School-Unschool!
This is an exciting day! I analyzed my life and realized what was happening with my homeschool, and realized— I LIKED it! When I first started out, I tried to set a routine and stick to it. I ironed out the wrinkles and got into a groove of a little routine which became fairly easy when my mind knew what to do next! But what I found is that on some days, this went like a song, and I loved it, BUT on days when I was dragging the kids, or dragging myself, I was really burning out!
The perfect balance, I came upon! That is on days when things roll on relatively smooth, we school! Or when I am tired of being unorganized and stretching things out, we school! We do a routine, we get things done fairly quickly. But on days when I can’t get into the groove, or have too many distractions, or want to but notice its taking too much energy to get the kids on board, then we unschool! Unschooling works great too, because as I let the kids imaginatively play, they float in and out. I can make an assignment through the day here and there, or just watch bemusedly as Milly or Rawl design their own learning. Milly will make up party invitations and write everyone’s names on them, or scrap book some pictures, spend hours on the couch looking at books talking or singing aloud little stories, and Rawl will build with blocks, build his tractors and sit and draw forever on the couch. I will sometimes sneak in some planned curriculum reads as read-a-louds in bed time stories! On ‘schooling’ days, they still usually imaginatively play and self-learn too, but it can feel great sometimes to have more control and feel accomplished in meeting a planned goal in the situation, and on other days, I let nature take its course and sometimes insert learning when I feel ready to impart it or that a learning window has chanced upon me.
Either method gets done what needs to, usually! And I have even let go completely on a few days with family in town, and noticed with a break, that we got more done on the next few days we schooled again!!!
Ebbing and flowing with life, its quite amazing how our bodies will tell us what to do, if we really listen, both us and our children!