Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

A couple of days ago, I tried writing an entry that would explain all the changes we’ve made in the last month – new books, new schedule, new co-op, new friends – but those kinds of posts are excruciatingly boring, both to write and to read. So instead I’ll just say that things are working much better now. It’s like everything just suddenly fell in to place. Only they didn’t of course because there are still a lot of things I’d like to see change, but we’re making slow and steady progress, and that is enough to celebrate.

We were really rockin’ last week. Seriously, you wouldn’t believe it. D was up every morning and at her work by 8:30. She was finished by 10:30 and experienced that rush of relief and freedom that comes when you have crossed off all the things on your to do list and your time is your own. We read poetry and current events, she discovered that math can be fun (!) and that she is capable of figuring a lot of it out on her own, we planned a field trip, went to Excel and to the unschool park day… it was decidedly our most rewarding week so far all year. And all of this while I’m on a sugar fast.

Then everything went to hell with daylight savings. I HATE daylight savings. I sometimes think it must be an evil plot against families with small children, devised by some bitter, barren monster. As if getting kids on a regular sleeping schedule isn’t hard enough without throwing a bi-annual time change into the mix. Without fail, no matter if we’re springing forward or falling back, our kids can’t fall asleep at night, are up throughout the night (even more than usual) and awake at some ungodly our. Except for D who now wants to sleep until noon.

I’m playing with the idea of switching of nights and mornings with P but that idea is pretty impractical right now. My magic thinking now revolves around finding the perfect schedule and sticking to it. If we were all up at the same time, eating breakfast at around the same time, stretching, doing morning chores together and then sitting down to work at the kitchen table, then life would suddenly be perfect. We would get twice as much work done, and we would all whistle while we did our chores, or listen to audio books, our sleep would be regulated and the children wouldn’t fight anymore, and everyone including P will be so impressed with us and come to me for advice… all if I could just make myself wake up at the same every morning. Regardless of how late I was up the night before with the baby or how many times she woke to nurse. Realizing the impracticality of that right now, my magical thinking shifts to the future. “When the baby is weaned,” I tell myself, then we’ll be able to do this homeschooling thing properly. My God, why is it so incredibly difficult for me to just stay in today and to work with what I have?

One foot in front of the other

You can usually tell when things start getting desperate around here because that’s when I start taking long overdue action. We finally made it to the unschooler/homeschooler park day yesterday. I’ve known about it since the summer and yet have never made it one. It seems like something else came up every week. It was especially difficult to make myself go at this late, when the initial excitement of homeschooling has worn off and I am feeling completely at a loss. But I went anyway, even though it was a crazy day, with freelance stuff to do, a meeting, P leaving town for the weekend, all of us getting his cold… but I went anyway. Footwork, right? And of course once we were there we had a really nice time and it was totally worth it.

I was only able to stay for an hour, but I was able to make some good connections. It’s amazing what a small world it is – on of the mothers I met is a yoga instructor at the studio where P has been showing his paintings for 5 or 6 years. She has a daughter close to D’s age, and the two of them hit it off right away. The really cool thing about that connection is that they haven’t been to park day at Cottonwood for more than a year, but had decided they wanted to start going again. Coincidence? Maybe. The other women I met is a great source of information. She’s got four kids and has been doing this for years. She calls herself a homeschool consultant, but as of yet is not charging for her services. Does that sound weird in writing? It sounded awesome in person. She’ll come to our house – talk with us about our schedule, our goals, our lifestyle etc. and help us come up with a homeschooling plan that will work for us, even if it’s just for the next few months.

