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This is such great advice! We often forget that our kids are watching our every move, catching all those nuances, and reacting accordingly. When the decision to homeschool (or continue homeschooling) is made, we have to show our kids that we absolutely believe in what we’re doing and that we’re doing it well. Thanks for the great tips on how to keep that up so the kiddos will keep believing in our lives as much as I do.
This is so spot on, and true for every decision parents make for the family, especially homeschooling. I’ve found that if my husband and I waver about *any* decision – say, taking a family trip to Kalamazoo. If we let the kids know that we aren’t 100% happy with the decision, and that instead we really want to go to Timbuktu, the trip will be a disaster, with the kids complaining the entire time that going to Timbuktu would have been soooo much better. If, however, we keep our ambivalence and insecurities to ourselves, and tell them that the trip to Kalamazoo will be an amazing adventure, all will gladly go along for the ride, thereby significantly increasing our chances of having a successful trip. Same goes for homeschooling: Parents who openly hesitate about their decision transfer this ambivalence to their kids who, instead of embracing their homeschooling life, will constantly question it and perhaps even resent it, always focusing on everything they are “missing” by not being in school. Parenting sometimes requires good sales/marketing skills, and the ability to fake it if you have to. :)
The “Goal setting is the most important activity” link is broken.
Fixed. Thanks for telling me. Also, I love knowing that people click these links.
Penelope
” Children should be allowed to get bored, expert says” – may be one of our biggest achievements in homeschooling is the decluttering all the meaningless things from kids lives so they can become the best that they can be?
I want to stay focused on the decluttering. I think my instinct is to worry my kids aren’t doing something someone told me they “should” do, and then I clutter my kids’ schedules with that stuff.
The other day I said to my son, “Come downstairs and talk to me so I don’t have to worry that you were on the computer all day.”
And he said, “Okay. I’ll eat potato chips with you so you can feel like you’ve had solid parent-child face-to-face interaction today.”
Somehow I felt like I had advanced — from clutter to maybe-pointless facetime.
But anyway, I am working on the idea that my goals for childhood are clutter in my kids’ childhoods.
Penelope
I suspect you are inspiring self-confidence in your sons by participating with them in their music lessons. I’m thinking specifically the Suzuki Method where you take notes and coach them on their lessons. Whether or not you can play well is immaterial. You’re there with them as they learn.
And surrounding yourself, learning from and emulating the success stories. It builds faith which then produces good results,
Richard Easterlin is my favorite macroeconomist, I’m glad you somehow stumbled across him. Though, as with all conclusions based on survey data, these particular conclusions are suspect to reporting bias.
God bless your good intentions. Unless you have a valid reason to be disillusioned by the public system consider the following:
Your children are not learning social skills
Your children aren’t learning to trust and respect authority outside the home.
Your children may not want to learn from Mommy – who is, after all, Mommy and not a Teacher.
You are not a qualified, certified teacher with professional training.
Would you enroll your child in a school with unqualified teachers? Probably not. As a certified, education teacher with 18 years in the field, I have never had respect for homeschooling parents. They just don’t know what they are doing.
I wish you the best. For your children’s sake I hope you change directions and put them into school with their peers.
I am also a “certified teacher” (which really means I was lucky enough to be brain washed by the system I was educated in and then financially able to continue jumping through its hoops). I completely disagree with your comment Lisa and if you have children I hope for their sake you take them out of the system :)