Adventures are Coming

So, for the past several months I have tossed around the idea of homeschooling. I know this would be challenging to say the least. We have 5 boys most of which are slightly over a year apart. But recently, my drive to know the answer to the question, "should we home school" has become overwhelming.

My eldest son, M, is in the first grade in a public school. Last week, when I went to pick him up, his teacher told me he was in the classroom finishing some work. I figured, "okay maybe 5 minutes." We were at the school waiting for an entire hour. He had 1 worksheet to finish, and it took an hour. I thought, "okay, I know he hated staying after school that long. For sure, he won't do that again." WRONG.

The NEXT day when I went to pick him up his teacher said, "He has some extra school work and he's not leaving until it's finished." My first reaction was to look the teacher straight in the face and say, "EXCUSE ME! He's my child, you've had him for 6 hours. We're leaving now." But I held my tongue out of respect for the teacher. We still have 2 months of school and I didn't want to burn any bridges with her. Instead I looked at my child and encouraged him to finish his work quickly so we could go home and ride bikes. This time it took him half an hour to finish his work.

As I relayed this information to a friend of mine she said, "Your first grader got detention?!" I told her it wasn't really detention he just had to finish his work. She looked at me and said, "He had to stay after school doing schoolwork. I don't care who you are, that's detention." So there you have it. My first grader, in detention.

This among other things has made me decide to do home school at least with my oldest child for next year. The more I talk about it with him, the more excited he is about it. Each day I'm finding new curriculum and new ideas on teaching. A friend told me once, "to start home school, all you need is a library card and the internet." I thought for sure she was crazy. But the more I look into home school, the more I realize this is a very viable way of teaching. I am apprehensive about becoming the teacher, but excited to spend more time getting to know my child.