Back to Homeschool

Even though I follow, listen and subscribe to a lot of homeschooling resources, and have for years, I never thought I'd actually be a homeschooler. And then covid came and gave me the chance to give it a try. Who'da ever imagined? We've had a sort of bumpy ride through our homeschool introduction. When schools first shut down in March 2020, we had a rather terrible time . . . everyone had a rather terrible time, I think. Online stuff, a little haphazard, trying to keep in touch with teacher and class, but mostly just tuning out for a couple of months, and expecting things to return to normal by the next school year.

Then fall came and we decided that in person school had too many questions and not enough assurance that things would not implode, so we opted for "homeschool" via the year-long online option through our district, Weber Online. So we were still enrolled in the school district, but not our local school. They had a contract with K12, which took care of all the curriculum choosing and materials gathering, but I was the "teacher" in charge: no online meetings, no assignments to turn in, no reporting to be done, except by what the program did automatically. It was slick, and I thought it was great. It let us do school on our own time, at our own pace, allowing us to school on the road in Vermont for a month, and take off days to vacation when everybody else was in school, etc. Until it just wasn't that great anymore. It became a battle to get Cal to finish her school checklist every day. Lots of tears by both of us. Just a lot of general grumpiness interspersed with some fun learning.

Fast forward to this year. Again, we thought we'd be back in person.  That's what we told people when they asked. That's what we were planning on with the kids. We saw that masks in schools had worked well; kids had still be able to learn and people weren't getting sick at school, for example. And then the legislature did some dumb things like banning mask mandates, and Delta came along and made covid more contagious, and our kids (all kids) are still not vaccinated, and cases in Utah kept rising and rising and rising. It just seemed like another big experiment that was leading to disaster and I didn't want to put my family into that mess. 

So I started looking into homeschool options. I emailed the principal at Valley Elementary and learned there would be no hybrid school options like last year. He pointed me to Weber Online, which we did last year, but I learned it was moving away from K12 to their own online school with teachers for every grade and online zoom meetings and reporting to someone other than me. I was not jazzed about that idea. So I looked into other ways to get K12, since that is what I knew and was comfortable with, even though it wasn't perfect. They were either expensive, or through other schools which required lots of "face time" with teachers somewhere else and not as much flexibility as we had last year. I just kept feeling frustrated that there was nothing that looked like what I was already used to. And then Cal heard I was shopping for K12 curriculum and told me in no uncertain terms that she was NOT looking forward to that. Okay, then.

I started feeling out options for "actual homeschool" homeschool. I texted some friends about curriculum they had used. I scoured the Read Aloud Revival forums for suggestions. I read so many blogs and articles and newsletters. And I slowly realized I really could give it a try. This was the part last year that had made me so nervous - I just wanted someone else to make the choice about what to teach and let me just open my computer or book and teach it. The curriculum choices seemed like too many for me to handle. But I started whittling them down and sketched out a plan (in pencil!) and bought a couple math books, and things were feeling good. With each decision I made, I got more and more excited to give it a try. I filled out the homeschool affidavit for the school district, got it notarized, and dropped it off at the office. We were officially homeschoolers.

The kids were still hoping for in person school, but as the summer progressed and we realized that was less and less likely to happen with our comfort levels with the covid situation, they came around to the idea of giving this new, creative, flexible, cozy homeschool option a try. We've said from the beginning that when the kids can be vaccinated, we'll send them back to school in person, if they want to go (and they say they do). Even mid-year. That was always part of the conversation as we made this decision. I think being around other kids and teachers could be a good thing for them after such a long time away from "society". And it has helped us all to know that it doesn't have to be forever if it isn't going well. But I secretly (maybe not so secretly) hope/dream homeschool this year goes so well that they don't want to go back for a long time. I love so many things about the idea of homeschool: free time, learning on the couch/kitchen table/backyard/car/trail, "counting" all the life learning we do every day naturally, flexible schedule, another trip to Vermont!, vacations when the rest of the state is in school, skiing in the afternoons, following rabbit trails, learning together, reading aloud, knowing what is being taught and what they are actually doing all day . . . it just seems so dreamy! I know, I know life is not always like what you dream. But I am glad to finally have this chance to do something I've thought and read and wondered about for a very long time, but was too chicken to actually try. So thanks for that, covid!

Allll that to say, here's what our "back to homeschool" first day looked like:

We decided to start school the same day our local school did, August 25th. So the evening before, we did one more thing off our summer bucket list: make cookie dough ice cream. We made ice cream last year the day before school started, so maybe this is a new tradition. Gregg gave the kids father's blessings while the ice cream churned, then we enjoyed a yummy end of summer treat.

bonus video!

"getting close!"

Since we're planning to go back to in person school someday this year, I wanted to make sure we were used to getting up and ready and out the door at the same time we would have to if we were going down the road. I made a little morning checklist for us to get through, and our "head to school" step has turned into a walk to the park for a few minutes of playtime before we start school things back at home.

We took first day photos, started our "morning time" routine of learning a song/memorizing a scripture/reading a book,  filled out a little "all about me" page, had our first nature journaling walk at North Arm, started our math books, practiced handwriting, and read the first chapters of the Trumpet of the Swan. And we were pretty much done! All before lunch! Success!

Notice this schedule is in pencil - it's still a work in progress!

Nature journaling was what Cal was most
looking forward to.

Both kids squatting on a bridge to draw what they're
observing.

Our first day of school happened to be employee appreciation day for Gregg, so his work had sent him a $50 gift card and gave him a half day off to go do something fun. We planned to use our last punches for the Roy Aquatic Center with him, so we loaded everything up into the car and headed to Roy, only to find that the pool was only open on weekends now. Womp, womp! We called North Shore Aquatic Center in North Ogden, which luckily was open that afternoon, and headed north. The pool was delightfully un-full (just as we hoped it would be on a Wednesday afternoon on the first day of school) and we had a great time sliding and lazy river-ing and splashing. We had codes for Book-it pizzas from summer reading, so we snagged them and a bigger one for dinner from Pizza Hut and took it to Harrisville Park to eat and play a round of disc golf.

Frequent warm-cement breaks were needed
since it was kind of a breezy day and these
kids don't have much meat on their bones
to keep them warm in a pool!

Day one down! Here's to a great year!