I've Always said Homeschooling was a Marathon and Not a Sprint

I have spent many hours this summer getting my school lesson plans ready for the fall. It seems as though I spend a lot more time than I did in the past. All of the classes are more of a challenge now that we are doing high school. The books my children read are hundreds of pages long now, and for some classes I need to do a lot of studying so that I can be better informed; overall, the work is at a level that stretches my knowledge and abilities.

As a young adult I read a lot of good books. I started working at our small town library when I was 16, and I pulled a lot of books off the shelf to read that were well worth my time—Jane Austin, Thomas Hardy, Leo Tolstoy were some of the authors I enjoyed. Many of these books are ones my children are now reading, and even if I have read them, I usually reread them so that I can better discuss them. This year, however, we will be doing books I have never read. The Odyssey is one of them. I plan to try using some of the lessons in Veritas’ Omnibus—I hope we enjoy them. Even the history books seem to bulge with more pages than can be read in a single class—Spielvogel’s World History: A Human Odyssey is over 1,000 pages long. Preparation for these large tomes takes much more time than putting together lesson plans for Blueberries for Sal and The Long Winter! It takes a lot of time and effort to prepare for the literature and textbooks that are used for high school, rhetoric level students.

This year we will be studying American government and economics. I have several texts and materials lined up for these classes. Although my father was and econ teacher, I must admit that I never took a class in that subject area. I am grateful for the help I have received from so many other homeschoolers who know more about this than I do. Between my own studies and their knowledge and help, I do believe that we will have an excellent class this year—and I will have learned a lot, too. Throughout our past 11 years of homeschooling, I have studied and learned many things—much has been a review of what I learned before, but I have also added new knowledge and depth of understanding that I would not have had if I had not taught my children at home. I have worked hard to give my children a good education and have benefited, myself, a great deal as well.

When my children were small, my children learned phonics and spelling. We studied the pilgrims and looked at the parts of flowers under the microscope. The children added and subtracted and learned their multiplication tables. Today what my children study is beyond what I studied and learned in high school. Although I took several years of Spanish, I have found that Latin demands and teaches a child a lot more about language and grammar. We all studied composition, but the progymnasmata teaches a use of words that I did not begin to study in school. Logic class has trained our minds to think and reason in ways we did not know possible. I am grateful that my children and I have had the chance to be challenged at this level of learning and understanding, which goes beyond normal expectations. It has been worth our while.

Now we are coming to the end of our summer, and although I am not as ready as I would like for the coming year, I am glad that we are going to be starting our 12th year of homeschooling. Soon my oldest will be applying to colleges and be preparing to move outside of my little schoolroom. She will be ready. I am grateful for the years we have had together and would not exchange them for anything! At times I could have said that “I found myself astray in a dark wood where the straight road had been lost”, but I know that we will not be sorry for the road we have chosen—you know, "the road less traveled…." We take the knowledge of having studied Dante and Frost and so many others with us. Who could regret it?