Education logo

Our Journey to Homeschool

It continues on

By Viltinga RasytojaPublished 2 years ago Updated 2 years ago 7 min read
Like

Homeschool had been in the back of our minds from the first day we watched our oldest put on a backpack half his size (because that’s what big kids going to school did) and walk down the street to our neighbors little preschool. It wasn’t a real preschool exactly. Our neighbor wanted to homeschool her son, but wanted him to experience school with other kids as well. So, she offered to teach a few neighborhood kids for an hour or so a couple days each week.

My husband and I were both intrigued with the idea of homeschooling. My husband was in the military reserves, working on a masters degree, and after he finished his degree he planned to go active duty. We knew the military would be moving us every couple of years; homeschooling the kids would mean one less change for them every time we moved. I had no idea whatsoever how to homeschool though. Sure, teaching letters and numbers was easy enough but what to do beyond that I was clueless.

I was working full time while my husband was working on his degree, so both of us were busy and did not see a way we could homeschool. We were still a few years away from our oldest starting in real school and by then my husband’s masters would be finished. We had plenty time to think over the idea of homeschooling and how to do it, so the thought was stashed in the back of our minds.

My husband finished his degree and put in for active duty. Eventually, we received word that he was accepted and Fort Carson, CO would be his first duty station after completing officer training. Life got crazy as we tired to prepare him with all the necessary uniforms and supplies, get the house ready for moving, put in my notice at work, and figure out what myself and the kids would do while he was off at training. All thoughts of any kind of schooling had fled our mind.

Somehow, we managed to survive getting everything done. After our household goods were packed and sent off to storage, the rental house cleaned and inspected my husband drove me and our kids to my parents, where we would stay until we got housing at Fort Carson, then he headed off to training.

While he spent his days doing “death by PowerPoint,” as he put it, I tried desperately to navigate the world of military housing and managing two young boys who were missing their daddy. Shortly before finishing up his training we learned the unit my husband would be going into was set to deploy about month after our arrival to Fort Carson. While we knew deployment was going to happen at some point we were a bit shocked it was happening so soon. We had expected to have some time together in our military journey before having to conquer this part of it. Thankfully, my husband received permission to allow his family to come stay with him at training so we could have a bit more time together.

We did have an enjoyable time together, so much so I discovered I was expecting our third child not long after moving into our new home on Fort Carson. Amid the chaos of getting settled into our new home, getting acquainted with military life, and trying to prepare for a deployment it came to our attention that our son should be registered for school. Our previous thoughts on homeschool were pushed aside. I was not at all mentally ready to take on moving from full time work to full time mom, being pregnant, and doing homeschool with out the help of my husband.

We found a Montessori school and signed the boys up to go. There were moments after my husband returned home that the thought of homeschooling would come into my mind, the kids even asked at times to do school at home. I tried to do some with them during the summer to see how it would go; I had no idea what I was doing though. I assumed I would have to come up with all their lessons on my own. I did not realize there were curriculums out there I could use. I was overwhelmed with the idea of making my own lessons and knowing what they would need to learn and it paralyzed me from moving forward, so they remained in the Montessori school the rest of our time in Colorado.

Our next duty station was at Fort Wainwright, Alaska and we tried to get the boys into a Montessori school there. School acceptance worked on a lottery system though, and eventually we learned my boys did not make it in. The school was taking forever to let us know if they made it and I finally got someone to tell me they would not know for sure until weeks into the school year. I was going crazy not knowing what would happen and finally we just enrolled our kids in public school a week before it started.

All seemed to be going well at first, the boys made the transition from Montessori to regular school just fine and were making friends. I had a nice relationship with each teacher that I felt pretty good about. But, then things started popping up that brought concerns, a swear word here and there they never learned at home, disrespectful attitudes that had not been an issue previously, a conversation with one teacher about how many kids he had in the class and the challenges of some getting neglected while dealing with the difficult kids. Let’s not mention the hours of homework they came home with everyday.

I was beginning to consider homeschooling again and what that would entail. If we were going to spend hours every night on worksheets, why not just do it all at home and get done earlier in the day I reasoned with myself.

A big motivator to homeschool was the day my son came home and told me to “F* off” when I asked him to do something. I was not pleased at all with these things he was learning in public school. My husband and I began seriously talking about homeschool after that day. I figured they were only a couple months away from finishing out the school year, so perhaps we could survive those and start homeschooling the following school year. Waiting until the next school year would give me time to research and prepare myself and kids for the change.

Then the big kicker that pushed us over the edge came. It was the day my innocent little six year old first grader came home and shared with me the extremely vulgar, make a sailor blush, knowledge he had gained about women and sex! I was beyond shocked to say the least. I knew sex would be a topic at some point, but I assumed I wouldn’t have to worry about it until at least middle school and never dreamed of dealing with something so vulgar.

We decided waiting until next year might not be the best idea afterall. We pulled our boys out of public school and began a frantic investigation into homeschooling.

I called or went and talked to every homeschool family I knew. I asked them all every question that popped into my mind and combed through all their curriculums. I begged them for any knowledge that would be of help. One amazing friend even let me come hang out watching and listening to how they did their morning school routine.

I was going nuts trying to figure out what curriculum would be best for us and driving myself crazy with worry over it all. I finally threw together some language arts and math for them just to get us through the school year.

In hindsight I wish I had known about deschooling and had taken some time for us to do that, but oh well.

Many tears, frustrations, and lessons learned on my part later we figured out a routine that works for our family. It may not be the best, but it is working for us. We have changed things up here and there and made adjustments when needed as my boys progress. I fully expect we will have more adjustments as time goes on, because homeschooling is a marvelous ever changing journey.

————————————————————

If you’d like to read a little bit about life during my husband’s deployment check out this story.

If you’d like to read more on homeschooling click on these stories below.

student
Like

About the Creator

Viltinga Rasytoja

Reader insights

Be the first to share your insights about this piece.

How does it work?

Add your insights

Comments

There are no comments for this story

Be the first to respond and start the conversation.

Sign in to comment

    Find us on social media

    Miscellaneous links

    • Explore
    • Contact
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms of Use
    • Support

    © 2024 Creatd, Inc. All Rights Reserved.