Busy days

One of the touted advantages of homeschooling is the flexibility of your schedule. You can do school in your pajamas! You can sleep in and start school at noon then stay up late and...I don't know...whatever people do when they stay up late.

One of the purported disadvantages of homeschooling is the lack of "socialization" which I think people use to mean a lack of interaction with people outside of their family, even though in my college anthropology course I was taught that the family is the primary agent of socialization. But that's another story.

Somehow my homeschooling story is turning out be to scripted a bit differently than the sterotype.

The flexibility of my schedule has made it possible for me to sign William up for two gymnastics classes, a flag football class and a boy scouts type group, plus speech therapy. None of which are attended in pajamas. Sadly. And all of which involve interaction with people outside of our family. And all of which significantly reduce the flexibility of my schedule.

But it's good. I like our days. We're out of the house pretty much every single day, and the anti-social part of me gets tired of that sometimes. But I like what we do. I like watching William learn things I don't have the energy or equipment to teach him. I like having deep talks while we drive to activities. I like squeezing in a trip to the library every time we go in that direction.

I think one of the biggest advantages of homeschooling is flexibility. Flexibility to find what works for your kid and your family. Flexibility to change your mind about what works--day to day, or year to year, or on the spur of the moment. Flexibility to make education and learning a continual process that is a part of all aspects of life. Flexibility to make your schedule as busy or laid back as you and your kid need it to be.

Right now, we're choosing busy days.