Homeschool While You Work

by Hillary Harvey, December 16, 2008

So what, you may ask, is a homeschooling mom to do when her work, the thing she does to make money, is piling up before her eyes, all over the house, and her child is looking over the piles of it to say, "Mommy, I'm bored"? Do homeschool moms even have time to work? The majority I've met do not, or have recently given up their part-time jobs to be at home and focus on schooling the children.

I brought this up at a meeting one night at the beginning of the "school" year. I said, “Do most people just have one parent who doesn’t work?" The room resounded with a triumphant, No! One woman worked full time and part-time. Another worked full-time, from home. People work part-time when the other parent comes home. People work part-time, from home. In a couple of cases, the main breadwinner worked from home, allowing the mostly-homeschooling-parent to pick up work here and there. The one thing people agreed on was that it's easier to work and homeschool when the kids can read and do at least some work independently.

This is not the case yet with us. But I have figured out a few things to help our situation. For one, my "lesson routine" was a bit ambitious for my busy season.  And maybe also for a kindergartener. We've pared it down to the staples, which we do just three days a week: calendar (because it's a nice way to signal the start of the lessons and because Zoë is interested in what we plan to do each day and what's coming up in the future), math, phonics with handwriting, and literature, history, or science on alternating days. If we have time, we throw in the weather chart.

At the suggestion of the moms at the meeting, Zoë also colors or draws at the table while I work on the computer. She plays story CDs in her room while she makes books at her little table. And there are a few opportunities for me to drop her off with other homeschoolers for a couple of hours: one friends does science with Zoë and her own son in exchange for art lessons on alternating weeks where her sons are dropped off with me; and there is at least one “class” where I need not participate, not including afterschool dance lessons.  Something I’ve figured out is to give Zoë oranges, which she likes to peel herself.  Pomegranates, too, are a good, time-consuming snack. And Zoë is finally at the point where she can keep herself busy playing with her plastic and stuffed animals for 45 minutes or more at a clip.

Occasionally, on certain assignments, I can bring Zoë to work with me.  A couple of weeks ago, I was working on an article. I spent a week or two scheduling in photo shoots as Zoë and I were on our way to other things: ie. dance classes, NYC, etc. Because the piece was fun and something I do with Zoe a lot (shopping), it ended up that Zoë modeled for a lot of the photos in the piece, particularly when a toy store was involved. (If you ever need a child model for any reason, I highly recommend Zoë. She really enjoys being in the spotlight, so much so that she can last about an hour in a shoot, which is pretty long in Child-Model-World, and she is fairly cooperative for that entire time.)  I stumbled upon Zoë’s compulsion to cooperate during my work over the summer when I had a shoot in Schenectady.  Not wanting to find a sitter for the entire day or have to scrounge up a model on the fly, I asked a friend to join me in the adventure, and we each brought our daughters.  I guess I’m lucky to have a child who is suited to my career.

This is all to say that I don't allow Zoë to watch TV during school hours. There are times that I curse myself for making that rule. And there are times when I break it, on particularly busy days when I have a deadline, when the weather is yucky, when she is not feeling well, or when she is excited about some movie we got from the library. But I've noticed that when Zoë is allowed to watch TV, it's all she wants to do. And when she isn't allowed, she easily devises her own missions to occupy her. When she doesn't get a lot of TV, she turns it off after one, maybe two shows. Ready to go back to her work. Whereas when she watches more, she wants more. She wakes up asking for more.


II.
Despite being desperately busy with work this fall, by the end of November, Zoë and I completed a string of curricula goals that we’d set out, and which I honestly thought would never get done. When I ordered the math curricula, I wasn't sure what the difference was between the Activity Book and the Textbook, so I just got both, figuring I needed them both. It turns out that the Activity Book is for additional (you know) ACTIVITIES and that we were supposed to do them in conjunction with each lesson in the workbook (you know, the one with the WORK in it). Needless to say, that didn't happen (while my refusal to ever read directions first did). We went through all the lessons in the Kindergarten Math Textbook A and none of the activities that go along with them. But I think we will use the Activity Book to review the lessons we did over the past three months in the workbook. With Zoë, review is very helpful, especially after some time has passed, and the activities are very much fun. It's almost like a big Highlights Magazine.

Simultaneously, we finished the Consonant Rhyme in our phonics lessons. Zoë now knows the difference between consonants and vowels, and the poems were incredibly helpful in solidifying the sounds each letter stands for. I have to say, thank goodness for this book! It is incredibly helpful. It looks really daunting at first and somewhat boring. But Zoë actually loves the lessons, and it's so well laid out, all I really have to do is read the script.

One thing I've learned about myself in all of this: I'm fine doing every lesson with Z (math, phonics, French, literature, art, cooking, science, culture, history, etc., etc.) EXCEPT reading! I just don't have the patience to sit with her and point to each word as she sounds it out. I'm sure that makes me an awful person and a horrible, terrible mother. However, at least I know this about myself and am willing to admit it. And at least I have a partner in this who is extremely patient and adept in that capacity. So Owen is taking over the practice reading sessions. She finished the Bob Books Set 1 a few weeks ago, and Owen started her on Set 2.

Lastly, we finished our weather chart. We've logged the temperature, type of clouds and precipitation for the past three months (maybe once or twice a week). I thought it would be helpful for Zoë to see how the weather has been dropping visually, and learning to read bar charts was one of the tasks in her math lessons. So we mapped the temperature and created a bar chart. I think after another three months of charting, it'll be even more obvious. In the mean time, it was fun to pick out the colors for each bar.


III.
When all your time is spent balancing between your family and your work, what is left of the person who is spending that time?

Is time just for spending? Can it be savored?

When I was childless, I used to write every day in a journal. Owen left early for work, and I would sit with my coffee and a notebook. Now I blog - without the epiphanies and venting about people. I save that for emails to friends, usually the ones who live far away.

I decided that if I don't get back to those things that make me human, I will surely burn out. It was a pivotal moment. We were running late, as usual, and I was trying to do too much before I had to leave the house for the day. I finally just stopped and said, I have to exercise. I gave up on being anywhere on time. And I went to the rowing machine.

This week I'm four for four. I've gotten up early every day to row, meditate or go running. And it's proving my point to me: that with my own needs attended to, I'm better able to focus during the times I'm attending to others.

Our first semester of lessons has officially ended now. We're taking the month of December off from formal lessons, but Zoë will still attend her classes until they end or go on break this month. I'm going to use this time to do some of the activities I've never had a chance to get to in our regular lessons: math games and sight word manipulatives from Scholastic. We also got a bunch of library books on Ireland to study for our next history and culture unit, which is easier to tackle during the "break".  And we have books on the upcoming holidays, Christmas and Bodhi Day.  There will be baking to do, with measuring and counting, and personal goals for Zoë to devise and accomplish.  In the New Year, we will continue with classes, work and all the juggling that goes with it.