If you thought this article was going to be give you all the details on my top 5 picks for homeschool curriculums, you might as well close your browser window now. Wait – don’t do that. I promise, I’ll make it worth your while. Just give me 5 minutes.
Nothing good ever comes from Googling. I should get that printed on a t-shirt. As a new homeschooler, I was Googling all the time. “Best homeschool curriculum,” “most important homeschool supplies,” “must-haves for homeschoolers,” the list goes on.
Soon I got smart, though. I joined a few homeschool groups on Facebook and used their search bar to find posts about everything under the sun related to homeschooling. Reluctant readers, socialization, computer time, you name it. Then I moved onto the blogs. I couldn’t stop reading the blogs. And looking at Pinterest. And reading all the things.
And at some point, down this cavernous hole we call the internet, I got lost. Completely overwhelmed at the prospect of homeschooling my kids. Everywhere I looked, there was someone swearing that their way was the best way and I didn’t know whether to trust Tina from Tennessee or Karen from Wisconsin. It was exhausting. I would start off searching for reading curriculums and 20 minutes later, find myself second-guessing my math curriculum choices.
I’m sure many of you have heard about decision fatigue – when your brain just craps out from having to make too many choices. From a 2011 New York Times article, “No matter how rational and high-minded you try to be, you can’t make decision after decision without paying a biological price. It’s different from ordinary physical fatigue — you’re not consciously aware of being tired — but you’re low on mental energy.” This decision fatigue can manifest itself in different ways, from lashing out at a nearby bystander (your kids) or not being able to make any decision at all.
Here’s the thing. There is always going to be someone (or many people) on the internet who disagrees with the approach you’re taking. Or who’s doing it better than you. (At least, that’s what it looks like on social media, right?) But if you let every Google search determine the way the wind blows in your house, you will never get back on course. Let me give you an example: The other day, I was Googling whether walking or biking was better exercise. My search was for naught. For every article that recommended walking, another recommended biking. I finally just gave up, clicked my laptop closed, and turned on an episode of Gilmore Girls. But I was missing the point. The point isn’t which one is better exercise. The point is to exercise. The point is not which curriculum is better. The point is that you’re educating your kids.
You need to pick a direction, be confident, and steer that way. Does that mean you can’t reassess? Nope. You can. Just not every second of every day.
If you’re not sure about what you’re doing, know that it’s normal and we all doubt sometimes. There is no wrong way to educate your child.
I remember a quote from John Holt that helps me out on the days when I feel like banging my head against a wall trying to explain irony in political cartoons to my curious but very literal-thinking 6th grader.
“What we need to do, and all we need to do,” Holt writes, “is bring as much of the world as we can into the school and the classroom; give children as much help and guidance as they need and ask for; listen respectfully when they feel like talking; and then get out of the way. We can trust them to do the rest.”
There is no magic curriculum that will turn your homeschool into an enchanted one. No curriculum that will ensure that your kids will look back on these years with rose-colored glasses and only remember the good times. Heck, we can’t guarantee that, no matter how hard we try.
Do I still Google? Yes. Probably more than I care to admit. But at some point, I have to ask myself – am I leaning more one way than another? If so, I lean in to that decision and just go with it. The worst thing that can happen is the project for that day gets scrapped, or that my son doesn’t finish (gasp) that book he’s been reading for school.
As William Stixrud and Ned Johnson write in their book, The Self-Driven Child, “When your home is a calm space, free of excessive fighting, anxiety, and pressure, it becomes the place to regenerate that your kids need. They can go back into the world and better deal with fraught social dynamics, academic stresses, and challenges like tryouts or auditions, knowing that at the end of the day, they have a safe place to recover.”
Remember that, and that will be more than enough.