I love homeschooling.
I love being with my child and sharing the moments of learning, adventures and exploration that have become part of our homeschooling days.
I love finding new ways to teach his curriculum, according to his learning style and I love the look on his face when he learns something new.
He enjoys his lessons and I have no problem with behaviour or lack of interest.
So, then why have we stopped homeschooling right now.
Homeschooling is not just school work at home
For me homeschooling has always been assisting my children to become lifelong learners and encouraging hands on experiences.
That is not only textbooks or worksheets ,but includes nature lessons outside for biology, field trips to museums for history, play dates for learning life skills and shopping trips for maths and budgeting.
The online world can’t replace those real life experiences.
EQ is as important as IQ
So, knowing this our homeschool lessons have in fact become boring and as ” not natural ” as our school children suddenly learning online or at home.
Our routines are different and dad is now home full time, which to a three year old feels like a holiday time not a normal school day with mom.
The world is also very different right now. He can’t meet with his friends, ride his bike outside or even go across the road to the shop with one of us.
For his little mind this is huge.
These are big rules that he doesn’t understand.
He hears words like pandemic, crisis, lockdown and knows a germ is making people sick.
Play is important
And so we’ve gone into holiday mode.
We read stories and play games. We do puzzles and sing songs. He spends time outside with mud and inside with his cars and trains.
We do crafts and bake together.
He watches far too much tv and occasionally goes to bed a little later.
But in everything we do, we have fun. We play and laugh and try to keep our adult anxieties away from him.
He’s only 3
Because at the end of the day he is only 3 years old.
Play makes up the majority of his learning right now. It’s the way he interprets the world and learns the valuable concepts that he needs later on at school.
He is still learning each time we read a book. His maths skills are still being practiced as we find the right puzzle piece or count the tomatoes needed for a salad.
He’s still practicing his pre writing skills when he uses playdough or cuts paper for a craft.
And as he talks to us throughout the day he develops his vocabulary.
In conclusion
So much of these things that he does over the next few weeks will be forgotten as he grows up but the one thing he will not forget is how safe home felt.
And that is the greatest lesson we can teach our children….
That in a crisis we loved them enough to make home the safest place.
