There is Another Way

Textbooks, laptops at the kitchen table, a strict schedule of compartmentalized math/literature/history/science, and an online checklist to answer to. Tests. Worksheets. Requirements and deadlines.

THIS was us a year ago. It looks so pretty and organized, doesn't it? It was so exciting at first getting all that fun stuff in the mail. I would have loved it if I were the one it was for. 

I had loved school as a kid. I loved homework, I loved working hard for good grades and I loved pleasing my teachers. I got mostly honors in high school and was even set to graduate early. I didn't identify with being 2 years below reading level and being put in resource classrooms. I didn't identify with being the only kid in the classroom not "getting it" and being afraid to raise my hand and say so. I just couldn't understand why these boys were struggling.

After all we'd been through with the public school system; a grade repeat, specialized reading programs, psychologist meetings, ADHD diagnosis attempts, 504 plan discussions with well-meaning teachers and a whole heck of a lot of tears over hours and hours at the kitchen table at night just trying to help my kids through their paperwork (-I mean, homework), I had prayed and asked Him what to do. My boys were hurting, struggling and suffering. 

I didn't want it to be the answer. I was working our business from home full time as well as driving our little daughter all over for therapies and appointments due to her Cerebral Palsy. Good grief, if I couldn't get them to do their homework, how in the world was I going to be their teacher?!? But it was the answer. And I knew it. Our boys needed us. They needed me. 

But homeschool wasn't going well. Tears, frustration and stress became common in our home. So wasn't I doing the right thing? I had felt called to do this!! If this was what I was meant to do for my boys, why were they still fighting, crying and HATING learning? I was trying my darndest to educate them, what was I doing wrong?? I started searching online for other curriculums. It HAD to be the curriculum, right? I tried putting my own together, but I felt aimless and unsure. I was so WORRIED they weren't going to keep up with their publicly educated peers. I wanted someone or something to tell me they were meeting standards, and that they were going to be okay. 

One morning I left Dave in charge of school to take our daughter to physical therapy, and I came home in the afternoon to all the textbooks, supplies and curriculum boxed up by the front door. I didn't have time to speak. 

"We're not doing this." he said. 

"Homeschool?" I replied. 

"No, K12. These textbooks, this online garbage. It's crap. They hate it, I hate it. Send it back."

Deep down I knew he was right, but I'd up pulling it all back out. I'd felt that gnawing feeling from the beginning that something wasn't right for my precious boys, but the program was my safety net. It was my security. It gave me that pat on the back telling me we were on schedule. But we weren't. The only things in our home that they loved were the things I was teaching them about cooking, gardening, creating things, and of course, bugs. They loved our trips to the library, field trips to Sea World and the zoo, playing in the backyard, and Legos. But that stuff is all extras, right? They needed math and language arts. Those were the two most important subjects, according to the experts. If I didn't require those things, my boys would never choose to do them. Right? 

"If you are being held hostage by a burdensome curriculum or a program that promises to get your kid into college—and if you’re wondering if this was really the life that God had designed for you, I challenge you to look at those first homeschool moms. They set the bar—and they did it without expensive “all inclusive” programs. They did it by faith. They did it because they knew God would provide for their every need if they would only trust Him to guide and direct them." -Heidi St Johns

(you can read the whole article HERE)

Again, I prayed. I searched online, I watched Ted talks, asked friends. Then one day, a heaven-sent Facebook friend mentioned something she did with her family called A Thomas Jefferson Education, also known as TJED or Leadership Education.

 "Hmmm...that sounds like a good curriculum." I thought. I went to the website and watched this video:

I immediately started researching more. I still couldn't understand that it wasn't a curriculum, but I started applying what I knew. Even though I kept using K12 for the next few months, (but adapting it greatly to our own needs), I began to get really passionate about TJED. Whatever it was, I could see little sparks. When I applied the principles, my children lit up. I lit up. Our home atmosphere brightened. In fact, it has taken me almost a full YEAR to wrap my brain around this model of education, but it finally has clicked. This has been a process. It required a 360-degree paradigm shift for me and a healthy healing period for all of us. I didn't even box that curriculum up until February of THIS YEAR, but once I did, we were truly free to apply these principles. This really has been a complete lifestyle change for the better. 

I'm currently taking a certification through TJED and the world has never seemed so colorful, vibrant and exciting. 

 A year ago I could not have fathomed my children choosing to study the presidents of the united states, or figuring out math problems for me. I couldn't forsee them EVER staying up late on a Friday night to read a book from the 1850's and begging to stay up just a little longer because it was JUST getting good. I could not have known that my entire family's future would be forever changed by ME studying and then inspiring my children in classic literature, poets, mathematicians, artists and scientists, let alone that I would WANT to make the time to study those things, or that they would respond.  

Our modern education system has its place. There are some incredible and inspiring teachers/mentors out there in public and private schools alike. (I know, because our daughter has one of them) But for our family, my children, and for myself, there's another way. 

"Everybody you have ever met, and everybody you will ever meet without exception has genius within them. That is what it means to be a human being. That is the purpose of education. That is its role; to help people find, develop, and apply that genius. That's what education is."

-Oliver Demille

"I am beginning to suspect all elaborate and special systems of education. They seem to me to be built upon the supposition that every child is a kind of idiot who must be taught to think. Whereas if the child is left to himself, he will think more and better , if less "showily." Let him come and go freely, let him touch real things and combine his impressions for himself... Teaching fills the mind with artificial associations that must be got rid of before the child can develop independent ideas out of actual experiences." -Anne Sullivan Macy

"What we want to see is the child in pursuit of knowledge, not knowledge in pursuit of the child."

-George Bernard Shaw