Maybe it would be more accurate to say problems I'll encounter with homeschooling...the problems aren't with homeschooling itself. I'm currently reading a book called The First Year of Homeschooling Your Child. I wont say it's a great book, but some things have been helpful. The chapter I'm reading right now is called first year hurdles and there are two specifically that she mentions that I hadn't really thought about:
The first is how defensive I get when people question us. I always saw this as other peoples' problem. They were being critical, insensitive, and ignorant. And that is part of it, but my being defensive isn't helping anything. In the book one woman shared her story and said that she realized that people weren't always out to criticize her (although some were, no doubt), but some people just really wanted to learn about what she was doing. She also pointed out that the way to convince people that you're not a weirdo who lives in a cave and never lets your family out, is not to argue back with someone and be insensitive yourself, but let time and your family's example do the convincing.
The second thing the author pointed out is that you may lose friends. I had never thought about this and I hope and pray that doesn't happen! She pointed out that some people will just plain disagree with you and it will be hard to be around them. Others schedules will change as their kids go off to school and there will just be less time. I noticed this with all my friends when we started having kids and some people went back to work. I hated that my circle of friends shrank then. I have met a lot of new friends since then, but I really don't want to ever just hang out with people who are the same as me!
Luckily for us we have a lot of support. We have a good amount of friends who are homeschooling too. And I think our parents are just so used to us doing everything differently than everyone else that when we told them we were homeschooling they responded, "oh, ok." Our parents are super supportive in terms of providing learning games and aides as gifts and a few of my friends will make us little activities to do as they make their own for their kids. God really provided for us here and I'm so thankful. I guess I just need to put on my big girl panties and learn to deal with some of the obstacles we'll face!
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2 comments:
Like you could maybe one day do something like 99% of the rest of the world does. Just sayin.
Megan,
I know that Isaac struggled when his church friends all went off to school. He didn't understand why they couldn't just up and go to the park or the zoo on a pretty day or that they couldn't "do lunch" because they would be late to school. He still adores his friends, but I really do think there is a change in their relationships that wouldn't have been there otherwise. I dealt with it a bit better, although, it was kind of weird to schedule lunch with a friend whose child was at school and my kids were still at the table. It gets easier and you make homeschooling friends who think like you and desire the same things you desire. But it is hard. And you're already a few steps ahead of the game in realizing that!
We'll miss you guys this Sunday (we're headed back to Michigan for Isaac's birthday party), but we'll be back next week! Oh, and Esther wants to go watch the penguin parade with Mary sometime!
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