2024-2025 Homeschool Plans..Pivot
Grab your coffee and read along with me!
We are gearing up for our homeschool year and I wanted to take a moment to share with you what our current homeschool year plans look like…because we’ve hit a pivot and I am excited to share what we are doing.
But first, I need to back up and tell another story.
A few weeks ago I was feeling mentally drained. I knew that I had been spending too much time on my phone and trying too hard in juggling online work with my family. I decided to take a week long break from all social media, my blog, my business. And let me tell you, it was the most peaceful week I have had in a long time.
I was going through a homeschool mom’s version of nesting before the upcoming school year and wanted to declutter and clean the house. I was able to get much of it accomplished during that week. I also had time to just enjoy hobbies. One of the things I like to enjoy is to gain inspiration from Pinterest. So I was just taking a moment and reading blogs about homeschooling. I happen to come across a beautiful blog that just really spoke to my heart. The next thing I knew, I was a binge reading her blog post (both homeschooling and recipes). One thing led to another and I ended up finding two You Tube channels within the same niche that again, spoke to my heart in a very clear way. That led me down a rabbit hole and into the world of Charlotte Mason.
The next thing I know, I am reading anything Charlotte Mason that I can get my hands on, ordering a couple the books in her Home Education series, and starting to delve into how to create a Charlotte Mason homeschool.
Before this I had been feeling overwhelmed and a little bit lost on how I would cultivate our upcoming school year. My oldest is just now 6 1/2 but I knew I needed something a little more concrete than what I had done last year. However, the thought of multiple workbooks and curriculum just did not sit well with me (nor did I think it would sit well with my children). So in a sense, I knew I was looking for something different. A more natural way to homeschool that just flowed into our every day, yet captured the beauty that surrounds us.
Of course, I had heard of Charlotte Mason before. Most anyone within the homeschool world (and perhaps even the education world) has maybe at least heard her name. However, I will admit that looking at the booklist of a Charlotte Mason method was dauting enough to scare me away initially.
It was not until I saw it through a different lense that it made sense to me. The lense of what all of those books can accomplish and look like throughout a normal day as opposed to just a list of books needing to be purchased.
See, I am a bookworm. I have read hundreds of books in my short 33 years so far. I always have at least 5 books that I am reading at any given time. I love to get lost in the world of literature and stories. I have since passed that love onto my children as well. We read books daily in our home so it has become just a natural part of our day.
As I was researching and pondering the idea more and more, it just made sense to take what is a natural part of our day and turn it into our homeschooling style. Now I am by no means an expert and still have yet to read Charlotte Mason’s Home Education series and learn about her methods and pedagogy. Given that, I wanted to find a curriculum that I could follow and take ideas from as I learn.
My husband and I were researching a few free options and going through the pros and cons of them. Then we checked out the CMEC (which I had heard about on a few different blogs and You Tube channels). As we were reading through the CMEC website, it just seemed to fit. They offer a level of support and community that I cannot find anywhere else (online or in our local area). So we decided to jump in!
This year we will be completing their Form 1A with my oldest and Kinderleben with my second.
The most interesting part of this story is that I had very much been hoping and praying to 1) find a homeschool style and we just really enjoyed and 2) that I could find a homeschool community (homeschooling can be lonely if you don’t have a support system). God answered both of my prayers. I just had to retreat into the silence in order to see it and then take the opportunity to explore it. I can guarantee that if I had not of taken that week off, I would not have ended up where we are now. I think there is a lesson to be had in that.