Comments on: Choose the Mom Friendly Homeschool Method

By: Monique

Monique — Wed, 18 May 2011 14:10:44 +0000

I agree so much! I used to think unschooling and delight driven school was great. I used to have a goal that my kids would all love to do school and Learn … Notice the past tense! I now believe that sometimes, you do have to do the unpleasant tasks in life. Your attitude has alot to do with the level of unpleasantness, and life isn’t always great and wonderful. I have never heard of unhouseworking, or delight driven cleaning. Sometimes you do just need to get it done. Having said that, I do try to choose things that they will enjoy, sometimes the lesser of two evils. I pick curriculum that works, if they aren’t learning, or it just isn’t working, I will look until I find what works. If there are two or three that would work, then I’ll let the kids pick, just to give them some ownership. It took us forever to find a math that works. The math we use is their favorite out of all we’ve tried, but they still complain and cry when it is time to do math. I don’t want to raise my kids thinking that life is about doing what you want to do, or what feels good at the time, or they’ll never grow up! They’ll turn into adults living on somebody’s couch playing video games all day, eating junk food, never showering or changing their clothes!

And I also want to know, what do these unschoolers plan to do about college? They have no transcripts, or how do they get transcripts? Maybe they don’t do college? I guess then they wouldn’t care.

By: Mel

Mel — Wed, 18 May 2011 13:56:31 +0000

I agree and would add that it has to be fun for mom! If it drives you crazy, even if the kids like it, you won’t do it.

By: Kristy

Kristy — Wed, 18 May 2011 12:47:40 +0000

AMEN! I counsel many new homeschool moms to pick a curriculum that they enjoy and understand – then they can easily translate it to their students no matter what learning style or challenges. I think it is important to give the homeschool moms the “OK” to stand firm and “make” their students do the work. As moms, we just have to keep a close watch on the hearts of our children and also make sure we are not being unreasonable – but finishing 3 math problems before you get a snack is not unreasonable!

By: HeidiCiravola

HeidiCiravola — Tue, 17 May 2011 17:47:07 +0000

In reply to Donna Earnhardt. Thank you Donna. I am flattered you think it is worth sharing! It has been a personal struggle of mine feeling guilty for not making everything fun, but I know in my head that life isn't always that way.

By: Donna Earnhardt

Donna Earnhardt — Tue, 17 May 2011 13:52:27 +0000

YES! Sometimes we do just have to “suck it up” and learn it! Love this post. Will be sharing it with my homeschool groups!

By: Lindy F

Lindy F — Tue, 17 May 2011 13:32:49 +0000

Great post! Love these thoughts…trying to find the balance of creating good learning memories but yes, there is just stuff ya gotta do! 🙂 I’m thinking it’s a rhythm- somedays we have a better groove than others.

By: Christa

Christa — Mon, 16 May 2011 15:19:32 +0000

I appreciate this perspective reminder. I too miss days of hands on learning, and have personally struggled to just let them learn like I have reared them to do!

By: Brenda

Brenda — Sun, 15 May 2011 13:47:13 +0000

Speaking as one who is in the home stretch of homeschooling,(one more year to go), your post was perfect. Sometimes it is not about the fun, but about learning the material and the only way to do that sometimes is to just do it! I must say I miss those days of more hands on schooling. To be quite honest my son has surpassed me in intelligence this year! I even have a science and math degree and the stuff he’s doing I believe has been invented in the past few years, its all new to me. He is very motivated and really only needs me for our Bible class time and some grammar stuff. Otherwise he and the textbooks are working well together. So somewhere along the way he managed to learn how to learn! Its exciting to be on this end and see that choices we made with God’s help were the right ones! Keep that in mind as you fight through the curriculum maze, there is a blessing at the end!!!

By: HeidiCiravola

HeidiCiravola — Sun, 15 May 2011 03:34:27 +0000

In reply to Danielle. What levels of Teaching Textbooks have you used? I am looking it to it for my 7th grader this coming year as the Singapore is now too "Mommy intensive"! ;)

By: Ingi

Ingi — Sat, 14 May 2011 08:38:08 +0000

I’m an eclectic homeschooler – I pick and choose bits that suit the program that I have created for my kids. One of things I love about homeschooling is that we don’t have write everything down; we read, we discuss, we type, we dictate. And mostly that works for us. But we still have to do things that the kids would prefer not too. I tell them to “suck it up”. Perhaps they would prefer being back at school? No? OK, then just let’s work through this exercise/worksheet and we can move on.

Great post!!

By: Danielle

Danielle — Sat, 14 May 2011 08:13:56 +0000

I’m not a curriculum-y homeschool mom, but Teaching Textbooks is my nod to a Mom-Friendly Homeschool Method! I tried to teach math in a relaxed, real-life way, but it just stressed me out. (My son liked it that way though!) So I keep my relaxed ways for everything *except* math. It helped my son to realize that colleges require certain math courses for admission. He sees that doing math (even though he hates it) is a part of working toward his bigger goal of going to college.