Those were the only two people I had a chance to talk to, and they both do a nice mix of homeschooling and unschooling (though technically I suppose none of us can really claim to be unschoolers if we’re doing any schooling at all. I guess it could be called relaxed homeschooling or something.) Anyway, the point is that they weren’t all hardcore unschoolers. Maybe some of them were. It was a pretty mixed group. There were a couple of people there who seemed to have their identities wrapped up in being “alternative” and those folks definitely had a holier-than-thou attitude about the group of folks next to us whose kids all go to the same school (RISD had the day off). When Patrick and I got a chance to debrief later in the day he was like “I know why those kids aren’t in school. Because otherwise they would get their asses kicked.” It was interesting to watch Peach ingratiate herself with the group of school kids, even though she didn’t know a singe one of them. She ran off to play all their organized games, like sack races. It was like she instinctively knew which group she belonged to.

I found out about a homeschooling co-op that isn’t too far from here. It looks like it’s too late to register for any of the classes this semester, but we can go and check it out. The prospect is both exciting and overwhelming. I don’t know that I have the energy to become emotionally involved in another co-op right now. But the idea of having some structure for D seems good. That and the involvement with other kids. That amount and that kind of socialization seems ideal (or as ideal as we’re ever going to find or afford). She could use a few friends who have an idea of what she’s going through.

I wish that I had the energy/time to sort out my thoughts about all of things that we have tried this year and why most of them seem like such complete failures. It’s hard not to feel that old familiar shame for having “failed” at this so far. It’s such a bummer to find out that, even when I think I’m detached, it turns out that I have all these expectations. I realize that I keep writing the same post in here over and over, how I feel like a failure and yet how we both have learned a lot about what doesn’t work. It was encouraging to be around other families who are doing this, who have been making it work and so I’m trying to just look forward to the next meeting instead of kicking myself for not having gone sooner.

Comin’ to Jesus

D and I sat down yesterday and had a frank talk about what’s working for us and what isn’t. This is what we came up with.

Things D doesn’t like:

That we’re not doing algebra

Being forced to read

Calculadder

Current Events

History – esp. slavery

Filling out schedule

“teaching”

memorization

Things she does like:

Reading what she likes, when she likes

Math text book

Art project

Reading short snipets about artist

science projects

When I’m involved and helping

Cuisenaire rods

Having a schedule to look at (not to fill out)

taking things apart

exploring/figuring things out on her own

What I don’t like:

Being a nag (D agrees she doesn’t like that, either)

That she doesn’t do work without being nagged

Not getting enough alone/quiet time

Science projects (I don’t like the idea of them – once I’m actually involved I enjoy them)

What I like:

Reading aloud

Doing math together

Calculadder challenges

Cuisenaire rods

and, as evidenced by this post, ranDom capitAlizaTioN

Some of our goals:

Consolidate errands to one day (possibly two days) a week

Consolidate computer time to first morning e-mail check and afternoon quiet time

Start having weekly family meeting on Sundays, to be followed by board game

Plan meals weekly

Make it to the library every other week

Our agreements:

We’ll both stay off of the computer in the morning (though we may check e-mail when we first get up.)

Morning time and early afternoon will be for getting work done, both school work and house work.

Late afternoons (while Scout is napping) will be quiet time.

Calculadder stays. Memorizing poetry goes.

The schedule stays. but she doesn’t have to fill it out.

We also agreed that homeschooling is a privilege, and that we should check in with each other more frequently this semester to see what is working and what isn’t. Today was a disaster because I had to work on freelance design project all morning, and then D went with P up the coconut tree to Commerce for the afternoon, and then there was swim team, all of which left very little time for anything else. So many of our days are like that. At least I’m a little less freaked out. As friends keep reminding me, we are learning something.

The schedule

This is the first day of the first week of our new schedule, and it seemed to go well! I made a checklist for Daryl of all the work she needs to accomplish in a week, broken down into managable chunks for each day. I don’t like being the nag so I sat down with her and told her that she is now going to be in control of when she gets her work done. She has to finish the week’s assignments before the weekend, otherwise no friends over, no swim meets, etc. until it gets done. Today was the first day since we started this that I didn’t remind her to do her work, which was a huge relief to both of us. Here’s what the schedule looks like:

At some point I want to explore the numerous reasons we decided to jump ship from the unschooling philosophy, but I had to start somewhere. Today was a pretty good place to start.