Continuing Past Conversations

I like having conversations in the car.  There's no better place for philosophy that when driving a considerable distance.  Jeff and I have had lots of these philosophical conversations in the last nine years.  Early on in our relationship, we had several conversations about education.  Jeff was a youth minister, I worked with kids and we were both heart-broken by how busy and stressed out kids are these days.  We knew 3rd graders who had no time to play because they were busy with school and tons (and tons and tons) of homework and music lessons.  We spent a lot of time hashing out our parenting strategy so that our kids wouldn't be so overwhelmed.  I mean , really, it's scary that the word "stress" is even in the vocabulary of young students, let alone a very real part of their lives.  The solution that we came up with was to limit the extracurriculars our future kids would participate to at most one extracurricular sport/lesson per season.  It never seemed like the best answer, but it was the best we could come up with.

We also spent a lot of time talking about our respective school experiences.  Mine was positive once I got into high school.  Before high school I was put in the "Barney"(as in big purple dinosaur) classes -classes for the "dummies" (of course, named by the "smarter" kids).  With the help of some amazing teachers who helped me gain confidence,  I eventually moved in to the more advanced level of coursework.  In high school, I flourished and became a model student.  I went above and beyond the requirements and loved everything about school.  

Jeff's experience was much different.  He is a pretty smart cookie who was not often challenged in school.  His grades were average because he couldn't see the point in doing all of the monotonous busy-work that makes up such a large chunk of school work.  School was tough for him because it held him back.  He had to listen to lessons and do (or not do) homework long after he had mastered a subject.  As we talked about Jeff's experience we also talked about the fact that boys tend to do worse in school than girls.  For some reason the system isn't working as well for boys as it is for girls.  

These foundations laid the groundwork for where we find ourselves today - carefully considering different educational options for our two boys.  Jeff had a friend who was homeschooled.  But, while we talked briefly about homeshool, we always just assumed our children would go to public schools.  Today I find myself leaning away from the idea of public school.  At the very least, if we send our kids to school, I want to be very prepared to advocate for my children.  

We don't have anything against public school.  They provide a wonderful service for the majority of people, despite the problems.  And the majority of the problems are logistical - it's hard work to provide education for an entire room/school/district/state/nation of unique individuals.  There are gads of amazing teachers who are devoted to what they do and make a great difference in the lives of the children they teach.  I had a myriad of wonderful teachers who played a big part of making me who I am today.  But, as I look at the problems inherent in the system, I have to wonder: is public education really best for my kids?  Is there anything better out there?

I look at my little Captain Silly Wiggles and his experience last year in preschool and wonder how he will fit in institutional education.  He struggled this year - not with the material, with the structure.  His little progress reports came home saying he didn't know lots of things he had clearly shown mastery in at home.  At the beginning of the year he was getting in trouble constantly for not participating or acting out with behaviors he just wasn't exhibiting elsewhere.  By the middle of the year he was coping - he wasn't really participating, but he would sit quietly at the table while the other kids went about their business.  And it wasn't a social issue - he had lots of friends.  At the class picnic at the end of the year kids where fighting over who could sit by him at lunch.  He has shown an ability to sit still, concentrate and follow directions at home and in other places.  But somehow he wasn't thriving in the school environment. He had a wonderful teacher who put lots of effort into helping him, but nothing ever seemed to work.  

Yet, this summer as we have tried out some "school" stuff at home in an attempt to ease the transition next fall, he has completely surprised me.  In the six weeks that we have been working together at home he is soaking up information.  He's willing to try new things, he's writing, he's reading, he's asking questions day and night.  So, as we experience learning together I find myself asking a question I never ever ever imagined I would consider - should we homeschool?  And I'm finding myself in a very scary/exciting/weird place of thinking the answer may very likely be yes!