was nowhere near to being an intuitive process for them. I will approach things differently for Wilfred. But I still won’t push it. My favorite way to engage literacy in general through all ages and beginning at the very start is by reading aloud. There are a ton of resources and support out there from Brave Writer to The Read-Aloud Family Revival that simultaneously gently and overtly teach a love of narrative and the written word and a love of exploring fiction and non-fiction alike. You can never read too much with your kids. I promise.

I gotta take a quick pause here to say that I am a secular educator through and through. I cringe at anything that feels remotely dogmatic even if I align with its messaging. I am cautious of cults and the insidious ways they reveal themselves in all avenues of life and learning. It is hard to parse out what the boundary is between making connections and becoming indoctrinated and I suppose that is in big part why I love life on the fringe, piecing things together as is right for me and my people and seldom adhering to a fixed curriculum. I am skeptical of standards and assessments. I take the yes/and approach to all of it, as well as the not this/not this. Seems straightforward, right? gah.

Anyhow. I think in general kids in K-5 should have some time spent in literacy, some time spent learning math, and that the rest of their lives should be chock-full of all of the experiences they need to begin to discover for themselves what they like and where their passions may lie. They also are well served by time to be bored and the opportunity to figure out how to deal with that on their own. They should get to be just a little bit (or a lot!)feral. After all, they are only little once and it doesn’t last all that long. Let them be little. This is in part why I knew that the 7-hour school day 5 days a week was not an option for me. It took too much time away from being a kid. And yes 100% I am saying all of this from a place of immense privilege to even have these choices to make for our family. It’s real and I know it.

I also think that having your kids with you every day all day is pretty unsustainable, especially if you are on your own as their primary educator and/or if you also need to work. This is where I think outdoor programs and homeschool co-ops are invaluable if you can swing it. Plus, kids need community too and time away from their main caregivers as well as plenty of opportunity to be mentored by other adults and educators. This is so huge I cannot really emphasize it enough. Our kids need mentors and there are incredible ones out there and you will absolutely know them when you find them. When Maple and Eider were both home, we had lots of contact like this in our weeks. They were both gone one day a week at forest school, they had another full day of the week with the other area homeschool kids and then the rest of their weeks were built out with sports, activities, and time with their Orton Gillingham tutor. I expect it will be even more scheduled for Wilfred, with 2-3 days at preschool and then when he is older a few days each week in the outdoor and local co-op programs. He will be the only one at home during the day he is a social little fellow, so I will most likely keep him a bit more busy than I did the other two. But for real, formal academics can wait til they are older, like 5th or 6th grade. Let them follow their interests and you will be stunned by how much they learn. I know I was.

As for if or when to start school, that depends. Maybe your kid will never want to and then you go from there. In my experience, there is a natural social desire that has kids leaning toward school once they reach the middle grades. Lots of kids decide to begin in eighth grade as a way of kind of getting ready for high school, and from what I can tell, that tends to be an incredibly difficult time to begin. Especially in public school. I would say either start in 6th or wait til 9th or find some alternative option if they really want to head to school before high school. Beginning in 7th or 8th grade is initiation by fire and a home-schooled kid who has an established love of learning and a strong sense of agency over their own education doesn’t need to deal with the shit storm of middle school. I probably do not need to tell you this. You remember. Except let me tell you: it is 1000x worse now than it was then. For real.

And maybe your kid won’t want to ever go to school anyhow. It is kind of a shame when they do honestly. Home school really does get good as they get older and have more interests coupled with more independence. It’s awesome. But it is also lonely, in part because the other home-educated kids got lonely too and went to school. The home school kids tend to disappear beginning in 6th grade. By the time they are 12 it is kind of like the last kid standing sort of a thing and well, I guess some kids fare better through that than others. For mine, especially Eider, that loneliness was devastating. For me too. It is sad and hard y’all. And no kid is the same. If you have more than one chances are they are gonna need different things and wouldn’t it be great if lots of options were available? From public schools to independent schools of varying sizes with diverse offerings. As I get older and spend more time on this path, I am very interested in what kind of learning options are accessible to kids, especially middle and high school kids who are ready for both community and comprehensive educational as well as extracurricular opportunities.

Ugh. Ok. Is this helpful? Did I say it all? I don’t think I did but I also think I have to stop for now. Maybe I will an addendum at some point. Maybe not. I know there is more to say especially regarding high school and after high school. We shall see! Cheers for now.