In the last post, we took a look at ways to homeschool successfully even during a messy, unpredictable home renovation.
Here’s one last idea (the best one, in my opinion) for successfully homeschooling in the midst of a remodel project. Drum roll, please.
The idea is to…
Anyone who has homeschooled for more than one hour knows that interruptions are part of the job description.
On my good days, I try and embrace the interruptions – the many opportunities for real life training and modeling grace and patience. I totally agree with the writer of this post who said, “Interruptions are not obstacles to our plan; they are opportunities for us to embrace God’s plan.” So true.
But some seasons bring so many interruptions – so much chaos – it just seems impossible to maintain any semblance of order or sanity, much less get any meaningful homeschooling done.
Over the past four years, we’ve renovated nearly our entire home, room by room. Home renovations are definitely one of those chaos-inflicting seasons – but there ARE things you can do to make it through.
I don’t want to overstate things but… the LeapFrog Letter Factory DVD taught my kids to read!
Well, ok, maybe I overstated things.
But in all seriousness, I can’t think of any other single educational DVD that has been so effective or so requested in our household.
Whether you’re a Planning Patty or a Spontaneous Sally, everyone can benefit from a big-picture look at the school year ahead.
So far we’ve seen what’s worked and not worked of my original plan for this year. But there have also been some unexpected resources that have ended up being some of our new favorites!
As hard as it is for a planner like me to admit, sometimes embracing spontaneity is the best plan of all!
In the first post in this series, I focused on subjects that are going well. I do love it when a plan comes together!
But that was the easy part. Now we come to the part that can get discouraging really fast if we’re not careful…
A lot of homeschool bloggers like to post their yearly curriculum choices (like I’ve been doing in this series) for their readers. Over the years, I’ve found it incredibly helpful to see what other families are using.
But sometimes these “what we’re using this year” lists give the impression that choosing curriculum for the year is a once-and-done kind of thing.
Totally not the case!
In the previous post, I shared how Daniel Tiger reminded me to be grateful and stay positive. We’ve started using gratitude journals in the evenings to help us focus our thoughts on our blessings before bed. So far there haven’t been any complaints about the extra writing – a Christmas miracle!
Daniel has been teaching me other things lately, too.
Our God is so good.
He knows what we need and he meets us where we’re at… even when “where you’re at” is buried under three loads of laundry, surrounded by a hopeless mess in every direction, with a crying toddler hanging on your leg, an oven timer beeping, and older kids who are fighting instead of finishing their math.
It was in a moment like this a few days ago that He caught my attention through the (unbelievably incessant) singing of the PBS character, Daniel Tiger.
“When something seems bad, turn it around and find something good.”
Many homeschooling families (and non-homeschooling families, too) are living on one income in a two-income economy.
Our own household income was cut by 50% when I quit my full-time architecture career to stay home with our first baby. We had some savings and made it work for the short-term but once we decided to homeschool we realized the “dip-into-savings-and-just-don’t-buy-stuff” approach wasn’t going to work for the long haul.
The loss of one full-time salary or the switch to part-time income with fewer benefits is a huge adjustment. In a culture obsessed with money and material possessions you’ll need to muster all your courage and intentionality to stick to a financial plan that works.
But I’m here to tell you it CAN be done!
