TOS Blog Cruise ~ Navigating Stormy Seas
I have been, or can be if you click on a link and make a purchase, compensated via a cash payment, gift, or something else of value for writing this post. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.
This week, the TOS Crew Blog Cruise is tackling the question “How do you homeschool during illness or family stress or crisis?”
Well, we’ve definitely had illness in the house. Although, it is usually acute and not chronic.
We’ve had family stress (aka the BIG move to Alaska with a newborn!)
Thankfully, I can say we haven’t had what I’d consider a real crisis. At least not during the ‘school year’.
Our approach has been pretty much the same for each situation that presented itself. We kept going, just at a much lighter load!
Now, there have been stressful times when we knew ahead of time things would be rough sailing. Big moves and pregnancies usually have some forewarning. Due dates are approximations, but barring unforeseen complications with the pregnancy you have a window for the baby’s arrival. Moves might have little changes happening, but you know when you have to load up and be headed to your new arrival.
When I was pregnant with J, I planned for our school year to start a little early so that we could get a good 9 weeks under our belt before my due date. And, we did just that. What I had NOT planned on when doing my initial lesson plans was the move to Alaska. So, that’s when I had to get flexible.
I will admit that the workload for the boys got really light from the day J was born until we were actually in our permanent home in Alaska. While I was recovering from the cesarean and tending to a newborn, I had the boys doing more in the ‘life skills’ realm (cooking, cleaning, helping care for a baby) than in academics. We did have some schoolwork though.
Online math places (e.g. ALEKS, Mathletics and Mathscore) were in our lives during that time as part of the TOS Crew. The boys loved doing math on the computer and were able to keep skills fresh while acquiring new ones. Reading books (both fictional and non-fiction) helped provide exposure to a variety of topics. We also utilized the TV for some school (shows on science and history are bountiful on cable stations like History and Discovery Channel as well as through instant streaming from Netflix.) Once we arrived in our temporary quarters, history got put back on the schedule with all the boys doing Story of the World Vol. 3. And, language arts made an appearance utilizing online sites with printable pages (e.g. ABC Teach.)
Recently, we took a trip to Louisiana. I knew that doing a full school schedule while at my parents house would be near impossible. Considering it would have taken a few suitcases to bring the books we normally use, we went onto a light load again. The boys started back up with ALEKS for math. The charter school we are enrolled in here also had other resources we can use at no charge. Let’s Go Learn is one that the younger boys did for reading work. Even P did the initial assessment that site offers (which showed me he needs to get back to a regular spelling program and more on reading comprehension. R’s improved on his spelling and blew away his older brother when it came to reading comprehension.) All three boys could log into Skills Alaska (that then can take them to Skills Tutor by Houghton Mifflin) for topics covered in the Alaska standardized tests for language arts, math and science. Brain Pop and Discovery Streaming provided a wide variety of subject material as well. I also printed out some language arts work from ABC Teach for them to have pen and paper time. Finally, we put in a few field trips where they covered subject areas such as science and social studies.
For me, the idea of navigating the stormy seas of homeschooling and life means being flexible in approach. Having the boys educated is definitely a big goal for our homeschool. But, we also have our eye on a bigger prize…Heaven. And, sometimes setting aside the school books to focus on more important things (e.g. family) is what needs to be done.
You can read a bit more of our family’s take on some of the online resources mentioned through the following review posts:
My adult girls and I still laugh about the time when the school schedule was "Reading Rainbow", "Bill Nye the Science Guy", and "Carmen Sandiego". That was not really all we did, but even back then, it was good to have something educational around when I was in the middle of some much need recuperation. I think the point is that over the long haul of homeschooling, it all evens out. Sometimes we are able to accomplish a lot. Other times, we need to slow the pace a bit.