Twofer Tuesday-- Homeschooling

My top 5 favorite things about homeschooling:

5. Flexibility-- Twice so far we've had Saturday school because we had to travel earlier in the week. And Nia did most of her school in the allergist office last week since it took so dang long. It's pretty great.

4. Control over curriculum-- Hear me out on this one. I am not a public school hater. I really am not. Both my husband and I went to public school. And truthfully, had we not been planning on moving, we probably would have sent Nia to public school. However, because we are not sending her to public (or private) school, we have the good fortune of looking through A LOT of different materials and selecting what is good for us based on our family values and our kids' learning styles.

3. Writing with a red pen-- This one should probably be number one. I really like it. Nia took a spelling test today and she got 7 out of 18 wrong. (Spelling is CLEARLY not her strong suit.) However, I hardly cared that she had just read ALL of these words during reading today and that I pronounced them so slowly that she had no excuse (I think I am getting off topic here). It was fine with me because I got to make a lot of X's in red pen. The power.

2. Doing projects-- I loved helping her with her Creation book, and her sun/moon/stars mobile. I loved helping her with her story the other day. We loved doing leaf rubbings and making a sundial. It was super fun to visit Uncle KC's farm and pick apples off their trees and have aunt Kristi help her make an apple pie. Homeschooling forces me to do all the things I *should* be doing with my children anyway. And I am finding that I love it.

1. Teaching my children-- This is probably so obvious, but it is AMAZING to be the teacher of my own children. I LOVE watching their faces light up when they "get it." I love hearing Nia read signs when we're driving somewhere. I love hearing Nico speak in complete sentences (he mostly works on speech during school time), and hear people comment how much he's improving. I love it. It's probably one of the only seasons of stay-at-home mom-ness (so far) that's had real, visible reward on a regular basis. It's hard to feel really satisfied mopping a floor no one will notice or putting the shoes in the closet for the 269th time in a day. But teaching Nia to read and write and do math... It's SO cool.


My top 5 LEAST favorite things about homeschooling:

5. What to do with Josiah-- It's HARD. He's all over the place. Sometimes he naps during school but not always. Sometimes he wants to "participate" but gets mad when I am working with one of the bigs. If he's not napping or participating, he's getting into every sort of thing he ought not to, strewing toys/clothes/movies/you name it all about the room, or just generally whining for attention. Any suggestions would be MORE THAN welcome. (And remember, he's an ACTIVE toddler boy, so putting him the pack n' play with some toys won't cut it.)

4. Getting frustrated with Nia for rushing and doing messy work-- It's pretty hypocritical of me to get mad at her for rushing through her work because that's like the story of my life. However, it's still frustrating.

3. Getting frustrated with Nia for lallygagging and taking 30 minutes to write one stinkin' line of P's-- For PETE'S SAKE! (Repeat sake, if you're Nia.) I know it sounds like I am contradicting #4, but it's not like she's being so meticulous that it just takes a long time. She's just getting distracted by everything else going on in the world and she just sits there and complains. (Which, incidentally, is in direct violation of our school rules.)

2. It takes nearly 3 hours a day-- And I was already not getting all my housework, laundry, dishes, grocery shopping, bathing, etc. done. It certainly doesn't help with that. In fact, it sort of makes me crazy some days.

1. Getting confused by kindergarten math-- It's not that I cannot DO kindergarten math, it's just that I can't always figure out HOW to explain the concepts the way our math book wants me to. I have always said that Nick was going to have to be an active part of homeschooling when it came to higher math. I just don't think he realized that meant first grade.