Wednesday, July 18, 2012

What is the hardest thing about homeschooling?

This is a tough one as I think there are many things that are hard but to varying degrees. So I guess I'll touch a little on all the things I find hard about homeschooling.

1. Not spending quality time not teaching to the kids. I think this would be hard even if we weren't homeschooling though. Based on homework neighbor kids bring home I think I'd still struggle to find quality time with the kids that isn't school related. One way we've found fun quality time is Friday night movie night as a family. I make popcorn and we get takeout. We take turns picking out a movie we really want to see and we just snuggle and watch the movie. During the summer we do a Fun Day Thursday. We pick something that is fun and go spend the day doing it. Mostly this year it's been bowling as we found an amazing deal on bowling for the family but in the past it's been water parks, Boondocks, Lagoon, and stuff like that.

2. Being with your child 24/7. Some days it literally drives me nuts. Some days I wish I had more time with the kids. On the days they drive me nuts I notice it's usually a time for some down time for all of us.

3. Not knowing if I am educating them well. I struggle with this all the time. I worry they are behind their peers in education. However my fears usually go away around the time some of the public school kids come over to play and I realize my kids are either on par or ahead of their peers.

4. Money. I wish I was rich so I could take full advantage of all the wonderful programs out there. As it is I pick and choose and a lot of times select the cheaper things to do. However the farther along our journey the more I realize there are loads of free stuff to do to educate your kids.

5. Alone time. I think wow I'd have all this time alone if I sent them to school. Yes I would. Yes my house would be clean. Yes I could workout when I want for as long as I want. Yes I could do all the things my neighbors do whose kids go to school. BUT then I spend time with my kids and I realize how much I would be missing if I did have all that alone time. As my kids have gotten older the more alone time I have now and I am missing the I need mom all the time stage.

I'm sure there are more but I think this is a pretty good start on what is hard about homeschooling.

1 comment:

Megan said...

My thoughts exactly!