Homeschool Rocks ~ Building Confidence & Over Coming Fear

It's okay to share a proud homeschool mothers moment every once in awhile on one's blog isn't it?

Great, thought so!

I don't do this very often but I think we need to. I think we need to celebrate the milestones and achievements of our kids. Mostly we homeschoolers are generally chatting to the already converted but from time to time interest seekers may just stumble across our words and these positive stories of encouragement are exactly what they are seeking out.

Recently I shared a similar version of this in one of our local homeschooling facebook groups and I wanted to record it here so I can look back during times of reflection.

My 13 year old has been home educated all the way through. Well all the way except for preschool and six months of prep in a state school. He is a quiet, reserved, shy kind of kid and I know many would say that this is because we home school, although I know in my heart it is simply who he is. He's always been that way, and it's in his blood, a family trait so to speak.

About 4 years ago I arranged for a group of home schooled kids to undertake some drama classes at our local theatre. Having shy kids AND home educating them I didn't want them confined to a life of debilitating shyness. Whilst being shy certainly isn't a bad trait per se I have seen how shyness can affect people and hold them back from a living a full, joyful life.

There is so much wonder to be seen and experienced in this world, but we need to get out there and seek it out. It certainly isn't going to come looking for us, sitting at home in the safeness of our own little existence. We need to be brave, to try new things, meet new people and to put ourselves out there in what can often be terrifying situations. Being overly shy just makes all of those things a whole lot harder to deal with.

One way to help us feel more at ease with people in general, social interactions and generally feeling at ease around others is through the many and varied games that the children are exposed to during their weekly drama classes. Of course getting up on that stage helps too!

So he was happy to participate in the drama classes but with out a doubt he informed me that he 'would never ever speak on that stage'. In all honesty I really didn't mind and I had never actually given much thought to the 'on stage' component of the drama classes. I simply wanted him to experience being a part of the theatre group and all that that entails. Today, 4 years later he is still participating but now attends their regular after school drama classes, with children from all walks of life!

The funny thing is, he did end up speaking on that stage. The first year I think it was one line, one quietly spoken little line, but seeing the determination and courage that that one small line took brought tears to my eyes, heck, even just standing up on that stage was one huge act of courage!

And then little by little, slowly slowly, his confidence grew and so did his speaking parts.

Late last month we saw him perform in the musical production of Narnia - The Lion The Witch & The Wardrobe, that the entire cast (including his little sister) had been working on for months. This was an optional musical and was all done outside of their regular weekly classes. Hours upon of hours of rehearsals. Learning lines and songs at home, again for hours, without a hint of input from me.

His role was that of Mr Beaver, which when he told me he had that part I was pleasantly surprised. I knew he would have several speaking lines in which to tackle, but because he undertook this task independently I had absolutely no idea just how many. Not only did he have a lead role, he needed to portray that role as a beaver with a cockney accent and sing, sing I tell you and in many parts this singing was completely solo, with a microphone strapped to his ear!

Oh Em Gee!!

Tears were literally streaming down my cheeks. Too watch him up there not one person could ever imagine that inside he is just a shy little boy doing what he enjoys because he has the time available to do so and the pressure free environment to enjoy what ever it is he chooses. No one has ever told him that being in a drama group is not cool. Even though there are limited males across all of the age groups. It really is predominantly a female based group. He has persevered and grown in leaps and bounds from the experience.

I have always lived by the mantra, of experiences, experiences, experiences. Give my kids as many wonderful and varied experiences as I am possibly able to and that is what we've done over the years. I have always encouraged my kids to try new things, yes even when they don't really want to. All I ask is that they try something and if they dislike it I will never bring it up again. Which by the way has very rarely happened.

I wholeheartedly believe that this has been what has gotten him to where he is now. He isn't afraid to try things (or I should say he still has a little healthy fear but he does it anyway) and this will take him a long way in his life. The older we grow it often seems the more afraid we become to take risks and to try out new things and so we allow our little dreams to die inside of us. We allow our fears to control us.

This is just one of the many positives that home education has given us. A place free of fears to try any new thing that looks cool and the freedom to say no, that really wasn't for me but hey I tried it and at least now I know!


So for all you mummas that are still in the very early stages of your homeschooling I really just wanted to say, have faith in what you are doing and in your beautiful children.

