Let me offer three tendencies to be aware of and give you three helpful tips for those
of you who might be pulling your children out of a classroom setting.
Welcome to the Simply Charlotte Mason Podcast.
I'm Sonya Shafer.
﻿Over the past few episodes, we’ve been talking about tendencies and tips for those
who are making the transition to using a Charlotte Mason approach in their homeschools.
We all come from different backgrounds and those backgrounds almost act like magnets.
It seems like they constantly try to pull our thoughts back in that direction.
So today, let me offer three tendencies to be aware of and give you three helpful tips
for those of you who might be pulling your children out of a classroom setting and beginning
to homeschool with the Charlotte Mason method.
Or perhaps you are coming out of a classroom setting as a teacher and beginning to homeschool.
Both scenarios are going to hold some challenges.
So let’s talk first about three tendencies to watch for.
Tendency number one: Trying to replicate the classroom in your home setting.
Sometimes we get so locked into “School looks like this” and we try make our homeschool
look like school at home.
You don’t need to be locked into that.
The wonderful thing about homeschooling is that you have flexibility.
But it might be a challenge coming out of a classroom setting, depending on how long
you or your child have been in that situation.
You’re used to a predictable schedule, sometimes to the minute.
It tells you exactly that you will be done with this class at 11:57 and you will have
lunch until 12:25, or something like that.
So, try not to get locked into replicating that strict time schedule at home.
Some of you will need to have a timetable because it will just help you keep moving
forward and get things done in a timely manner.
Others of you will work better with, let’s call them “time boxes,” where we’re
going to do these things before lunch and we’re going to do these certain things after
lunch and you’ll just find what fits for your family.
That’s the main thing: Find a good balance for your family.
But be aware, that that tendency to have a strict, minute-by-minute schedule might not
be necessary in your homeschool.
Figure out what’s going to work best.
Tendency number two: So often, it’s easy to feel like you’re not doing enough because
you’re done so quickly.
You know that in a one-on-one situation, where you’re tutoring one child with one teacher,
things go much faster than when you’re trying to corral a whole classroom full of children.
So, yes, you’re going to have shorter hours in your homeschool.
But you also might feel like you’re not accomplishing enough, or you child might feel
like she’s not accomplishing enough, because you’re not going to have this paper trail
of worksheets and busywork.
So often it’s easy to depend on that paper trail to say, “See, I learned something.
This is what I learned.”
And in a Charlotte Mason approach it’s much more organic than that.
You are learning things, but we don’t have to fill out a paper trail to show what you’re
learning.
Another little difference about that is you’re not going to be teaching to the test and that
might take some getting used to.
What I mean by teaching to the test is often in a classroom, the teacher knows what’s
going to be on the test and the scores on that test are going to show whether that teacher
did a good job or not.
And so it’s very easy for the teacher to say, “Here are the things that are going
to be on the test, so these are the things you need to learn.”
Charlotte Mason did not do it that way.
She spread a wide feast and let the children take what they were ready for and, when it
came time for exam week, there was no reviewing, there was no going over “This is what will
be on the test.”
Charlotte thought that either the children knew it or they didn’t.
So, just be aware that your kids might have some transitioning to make in their mental
thoughts, and so might you if you were a teacher.
It’s not “This is what I need to know for the test,” it is “This is what I’m
learning as a person and that’s all good.”
And then tendency number three: Be careful of using grades as motivation.
That’s easy to do in a classroom setting.
But Charlotte wanted her schools to teach the joy of learning, knowledge for knowledge’s
own sake.
That was foundational in a Charlotte Mason school.
So encourage your children to go ahead and learn things they’re interested in during
non-school hours.
Try and reignite their natural curiosity, their natural desire for learning that all
of us are born with.
Often that gets schooled out of them, so try and make room for that and encourage that.
Let your children see you learning new things just because you want to, not because there’s
a grade or a prize.
Be cautious of using prizes and grades as motivation.
When you hold that up as the goal, it takes away the value of knowledge: “I’m getting
the knowledge just so I can reach this goal, the prize or the grade” And that’s not
what we want the children to think about knowledge in that way.
The focus should be the knowledge, not the grade or the prize.
So those are three tendencies you’ll want to watch out for.
Let me also give you three helpful tips.
Number one: Allow some time to “de-school,” if you will, to decompress.
It’s only natural for everybody to think back to their school experiences.
You’ve been programmed to do things a certain way, for several years sometimes, and the
longer you’ve been doing things a certain way in a classroom setting, the longer it’s
going to take for your mind to let go of those things.
So take some time off at the beginning, just to get to know each other again, to make sure
that your hearts are turned toward each other, and so that you can start fresh when you’re
starting to homeschool.
Tip number two, then: Before you start in your homeschool, you’ll want to sit down
with the kids if they’ve been pulled out of a classroom setting and discuss how things
are going to look different in your homeschool, just so the children know what to expect.
And then give yourself grace, especially for those first few weeks, because it might feel
uncomfortable.
It might almost feel like you’re playing school at home.
Some of these tendencies and tips really depend on whether your child was doing well in a
classroom setting and you’re pulling them out, not because they’re struggling, just
because you think you can do some things better one-on-one at home.
Or, maybe your child was struggling and then it might be a completely different mindset.
So keep that in mind as you’re looking at these tendencies and tips as well.
Adjust them to your child’s situation.
But then tip number three, I would encourage: A lot of times when we pull our kids out of
that classroom setting, if your child was the social butterfly and being with those
other kids all day just filled up her friendship cup, then you’ll want to intentionally schedule
time with friends outside of school.
And also emphasize the benefits of leisure time that your child will have.
As we mentioned, you’re going to get through school work much faster.
You’re not going to be schooling from eight to four every day.
And your child might not be sure what to do with that leisure time.
So encourage your child to explore her own interests.
Point out how there’s much less stress in your family, because you’re not going to
have homework either.
You might volunteer as a whole family in your community or in your church.
You could discover some old traditions that take some time, those old traditions that
can nourish your spirit like gardening together or cooking from scratch or building and making
thing to use in your home, even those wonderful traditions of reading aloud as a family or
singing together.
All of those things are going to enrich your home and help your children discover the joy
of leisure that they will have, now that they are homeschooling.