Were you scared?

[kecmom]

I am on the verge of pulling dd from school b/c it's simply not meeting her needs. I don't know why I feel so scared but I do. I am a planner. I like organization. I guess it's the uncertainty of the learning that is freaking me out. I don't have a time frame, a list of what dd is to learn or an idea of how it's going to go. I know that if it doesn't work, we can always go back but I truly want it to work for us. What can I do to ensure that it does? (I know the first thing I need to do is change the way I think...) Is there a happy medium between child led and parent directed?
Was anyone else scared? Am I atypical?

[oceanbaby]

Well, I didn't pull ds from school, but when the application deadlines passed for Kindergarten and we didn't submit ours, yes, I was very scared. Then I was okay, until September hit, and I freaked out again for a little while. We're in our first year, and he's only 5 so I'm not getting real serious about anything. But I still have freak out moments.

[Dillpicklechip]

Kari I know how you feel, I am planning on pulling my 7 year old from school over Christmas and I feel terrified! I too am a planner and organizer and this just feels too risky and unfamiliar for my liking! But the ladies here tell me that once you get started those feelings will subside, you just have to work through them. So right now I'm just trying to go with it, and remind myself that if it doesn't work out, it's not the end of the world, the public school will always be down the street.

[Lillian J]

Most people who've had their children in school are scared when they start!

I wasn't scared, because I had the notion that the local public school program was going to tell us "how to do it" - I also had my own ideas of how I felt it should be done. I'd observed a lot at the Waldorf school my son went to, and at the unit studies based school he went to afterward for 1st grade. However, it didn't long to realize that I had a better grasp of the situation than the school did - and then it didn't take all that long to come to the realization that it wasn't even about me as a teacher or about somebody else's ideas of how education works best - it was about my child and the way he learned. And he was learning up a storm in ways that I couldn't understand. Every time I turned around, he was demonstrating something else he'd learned seemingly out of the thin air somewhere. And yours will too.

What can you do to ensure it will work? If you can get past the ideas that most of us began with that it's about you as a teacher and your child as your student, that will go a long way. I'm not saying you need to "Unschool" - it's just that you can provide opportunities and great materials in concert with your child, and give her the respect of realizing that she can teach herself with your help (and often without it) a lot easier than if you try to teach her and orchestrate the way she learns.

You also want to make sure to provide for a nice decompression/deschooling time during which you just support her and your relationship - doing fun things together, but being open to her wanting to just "be" for a while or even be a couch potato for a while, because there's really a lot going on internally at that time, and it's very productive in the long run.
Don't be watching for the pot to boil - just let her be, and trust that it's all going to work out fine. If she brings up wanting to do schooly things, that's absolutely fine - the whole thing is to let her be, and if that's what she wants to do, fine. But don't get attached to it and think "Oh well, we'll just go ahead and 'get started' since she's 'ready' - because it could pass pretty fast, and you'll be needing some deschooling time too.

You can provide more stimulating experiences that give her opportunities to branch out too. Model your own love of learning, have good conversations, play games, read wonderful books to her, make holiday crafts and foods together, get out into nature, get her together with other children to play with, go to some support group get togethers even if you're not that eager to (you just might find a good playmate or two for your daughter), take a fun field trip (but don't have expectations of her paying attention to exhibits or "learning" from it), do fun craft of construction projects together, and think in terms of her being a naturally curious person who will be learning everything she needs in good time. Start noticing after awhile the way she absorbs learning - but keep your eye out for learning that isn't just about the 3Rs. Be sure to read the articles this MDC thread links to: decompression/deschooling.

You might start with an older book called I Learn Better By Teaching Myself. You can pick up a copy for a whopping 32 cents plus shipping through Amazon.com. It isn't particularly about "Unschooling" - it's a homeschooling mom's observations about how she discovered that her children learned best by teaching themselves in a variety of ways. I wished I'd read it sooner, because when I finally took it down from the shelf, I had to laugh at how our experiences had been so similar - and I could have avoided some mistakes if I'd had a "heads up" from someone who had already explored the territory.

