taking flight

Much has changed for me since last September, and it has been quite a roller coaster ride leading to today: my first day of school as a home schooling mom.  Home schooling...wow...not something I really ever imagined myself doing, and yet here I am.  It's HARD.  I mean teaching in  general is hard--really hard--it drains you emotionally, physically, mentally, even spiritually at times.  I feel like the societal and political trends, attitudes, and (misguided) expectations of public education have dominated my spirit as a teacher over the past two years, and that can make a hard job unbearable.

The past month has allowed me some much needed distance, and I am at the point where I am free to remember the joy, magic, and art of teaching and learning with a group of students.  Today was the first day for my former students and colleagues, and I have to say they have all been on my mind all day.  Teaching never leaves you...when it's real, true teaching.  You share your life, vulnerable moments, failures, successes, tragedies, celebrations, families, experiences.  That's why it's worth all the drain, all the hard.

But now I'm home schooling a first grader and a preschooler, and today was our first official day, and I made the most ridiculous rookie mistake a new teacher can make: I forgot what teaching and learning is. I have been so unbelievably excited about the prospect of focusing all my energy and attention to my family (with no drain, no need to balance), that I somehow ended up on a strangely familiar, yet very uncomfortable path.  I have no idea what I am supposed to do as a home schooling mom--I mean, I've read lots of books, made lots of notes (filling two whole journals with ideas and plans!), researched a zillion blogs & web sites, but all my preparation and experience led me to a first day of many examples of what NOT to do.

I had my house organized, schedule posted, plans and materials ready...all those things teachers do before the first day.  So where did I go wrong?  Well, there was no group.  There was Seven and there was Four...all amped up and confused about what the heck home school is, and there was me, all amped up and confused about what the heck home school is.  Now don't get me wrong, we had some really amazing learning moments that I am proud of, but it's what I learned that truly is the success of the day.

After the fifth, "This is boring" from Seven, (who is the least motivated emergent reader I have ever met), and the third meltdown from Four, (who is the most reluctant to transition from free & easy summer living), I almost felt zapped back into the stress of public school teaching.  And that's when I realized my rookie mistake.

I'm not teaching in the public schools.  I'm not teaching a group.  I'm teaching Dr. Suess' Thing One and Thing Two in my own home, and to top it all off: I am madly in love with them both--even after the "I'm bored's" and the tantrums.  I'm calling the shots here, and for the first time as a teacher, I can fully embrace what I believe about teaching and learning.  It's just a very different atmosphere....but a very special one.

While I expect to spend the entire year unravelling the mysteries of home school education, I so look forward to our "curriculum": learning about the world and ourselves, and how those two things fit together......hey, there's our year long curriculum arch--who am I in this world?  mmmm, nice and juicy--lots of room for inquiry, reading, writing, computing, puzzling, laughing, crying, socializing, and risk taking there...

So I'm taking flight, which is a fitting allegory to my last year as a teacher and how significant birds became (more on that later...).  My former eaglets have all fledged the nest, and now I am tending a new nest, and have adjusted my perspective, am not wasting my mistake, and approaching tomorrow as Thursday--a day which will include some reading, some writing, and some computing as needed in our real world setting...a day full of possibilities...a day chasing rainbows with Four and catching worms with Seven, and a day that will yield some poignant teaching and learning moments I look forward to writing about in bed.

My teacher prep tonight included hiding seven of Four's little stuffed animals that have been "very sick with the sniffles" as she's played doctor to them all week.  They are all over the house with tails and whiskers peeking out, and I left behind a note written in pictures and words from an evil fairy who takes credit for this dastardly deed and challenges them to find all seven.

Nothing like starting the day with a magical mystery to solve....and at home school, we consider that "time on task literacy/math/imagination fusion"!