Part 2:
I had just completed two years of homeschooling my son. And my husband and I had decided that, as Little Man got older in grade levels, we would be placing him back into the public school system. Up to that point, his one and only year of public school had been Kindergarten, and then he received home education for first and second grades.
While I valued and appreciated the opportunity I was given to homeschool him, I did feel that there were some educational aspects that he was missing in his school experience that my two older children were able to partake of. Even though there’s quite an age difference between my youngest and my two older children, it was easy for me to recall differences between Toodlez’ and Junior’s educations and the education that Little Man was receiving at home.
At the onset of their educational training, my adult children were challenged to excel and academically compete. Furthermore, they were exposed to social etiquette and, consequently, developed strong interpersonal relationship skills that can only be developed by being around other individuals outside of their regular interactions with family members.
During my short-lived homeschooling stint, I never fully reached a comfortability level in guaranteeing that I was replicating (for Little Man) the academic rigor or socialization scenarios my two older children experienced in school. And to this day, I credit my adult children’s strong educational beginnings as the partial reasoning for their incredible achievements throughout their academic careers.
And even more concerning was the realization that my son wasn’t getting regular interaction with children his own age. There’s just something about being around your peers that creates a natural tendency to compete and get better at things. Young children bring out a healthy competitive nature (whether it be in academics or recreation) in one another. He was missing that element of having other children to learn from, work in groups with, bounce ideas off of, and challenge and be challenged by.
Essentially, he was around me (an adult which happens to be his mother) all day long. And being the lone homeschooled child, throughout the week, left him void of regular child interaction. So, to pick up some of these pieces that I felt my son was missing in his educational experience at home, my husband and I decided to place him back into the public school system for his older elementary grades.
My son’s transition back into public school initially required all focus to be on getting him successfully acclimated to his new surroundings. Therefore, the effect Little Man’s return to a brick-and-mortar school would have on me didn’t actually surface until after-the-fact. In reviewing the situation at hand, I had two adult children who were quite self-sufficient and functioning independently for the most part. They didn’t need me catering to them day-in and day-out. And then I had my youngest who’d required a lot of my attention but would no longer be homeschooled by yours truly.
My mornings and afternoons were mostly about my child’s education; and with Little Man gone throughout the day, my responsibilities at home would shift dramatically. So, I had to think about what I actually wanted to do with my life at that point. I would still be a wife and mother, but everyone in the household would be gone throughout the day and I’d be home alone. Doing what? Well, of course, I would still have daily responsibilities to attend to, but certainly there had to be other aspirations that I wanted to pursue outside of the normal domestic routine. Right?
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