Get them out in the world, that's where the real education lies.

Books, the internet and documentaries are great, yes, but experiences, experiences, experiences is where the real learning happens.

Experiences is where life happens!!

Experiences are the real magic of our existence.

As a homeschooling family we are truly blessed to have ample time for all the experiences in the world.

Home School Really Is Cool!

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Bringing In A New Year!

As a homeschooling mother I embrace this time of year completely. After spending the last few weeks in a time of reflection on the year that has passed. Time considering the activities that did and did not work for us as a family, and for my children as individuals, the new year brings with it a newness, a time for starting fresh.

Each year I always wipe the slate clean, I don't allow myself to get bogged down in the past. If a certain curriculum was a disaster then so be it. We let it go and move on. That is one of the true beauty's of homeschooling. We aren't tied to any one single thing.

With each year, I have children that are also another year older, this year mine will turn 12, 9 and 5, we are very quickly approaching the high school years, exciting times ahead!

Right now though we are enjoying the wonder that this time of year brings, loads of sunshine, swimming, backyard cricket and golf, reconnecting with family and friends that we don't always have the opportunity to spend extended amounts of time with throughout the busy year. It truly is a wonderful time of year.

We have many exciting things planned for the year ahead. We are teaming up with a small group of families to undertake some more 'structured' learning activities at home on a regular basis, or a Learning Circle as we like to call it. The kids will be embarking on their first overseas holiday in the not too distant future. They are also very excited to have more horse riding on the agenda this year, plus Lego Robotics and Sewing/Handicrafts are high on the priority list.

Our one big plan is to get a veggie patch happening. Something we've talked about for awhile now and after seeing the younger two enter my friend's garden as if they had entered Eden I knew that this was the year we had to make it happen.

We will very slowly ease back into the swing of things from next week. More than likely just some very gentle activities around the breakfast table to ease us all back in to the year.

On a blogging note, I've missed this space immensely and the connections that I had made with several bloggers, it is a wonderful community and my hope is that 2013 will see it flourish once more.

Happy Homeschooling!

Part 3 - Reflections As We Enter Our Fifth Year

Just recently I had a bit of a light bulb moment, some might see it as daft of me to not have thought about this before and others might think it really daft that I’ve actually implemented it!!

You know what if it works for us, then it’s ok and there are times in ones’ life when it’s ok to be ok with ok!

I guess I need to back up a little. Having a toddler in the house is demanding, but in a please read to me, play cars with me, pick me up and kiss and cuddle me, demanding sort of way. It is definitely a juggling act when you have spelling lessons, time to read one on one, phonics instruction and a whole list of other stuff to get to with two school aged children, without leaving the toddler to simply run wild.

I’d be telling false truths though, if I said that we have never had those days, because we have certainly had our fair share of them.

We tried for quite some time with Montessori inspired activities but these either ended up all over the floor everywhere or unless I sat with him for every second of his activity he was simply not happy. So in essence I was spending a good portion of my time preparing, so called, independent activities for the toddler, when they were actually making more work for me.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the Montessori philosophy and I do intend on trying again, now that we are very close to having a 3 year old in the house. I’ll keep you updated on how that goes.

That left us being back to, ‘what to do with the toddler’ so I could at least spend some time with the other children.

For awhile they all lined up on the kitchen bench. I’d go from child to child to child, with each spare moment I would be cleaning the kitchen, doing laundry or baking something...what a circus that was.

We’ve also had the tag team schooling, one kid plays with said toddler, whilst I spend time with the other and then they switch. Which often worked out pretty well, until said toddler became upset for whatever reason and wants no one but mummy!!

A couple of months ago, it dawned on me....why, why, why where we not taking advantage of the times when daddy was home.

That was when we threw Monday – Friday schooling out the door.

We overcame the need to stick to school terms about a year or so ago. Not having set ‘school holidays’ is very freeing and opens up a whole new dimension to our year. We don’t attend a school, have no intention on attending a school, why on earth do we see the need to schedule our lives around school terms and school holidays?

Now if we have a busy social week it doesn’t matter, we are always learning, never needing to worry about having to ‘catch up’ before school holidays are upon us. We simply continue where we left off. We don’t have the worry of whether we need revision because we have taken too long a break either.

