Summer is a double edged sword for homeschoolers.  (Maybe for all schoolers, I don’t know.)

On the one hand — FREEDOM.  No schedule.  No routine.  No lesson plans.  No math homework.  Sleeping late.  Staying up late.  Eat lunch at 3 pm.  Eat breakfast at 11 am.  Have watermelon and corn on the cob for dinner.  Eat popsicles for dinner.

On the other hand — FREEDOM.  Grouchy kids from lack of sleep.  Messed up schedules from sleeping late.  Saying yes to too many fun things because (FREEDOM).  Not sitting down to regular family at-the-table dinners.  No routine.  Staying up late.

So sometimes you kind of want (and need) that structure of a school day back in your life but you sort of dread that structure of lesson planning and expectations back in your day too.

And it hardly matters what you want anyway, because school is about to happen to us all come August, in one form or another.

So how can you get on board with what is already looming in your future?

A few tips and tricks that work for me when I’m not all gung-ho about Math 7 and dictation and grammar and the pyramids.

1.  Talk to friends about school plans.

When you sit down with fellow homeschooling mums and you talk shop, it can be invigorating.  Inspiring.  Encouraging.  Or at least – it can be forward momentum causing.

It is still summer, so have that chat stream side or at the pool or with a giant slice of chocolate cake between the both of you.  Whatever it takes.  FREEDOM!

2.  Attend a conference.  Take a class.  Go to a workshop.

Pick a topic that you already know you love.  Or pick a topic that you feel a rising dread toward.  It doesn’t actually matter all that much.

Attending a class and listening to experts in their fields will inspire you.  It will remind you that YOU are actually an expert yourself and you know lots more than you realize.  You have loads to contribute and you are the master of your home classroom.

You’ll hear new ideas, be snapped out of your routine to try new methods and get a little boost and push in the right direction.

You should go with a friend or two if you can.  And eat chocolate cake.

3.  Listen to an educational podcast.

If you can’t find a conference – or even if you can – try a podcast or two.  (Or eight.  Whatever.)  Pick a topic that is school related or even a topic that you just find interesting.  In order to have stuff to teach, we have to have already had stuff to think.

Listen in your car or on a walk or in the kitchen while you are making dinner or in the laundry room while you fold clothes or on your front porch while you sip frozen hot chocolate.  And eat chocolate cake.

I enjoy Sarah Mackenzie’s podcasts at the Read Aloud Revival and the Circe Institute’s too.  This podcast about the use of simple spiral notebooks had some helpful ideas that I plan to implement on our first day at school this week.

4.  Read a novel. 

Yes.  Read a novel. A fiction novel.  Just a book that you think looks interesting for its own sake.  Learn something.  Have dinner table conversation about the book YOU read.  We’re always asking our kids, “Tell me about Tom Sawyer.”  “What happened in that last chapter, son?”  If you want your children to love reading beyond what you require of them in school, you had better have read a novel or two (or sixteen) yourself.  I’m always amazed at how closely the kids listen when I spontaneously tell them about a book I am reading.  Of course, I have to be careful not to make the book sound too exciting, because then my big kids want to read it too.  I just finished reading The Goldfinch at the recommendation of Smandy at the library and I was chatting it up about the novel (because it STUCK in my head for days on days and it’s still murmuring about in some subversive way in my brain) and then London was very interested in reading it herself and I had to just say, “Nah.  This one’s an adult-only kind of fiction for now.”

It’s amazing how simply learning for fun can ignite your engine to want to teach again.

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