You might also want to read Linda Dobson's book, The First Year of Homeschooling Your Child. You can find it on this page of the FUN-Books catalog. Here are excerpts from it:
Top 10 Gems - "What I wish someone would have told me during my first year of homeschooling."
and
Homeschooling: The Ever-Changing, Never-Ending Story

Since you're feeling some anxiety, this would also be a very good article to read:
Crock-Pot Homeschool: A Dozen Ingredients For Healthy Nourishment

Well, I hope that will give you a few things to keep your mind off of being scared for awile . Also, take a look through my (noncommercial) site - there are a lot of articles in there that should make you feel good about what you're doing, and there are links to lots of good articles in other sites that will be a big help too.

Enjoy! A suggestion - plan to bake cookies or something especially fun and festive and/or cozy the first day.
Lillian

[Lillian J]

Re planning and organizing!

I forgot about this!

Okay - you like to plan and organize? Have at it!

Make yourself a calendar with the category of things you'd like to do each day of the week and each morning and afternoon - library morning, craft afternoon, games morning, reading to your child every morning at ____ o'clock, math games and activities at _____, science experiments on _____, picking up the house at _____ o'clock, dinner preparation at _____o'clock, etc... Organize your bookshelves and other supplies. Clean out all your closets. Go through kids' science experiment books with your child and make yourself lists of things to gather for them. Go through craft and recipe books and make lists of things you'd like to make together and the supplies you'll need. Go through book and librarians' sites and make lists of books you'd love to read to your child - and some your child would like to read. Look through these links to find such sites: The Written Word, Reading, and Language. Think of good films you'd like to view with your child, and make a list. Organize up a storm! It will keep you out of your child's hair for a while .

And if it doesn't work well, just reorganize it - but you don't need to fret over planning and organizing your child's learning, because that will all work out without a lot of planning. Don't fret about whether something specific is being learned from every little activity - it may or may not, and often won't, but there will be plenty of other times and opportunities for those things to be picked up. They have all the time in the world! If they were in school, they'd have to be fitting into the slow moving process; but at home they can spend a whole lot of time doing things the schools simply don't have the time or resources to allow, and they can still learn what they need in a relatively short time at some point.

Lillian

[3momkmb]

Yep. Terrified.

Would I be able to teach her *everything*?

What will I teach her?

How will I teach her?

Would I mess her up?

Would she hate me for taking her out of school?

Would I resent having no time to myself?

That first year I wanted to know what to do and when to do it. I felt like I was in way over my head! Over the years I've come to realize that she knows what she needs and my job is to just make sure there aren't any major gaps and to support her in her learning.

You'll do fine!

[Itlbokay]

Scared? Definitely. And I felt like I had knots in my stomach from worry.

It was hard for me to make such a move when my children had already been "in the system" of public school for so many years.

Then the knot slowly released, our confidence grew, and I found myself wondering why we didn't do it sooner.

[time4another]

My DD is 7 & in 1st grade...we will finish up this year in PS at least.

I am afraid *I'll* fail her somehow & she'll end up back in PS "behind"...THAT is my biggest fear.

The planning.

The work that I'd have to do to get started and continue.

What to do & when to do it are next.

I feel overwhelmed by it.:



I really think she'd thrive in a HS environment though. I also think that because of that, I have little choice-because as a SAHM I have the perfect opportunity to give her exactly what she needs. Yet it seems so daunting because how do you measure success?

Heather

[kecmom]

Thanks for your responses! It certainly helps to know that I am not the only one who's overwhelmed by the upcoming changes. I need to relax...

I have decided that this week will be dd's last in ps. Why wait?? : I am hoping selfishly that it will ease my anxiety abt starting by just jumping in head first and start the de-schooling process sooner.

I am still scared out of my mind b/c I was raised in a ps system and I thrived. Unfortunately the times have changed dramatically and I am afriad that the experience, no matter how much I hope, will not be the same for dd. I need to start thinking in another way, which will probably be my biggest obstacle.

Dd kind of put it into perspective this am by telling me that 'parents know what kids need better than any school' and she seems psyched. I told her that we'll try it for the remainder of the schoolyear and see how it goes. Is that a reasonable time frame?

I am checking into local hs groups right now.

I must not freak out. I must not freak out.

[kecmom]

... and Lillian, a very special and heart-felt thanks to you for all of your support and advice!! Researching using the links you've provided has actually made me a bit more calm in knowing that I am doing something to ensure our success!
(((HUGS!!!)))

[guest^]

I think you're normal!

For me, there are no securities about it working out. However, reading up on it, and surrounding yourself with support goes a long ways.

Good luck! And ITA-why wait-life is too short!? Go for it!!

mp