Thursday, February 17, 2011

I Bit The Bullet

Er, that is a picture that I took while I was waiting to board my ship to paradise....the boarding happened to be much later than expected.


Something else I didn't really expect. I pulled the eldest son, Farm Boy out of school. There wasn't one big reason. I have wanted to homeschool all of the kids for a long time. He was being overlooked and not challenged. And he HATED school. HATED it. I felt like I owed him to try something else since four continual years of hating 75% of his day didn't ever make him wake up with a different attitude. I knew it would be a challenge. Still...I didn't really expect what I got.

We quickly formed a sweet little co-op of our own with two other families and two fun mamas. The kids are pretty awesome and it is nice to have a group for the male child to hang with, especially around holidays. We meet on a weekly basis and have a fun project which the kids get through with gritted teeth so that they can move on to challenging each other on the Wii (yuck).

For the first few days while Farm Boy and I were on our own, it was like all of the dreams I had about homeschooling.....except for the missing ten other children and the long farm table. I tested him out of 3rd grade and moved him on to some other things that didn't glass over his eyes. He read, he wrote, he did algebra. And then the honeymoon adjourned rather quickly. Despite how terrifying and wicked mean I find myself, Farm Boy is not ruffled or intimidated. I hate it. If I don't have intimidation I have nothing. Even love doesn't pack the punch pure meanness does. Farm Boy and I are a poor personality match. I pray that someday he finds a girl just like his dad that can put up with the shear amounts of stubborn that spit out of him like lava. He has yet to actually win one of our scuffles.....but he is getting close. Ssh don't tell him. I'll flat out let it be known I dream about starting to drink.

All of the field trips, organic learning in situation, brain bending science experiments, leading Farm Boy to find internal motivation, and break out literary adventures......they are in the crapper and I am about ready to flush. I think my expectations were too high. I think learning is so fun. I want it to be amazing and exciting. I think he should pick up on whatever I present him before I am even finished. I think that I don't want to have to stand behind him with a bull whip and physically press him into doing a teeny weeny bit of work.

At this present moment it is 4:38 p.m. mountain standard time. He has done nothing more than eek out a few words of writing. He has yet to attempt his math. He did not read anything. There was no science experiment. He did however move all of the chairs from one room to another, make cup upon cup of chocky moomie for Nugget, play football with Nugget, make two meals for himself, poke me everytime he walked by, help unload groceries, and explain a movie that I haven't seen. And still......still! Even though I want to drown myself or put my passport to good use by disappearing.......I STILL think that for right now, this is a better choice for Farm Boy than going to an organized school institution.