When I talk to people about home-educating my boys, I am always very quick to tag on, that what we are doing is 'unofficial' right now, as my eldest is only four. Bear would have technically started FS1, also known as nursery, in September last year, so that was when we 'officially' started our home education journey. However, when I speak to anyone about it, I'm still quick to tell anyone else on their home education journey that we are still in the very early days of ours.
When I talk to anyone about our home ed journey, I always feel like an imposter because they are always so much further along than we are, and because Bear is so young, we really aren't doing much right now. Had Bear gone to school, I would still have done the majority of what I have done at home with him so far... We are only doing number and letter recognition mostly through games, puzzles and some wipe-clean activity books. Other than that, we do some seasonal activites which I've been doing since Bear was small, and we follow his interests and I do activities and we read books about the things that he wants to learn about.
I plan to continue along this vein for the rest of this academic year, and possibly into next year too. I have no intention of pushing Bear into learning while he is still so young, one of the many benefits of home education! I am a firm supporter of the idea of delayed formal lessons that is a theory included in the Charlotte Mason approach, as well as her idea of having nature support growth and education. We are very much an outdooorsy family, especially through the warmer side of the year, and I will prioritise that and play for both of my boys while they are still young.
One of the deciding factors in my decision to home-educate them was that I wanted them to have a childhood that they look back on and remember fondly when they grow up, not one filled with only pockets of that time squeezed in around monotonous hours in a school setting that may or may not have supported them as an individual. I have already seen so many benefits to keeping them home instead of sending Bear to nursery, and that is only in the first six or seven months of our journey. The biggest benefit so far, for me, as selfish as it can sound, is that I am getting to watch my babies grow up together. I have always dreamed of being a mother, and I didn't want to have my children, to then have someone else raise them and get the best of them, leaving me to cram in time with them in the evenings and weekends. Not that anyone who has chosen that road is at fault either. This is my journey and my desires and I am lucky enough to be in a position that allows the life that I always dreamed of.
I have yet to work out when the Imposter Syndrome will wear off, maybe once Bear would have started school this September, maybe when The Cub catches up and is also old enough to be on his educational journey too... who knows?!
I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on this too... How old were your children when you got past the idea of wondering whether others thought of you as an imposter?
Mama Bear x
No comments:
Post a Comment