When Homeschool Moms are Sick…What I Learned this Week
I woke up 9 days ago so dizzy from an inner ear problem, it landed me on the couch for over a week. My plan, my busy household…all came crashing down.
I manage a household of 8 people, our homestead, and a very busy homeschool. Being sick or out of commission is never in our plans but it happens…life happens.
As homeschool mothers, we can never plan for the unexpected, we can however prepare our children in advance by learning life skills and raising children that are self-educating.
One beautiful aspect of the Charlotte Mason way of life is…we are raising children that are self-educated. Don’t confuse that with unschooling or no lesson plans. Our goal is to create a feast for our children and watch them eat from the table on their own. Making the feast isn’t altogether easy. Often times, homeschool moms have to walk uphill and walk against the grain of society. We have to life a different way as we are constantly working on developing good habits in our children and promoting a home environment that promotes self-education.
As I was sick on the couch, I watched my children learn regardless of worksheets or lesson plans. This particular week, we had a new litter of rabbit kits. The mother rejected the babies so my kids were taking care of them. They were on the couch reading as much as they could about rabbits and the way their bodies function. Back and forth they went reading and caring for these baby rabbits. Education. They were being educated by the natural (God-given) curiosity with them.
Curiosity is the Key
Raising children in this lifestyle for the last 11 years has taught me, the curious mind is quenched by continual testing/multiple-choice/forced learning. However, if you allow children to live in an environment with opportunities to learn, they are endlessly curious, and that leads to further research…and self-education.
“What a child digs for becomes his own possession,” ~Charlotte Mason
Our Home Environment
The work we do, as homeschool moms, is to create a home with rich offerings to a child.
Years ago one of my children told a nurse, ” The most fun thing to do in our house is read a book or play an instrument”. Oh my! I didn’t realize it until it came out of her mouth. The truth is, I have worked hard to keep our home free from video games, excessive television, and passive entertainment. To me, it’s like filling your refrigerator with healthy food-Children will eat healthy food. If I fill it with junk, they will eat it. I created “Beautiful Wonder” as a way to get productive handicrafts and life skills into as many homes as possible.
Life-Skills
When I first started homeschooling, I didn’t realize how many times our best-made plans would fall through. Many times, they did! You can’t plan for the flu to hit your home or a miscarriage…I finally learned, what I can plan for is the interruption that will surely come. Teaching my children “home skills” became a priority for me. We use the afternoons to learn home skills and to be productive.
In my course, Daily Rhythms of Home, we talk extensively about home skills and routines.
I wrote, Daily Rhythms of Home, as an outreach to help homeschool moms before the hard days come.
TRUE Education is Our Goal
So many times, I’m guilty of this as well, we view education as the time children spend at a desk. The truth is, I had to adjust my thinking. I had to finally embrace a lifestyle of learning rather than a 9-3 ideology. I have found, children are learning leaps and bounds when they are in the right environment without social pressure. For us, that doesn’t mean our children live without external pressure to do well. In fact, we do give our children deadlines, essays to write, inventions to work on…etc.
Charlotte Mason said, “Education is an atmosphere, a discipline, a life,”
Shifting my thinking to fit this “idea” took an enormous amount of guilt off my shoulders. Instead of feeling like we are not “caught up” with everyone else, I looked at education in an organic and raw sense. Learning to read (and penmanship) well is my only first grade priority. When I say reading well, I mean a very good foundation of the mechanics of the English language. The rest of a first graders day in our home is full of living books, creating whatever they want, using their hands in handicrafts, cooking with me, chores, and much more. Instead of thinking of homeschooling as “school at home” I use the term…”Bringing up” I am bringing up a child.
Truly Educated Children will Continue to Learn Even When the Teacher is Gone
Our entire goal as homeschool mothers is to raise children that become adults who care about fellow humans, love God, serve their communities, and become life-long learners.
I’ve learned this…Homeschooling that is successful is very connected to the homeschool mother. You will notice on most of my social media presence, I am constantly uplifting mothers. Daily Rhythms of Home is support for mothers.
If we raise our children to love learning, they will continue to have a thirst in their souls to learn. We prepare the feast…they come to the table…we oversee the process.
When I was sick, my children still learned. They worked as collaborative biologists on little baby bunnies. Embrace a lifestyle of learning, embrace what true education is and relax.
To learn more about routines and home life…Join us at Daily Rhythms of Home. I am closing this class soon! (Includes a home skills planning kit)
