Thinking back to when you started homeschooling, how long did it take to get adjusted to it? Did you start at the very beginning with your kids, or did you try public schooling first and than pull them out? Did you feel like it was slow starting? If you’ve been doing this a while, looking back on that first year did feel like you got less done than in later years, once you had things down a little better and knew what you were doing?
I feel like our first year went well, but I don’t feel like he progressed as far as I had hoped…but I feel like part of that was due to just figuring out where he was and de-schooling and me figuring out how to best teach him. I was wondering if that was a common experience, and if you gain momentum as you go.
We’re starting our 5th year of homeschooling and last year was the first year I really felt was successful from start to finish. We started from the beginning after a week in a local preschool. Yes, your experience is perfectly normal! It takes time to find what works and what doesn’t and to learn how to work together.
I always get mixed up as to whether we are going into our 5th year or our 6th year lol I always have to count, but we started homeschooling from the beginning. In the beginning we spent our days crying and not getting much done at all. We would sometimes only do one subject a day! Thankfully I had a friend who reassured me every time I called her that everything was ok. now 5/6 years in (yes I still need to figure that out lol) we get so much more done we went from maybe one subject a day to getting 4-5 subjects in a day. However sometimes the curriculum you choose can determine how much you get done in a day. How long is a particular subject taking and why? Is is just that your child is not understand something or the way it is presented?
We took about 3 years to feel confident about homeschool and this year I went totally out of the box of what I had started out with. We get more done and we are enjoying learning more and moving forward. I’m glad that we stuck it out. Keep going and you will learn your child/children and get to know what works best for your family.
I was super nervous the first year. Looking back we had a great, fun, full year (it was Kindergarten) but I wish I had stressed less. I was SO worried about him meeting all standards that I pushed at times when I shouldn’t have. By the time he was in first and he was ahead of target I realized I could back off. I got much better at saying “okay, lets put this away and try again later” which was ALWAYS the right thing to do. 100% of the time when we came back to something he got it quickly versus the battles we’d had in K because I felt like he had to know it RIGHT THAT SECOND. He was in private school for 2nd grade this year, I just got his SAT scores back and he scored insanely high (post high school levels on reading, high school levels on everything else). So I feel like I did give him a great foundation and I’m super excited to be back to homeschooling for 3rd grade. I know I’ll be a lot more level headed than I was that first year. One thing I read during our 1st grade year was to always put our relationship first. That little thought saved us from many many battles that could have resulted in a broken mom/son relationship for the sake of a skill that could come later.
We’ve been homeschooling from the beginning, and my oldest just finished 4th grade. This year was the best so far, but I feel there is still a LOT of room for improvement. The first years were pretty chaotic for me because our family was growing and I was trying to figure out how to homeschool older kids and take care of younger kids. It has become much easier as my kids have gotten older and more independent and can help out more around the house!
I really needed to read this today!! Thank you for posting it. @Proverbs31 I am so grateful you shared that you cried so much during the first year, I feel like frustration and tears was the only “subject” we did every day.
My 1st grader went to Kindy and part of 1st in a charter school and when we pulled her out in September this last fall, I had NO clue what I was doing. I also had no idea where she was at, how she learned and how to get her to see me as her teacher. @goldenecho I love your phrase “de-schooling” that is such a perfect word for the transition to home school. Tough days there.
We will end up schooling through the summer here at our house because we got such a rough, rocky start. We do finally know what we are doing though and can get through our subjects in half a day and my kids are taking it well. I think so much of it was me building my own confidence in my ability. God helped me a ton there!!
Believe me I’m totally with you there! We all cried. My hubby would come home and I would tell him to please deal with the children while I went to my room and I would cry some more wondering if I was doing the right thing. He would stay with them to cheer them up as they would be in tears too. Part of our original problem was me trying to make sure I justified to everyone else that homeschool was right for us. I wanted to make SURE they learned so I could prove that it works. It was definitely an insecurity issue. Once you build your confidence it makes a huge difference in everything you do.
Before I even started homeschool, when we were not sure what we were going to do and thinking possibly we were going to send him back to school, but wanted to catch him up a little…it was 20 minutes of crying while we tried to console and encourage before 5 minutes of reading. Some days we would have several starts where I would let him try again later, and some days I was just like…“No, you can do this and we’ll take as long as it takes.” Reading in one Bob book each day and doing one worksheet was ALL WE DID, and I’m glad we just did that. (Then later in the summer I started playing school with him…with his stuffed animals and just stuff I would make up to do off the top of my head and he liked that, so it became the backbone of our homeschooling when we started it. I used curriculum, but I just presented it to a class of dinosuars.
I’m not sure how I would handle that reading differently now. I knew he could do it but I just wanted him to see it…and gradually over the summer the crying decreased in time until at the end he was picking up a book and most day, there were usually no tears. I wonder whether if we had just left it and tried much later whether it would have gone better…but at the time I needed to convince my husband that I could do homeschool with him and that was what convinced him. He liked the idea of homeschool but wasn’t sure I could handle it, and I needed him on board. And I also needed to convince myself I could do it. If we hadn’t pushed on the reading I might not be homeschooling today because I would have thought I couldn’t teach him. Hindsight is 20/20, but sometimes you need experience to teach you.
What you felt is so what I am feeling. Insecurities, trying to prove myself. Thank you for sharing your heart. Hearing the ladies hearts help me to feel I’m not alone and encouraged!
We have HS from the beginning. I think each year is better. I am better able to see his learning style, the areas he excels, the areas he needs help in. So each year has been better than the last in my opinion. I have also learned not to feel bad about ditching a certain curriculum and starting new. And not to compare him to others.
Luckily I have a laid back personality, so I naturally let him learn at his own pace and didn’t push him too early. He loves reading right now and does well at math…I would like to think it has something to do with that attitude.
Keep going and you will learn your child/children and get to know what works best for your family.