A New Year... Renewed Perspective

I began our September term of home school full of inspiration and motivation, in part due to the excellent Ambleside Online Conference I attended in Texas in July. I love educating our children--I really do. I love reading great books with my kids, giving them great books to read on their own, hearing their narrations, teaching math to the youngers, having tea and reading poetry together, driving them to music lessons while listening to classical music, teaching phonics to our youngest...

BUT... about this time of year, my enthusiasm fizzles. Discouragement looms like a mountain.

Spunky has captured some of my woes in this post, Climbing Mt. Homeschooling, comparing the home school parent's journey with climbing Mt. Everest. How familiar her lament of, "Nothing seemed to be going as planned." I, too, have those "classic, woe-is-me, meltdown" moments.

When I start feeling down about life, I get down about almost everything, but worries about the progress of our home school are especially heavy on my mind. Spunky's husband gave her some great advice, just what I needed to hear: The challenge for you is not to give up when it's difficult. And not to rest too long that you don't go to the next level.

One of my challenges also seems to be to not push too hard. When I lie in bed at night and dread the thought of starting school the next day, I need to take some pressure off myself and the kids. A life of drudgery is not what I envisioned a few short months ago... What, specifically, needs to change to get us back to enjoying our school days again? I think something needs to be cut out-- I'm pretty sure I'm doing too much--but what to cut?

I can't answer that question right now. For today, however, I am determined not to push for a lot of school work from the kids. I also hope to sit with my AO Conference notes and my planning notebook to renew my perspective on my true goals and hopes for our family.