Letting Go Of Control
Homeschooling can seem overwhelming when you consider the anxiety we experience based on societal pressures. How can we gain meaningful employment and get into college without attending school? However, we can alternatively ask the question; “does our school system do a good job of ensuring success for everyone?” Our faith in the school system is supported by a false assurance that if we control our children’s lives, they’ll be successful adults. Curriculums are limiting, learning isn’t linear, and skills can be learned at any time. We are all individuals with unique interests and strengths. The school system we have today impairs an individual’s ability to explore their interests fully, and therefore is limited by its own organizational constraints. Jenna shares that her husband studied French for five years, but hasn’t used it or needed it in his life and has since forgotten most of what he’s learned. What could he have been learning during that time that would have served him better in his life? Rosa Bonheur was an artist who felt confined by the limitations of school, and upon being expelled, was finally free to pursue her passions. She ultimately led an enormously successful career as a painter. Learners are the best judges of what they require to succeed. Their motivation leads them to learn new and exciting things and supporting their goals is the best thing we can do in truly educating our children. Self-directed learning provides students with the individualized resources, classes, and mentors they need. We can not force anyone to learn. We can’t control our children and we should be focusing on our values and modeling them for our children. We can control our own behaviors. Jenna shares an example of a time when her daughter wanted to order a math workbook, but she doubted she’d ever use it. She realized later that rather than controlling the situation, her daughter could learn a valuable lesson about how she best learns by ordering the workbook and testing it out. The beauty of homeschooling is its flexibility. Not having control over every aspect of the learning is difficult to adapt to, particularly when we have a schooled mindset, but providing this flexibility and openness improves the trust in your overall relationship with your child. Jenna shares a tip that helps her family feel more organized and on the same page at the beginning of each month. Together with her kids, they create a template of “an ideal week,” which they then use to help fill in each week’s plan during the month. They cross-check one another’s schedules to make sure they’re all available for each other as needed. The kids participate in clubs through their online school, and these are also added to the template. Jenna encourages families to embrace and find joy in the unexpected nature of the homeschooling life. She leaves listeners with these two quotes: “True love is built on free will and free choice, not control and manipulation.” Ken Poirot “To be trusted is a greater compliment than being loved.” George MacDonald