I Stopped Trying to Make Homeschool Impressive

There was definitely a version of homeschooling I pictured before we actually started doing it.

It wasn't completely unrealistic. We really do have days when we follow rabbit trails for hours. We've learned things on beaches and in museums and in the car on the way to somewhere else. We've rearranged entire weeks because something interesting came up on a Tuesday. There have been projects spread across the table, stacks of library books, experiments, field trips, and conversations that went somewhere I never could have planned.

Those are some of my favorite parts of homeschooling.

They're also not what we do most of the time.

Most of the time, somebody is doing math.

Someone needs a pencil.

Someone else needs me to explain the directions even though I am almost positive we just read them together.

There are books on the table, dishes in the sink, laundry happening somewhere in the background, and at least one person asking what we're having for lunch before I've finished my coffee.

It's considerably less cinematic.

And I think there was a time when that bothered me more than I realized.

Not because I thought every day needed to be beautiful. I've never been particularly interested in creating an elaborate themed homeschool or turning every lesson into a production. That's just not really me.

But I did feel a certain responsibility to make good use of homeschooling.

We had chosen this enormous freedom. Surely we should do something with it.

If we were learning about something interesting, shouldn't I find the field trip? If there was an experiment we could do, shouldn't we do it? If a curriculum suggested a project, shouldn't we at least consider it? If there was a better book, a more engaging activity, a beautiful printable, or some memorable way to bring the lesson to life, wasn't part of my job to find it?

And there almost always is something.

That's the problem.

There is an essentially endless supply of ways to make a homeschool lesson better.

You can add another book. Find a documentary. Build a model. Cook the food. Visit the place. Make the timeline. Go outside. Turn it into a game. Follow the rabbit trail.

All of those things can be wonderful.

But if every lesson becomes an opportunity to make learning more memorable, homeschooling gets exhausting remarkably quickly.

At some point, I started realizing that I was measuring perfectly good school days against what they could have been.

We learned the science concept, but we didn't do the experiment.

We read about the historical event, but I didn't plan anything to go with it.

Someone finished the worksheet and understood it, but there wasn't anything particularly interesting about the experience.

And instead of simply recognizing that my child had learned something, there could be this tiny sense that I had left something on the table.

I don't feel that way nearly as often anymore.

Maybe it's because I have three kids now. Maybe it's because I've been doing this long enough to have watched a lot of lessons that felt completely ordinary at the time quietly become part of what my kids know.

Probably both.

I've also learned that making everything special has a strange way of making nothing particularly special.

If we do the experiment every time, it's just another thing on the schedule. If every chapter has an activity attached to it, the activity becomes another assignment. If we're constantly trying to create memorable experiences, we can end up so busy manufacturing the experience that nobody has much room to actually become interested in the subject.

These days, I'm much more willing to wait and see what catches.

We might read three chapters about something and move right along. Then a fourth chapter sparks a question and suddenly we're looking something up, watching a video, ordering a book from the library, or planning somewhere we want to go.

That feels different to me.

We're not adding something because a curriculum guide told me this would be a good opportunity for enrichment. We're following something because one of us genuinely wants to know more.

And yes, sometimes I'm the one who wants to know more. 😂

I still plan experiences. I still find things I think my kids will love. There are absolutely times when I decide we're going to make the thing, visit the place, or spend considerably more time on a subject than was technically necessary because I think it will be worth it.

I haven't become opposed to making homeschool memorable.

I've just stopped believing that's the standard every lesson has to meet.

Some things are worth experiencing.

Some things are worth lingering over.

Some things become fascinating only after we've spent enough ordinary time learning the basics to understand why they're interesting in the first place.

And some things can simply be learned.

Read the chapter. Work the problems. Practice the skill. Close the book.

There is something freeing about allowing that to be enough.

Because when I stopped trying to extract every possible benefit from every homeschool day, I didn't end up with a less interesting homeschool.

If anything, I think we gained more room for the interesting things to happen naturally.

There is margin to follow the question because I didn't already fill the afternoon with enrichment. There is energy for the project they actually care about because I didn't use it all creating projects for things they didn't. There is room to recognize when something has genuinely captured one of my kids instead of constantly trying to capture their attention myself.

And there are plenty of completely ordinary days in between.

I'm grateful for those too.

I don't think my kids need to look back and remember the clever activity I created for every unit they studied. I don't even think they need to remember most of the individual lessons.

I want them to know things. I want them to know how to learn things. I want curiosity to still have some life left in it after we've finished school for the day.

And I want homeschooling to fit inside the life we're building together rather than requiring that our entire life become a homeschool production.

So yes, we'll still have the ridiculous rabbit trails.

We'll still go somewhere on a Tuesday just because we can.

I'll still occasionally decide that something absolutely requires an unnecessarily elaborate project because apparently I enjoy creating problems for myself. 😂

But tomorrow?

Someone will probably do math in pajamas.

I'll probably explain something twice.

We'll read some things, learn some things, close the books, and go make lunch.

And I'm not waiting for the impressive days anymore to believe that was a good one. 🌿