Shhhhhh.....

Can you keep a secret? Well you know the truth is some days I worry that I am not cut out to do this at all.
I can't really tell anyone that because the first reaction is, "well put them in school"
I often think I either am a martyr or people think I am. I can't always figure out the truth. If a kid in school is doing poorly or acting out you don't often hear, "Well just pull him out and homeschool him" but as homeschoolers life has to be perfect or people question us and I sincerely think they don't really want to help b/c well, we did this to ourselves. Just put them in school..as though that would solve all the problems. In my opinion I really think it would create more problems but again...no one wants to hear that.
So my blog has pictures of smiling learning children in their happy carefree homeschooled life. There are no pictures of the bad mommy AKA teacher moments. There are no photos of the worry I have for my daughter and how something is just not right. How I see her struggling in some inside way that has nothing to do with homeschooling but will assuredly be blamed on it.
I joke that she is not "that way" b/c we homeschool but rather we homeschool b/c she is "that way".
Her anxiety peaks and puts everyone on edge. I hear, even my husband's thoughts, "Put her in school"
and sometimes when I am on my last ounce of patience..I want her in school but not for any other reason then; I need her to get into enough trouble, that someone looks into it. That someone says, "this child needs help" That something IS wrong. I don't know how to to go about telling someone what I see when it's so hard to explain anxiety and not have it sound like a child who needs to be disciplined more effectively or a child, who of course is like that, b/c she is homeschooled.
But Shhhhh don't tell anyone about that.

No cafeteria food

...and no one sits alone

Sending my own interim reports....

Please advise: Johanna is still talking in class. She laughs during reading group. Today she played Star Wars with her friend instead of sitting down for lunch.
She thinks it's funny to refer to the President as "Barrcoli Obamaali" She is not interested in coloring.
As for Michael
He dances during the reading group he is not even in. He insists on trying to sound out letters. He insists we call him Luke or R2D2. He has shown up in a dress and pig tails.
Both kids are chewing gum in class. Both kids spend more time playing with other kids than they do on book/seat work.

Thank you for homeschooling!

We don't know nothin 'bout no book learnin'

This is Johanna in her swimming class learning to dive. I got permission from the swim teacher, "Miss" Sarah that I could post her pic as well.
I think a myth of homeschooling (and also something that might worry people) is that We as parents do all teaching. My own mother was concerned that perhaps when it was time I would be unable to teach higher math subjects.
The thing is though we utilize everyone as teacher b/c no one in my kids' lives is the be all end all "Teacher" No higher authority for my kids to hold over my head and say, "but that's not how Miss Teacher told us to do it"
Sure my kids take classes but the teachers mostly are other parents or someone who is very knowledgeable on a particular activity.
Sunday school teachers are volunteer moms and dads, maybe some are licensed teachers for their "day job" but it is not a requirement.
Johanna is taking a class on winter at the OEC and that guy who teaches is fabulous. The kids trek through the woods and search for birds and trees and twigs. learning how to identify each on the way.
"Miss" sue at the Y has helped Johanna transition from mommy and me classes to drop off in a very gentle way..as far as my experience the only Y teacher who was truly helpful in this endeavorer when Johanna was 3 and 4. She has connected with Johanna and lends her books from her personal collection.
I read once that in a small town in (I think) Italy school teachers are often over the children's homes for dinners and all the families and teachers spend much time together so that there is a connection...a trust built for the kids and for the teachers and the families.
And even if my kids were never enrolled in a single class I still could not look to myself or Mike as the sole teachers. At the Morris Museum just the other day the grandmother to a little girl we didn't know was trying to tell her granddaughter about the ink well pens and Johanna gleaned a bit of really cool info from her..so a quick teacher moment but lesson none the less. We would likely attend programs or plays or museums. We might watch the history channel or Youtube. Speakers and artists are everywhere. Grandparents who know how to sew or to swim. Friends who teach what friendship means and adult friends who teach about far away lands such as England. They all go about living their lives and help me homeschool my children Most of whom never wear a "teacher" label but teaching all the same.