I guess it was only a matter of time before I came to the realisation that we could also ‘do school’ on the weekends.  So now that is what we do. Not every weekend though, we’re pretty relaxed with it and if we have family things going on then that’s fine we let it go. However if we are home we take the opportunity.

It works out fabulously for the toddler, he gets loads of totally fun one on one daddy time!

For us this is a season and I know it will be only a short time before we have no need to do this. However the happiness of the kids and my sanity is way more important than trying to get our school work done if the toddler simply doesn’t want us too.

Part 1 of this Reflections Series
Part 2 of this Reflections Series

Part 2 - Reflections As We Enter Our Fifth Year

As we enter our fifth year of home schooling I am beginning to see clearly just how ingrained the ‘school mode’ is in all of us, well especially me. I thought I was doing a pretty good job with leaving school notions behind, why we’ve become so much more relaxed over the years. Often at times verging on the, oh my gosh, dare I say it, ‘unschooling’ mode of home education.

That’s not to say that I have felt my share of angst during those periods because my golly I have. It is though, always my children that show me time and time again that they are learning, regardless of whether we sit at a desk with an open book or we simply live life to the fullest. Living and learning and growing as it should be, not confined to a square room, sitting at desk for the best part of the day, being told what to do by a teacher who is told what to do by someone else, whether that be the right thing for the children or not.

However I have come to realise that complete letting go, total immersion in an unschooling life is not for us, any of us really. The kids do so much better when we have some kind of routine and structure to our day/week in place. So do I if truth be told, without some structure there are days that I simply forget I have children that I am supposed to be educating and just go about doing the things that I need or want to do.

Plus, low and behold I have found out that I am book/curriculum junkie, love searching for stuff and love finding things that work, really work for the kids.

So whilst we are very relaxed with how we ‘should’ be learning these days we do still use a good deal of structured curriculum. I do not allow us to become tied to it though. I always disregard the number of lessons and simply work at our own pace. I am not bothered by having to work out how many lessons of Math we will need to complete each week to ensure we finish by the end of the year.

My children move on to in their programs, when they are ready, if that is well before the year ends then so be it, if it is well after the year is over then that’s totally fine too. This also allows us to follow rabbit trails or even still, if we are ever a little bored with one of our programs we can simply do something else for a while. Because you know I will definitely have something here on my shelves to cover what is needed to be covered ;-)


Part 1 of the this can be found here.

Reflections As We Enter Our Fifth Year.

This time five years ago I pulled DS from school (mid way through his prep year). A school that boasted about having enrolled children living up to 30 minutes driving distance away. We ourselves drove over 15 minutes one way just to be there every day.

A small school, just 130 students, where the principal knew everyone’s name and if he didn’t he made it his business to learn. A well established school and one I grew up hearing about regularly. A good school, but really what does constitute a good school?

I think the answers here will be different for most everybody. All parents want their best for their children, regardless of where they receive their education. So I don’t think I’ll even begin on that topic.  I’m not about to be harsh on the schooling system, it serves a need that is for certain.

All I will say is that the system didn’t really deliver for us. Granted we only gave it a short 6 months and many would say that probably wasn’t long enough. For me it was too long! I also think that the reasons I decided to pull DS from school probably seem very petty and insignificant to others.

Once again, for me though, I could quickly see things spiralling out of control. What begins with a few simple issues can quickly snowball as the years move on.  This is a story I have heard again and again from families that have pulled children from the middle to upper grades of school.

There was the odd small issue in the early years, but nothing too challenging. However year in and year out the small issues were somehow no longer that small.

We too had the odd few small issues in that six months of school that we experienced. Two bumps on the head, with large lumps that no one either knew about or chose not to tell me about. Unruly children, where I was completely and utterly amazed at their behaviour and this was rubbing off on our quiet placid little boy. A school principal that thought he was shepherding sheep, not children. The final straw, being told that parent classroom helpers were not wanted that year!

So call it mother’s intuition if you will but that was exactly it for me. I knew that things would only go downhill at school, not up.

And so our journey began.

I had originally planned just one post on reflections, but now that I have filled a couple of pages on Word writing it all out I thought it best to cover my reflections in a few posts, so part two will follow soon.