Time for Change

I have been nose deep in books, and I'm not exaggerating when I say that I have stacks upon stacks of books in my living room. I've been speed reading as well, as time is definitely on my side! It's not unusual for me to be struck with this reading frenzy, but this one is different; this one is for a cause, not just to satisfy my child-like curiosity about the world.

S unfortunately does not like 'learning'.

"Oh, that's learning," she would say whenever I would bring up some interesting facts.

It troubles me to no end, and I have attributed it to my weaknesses as a teacher. This has been one of my worries and stress source, but only recently was I driven to make a move for a change.

Doing OHVA, well I don't like it, but I did it because of several reasons:

1. I tried doing homeschooling the traditional way but I ended up having to prepare a lot of stuff myself that I slept at 1 am each night only having to work a full day the next day, every day.
2. I was very apprehensive about homeschooling 'on my own' because for one, I wasn't even brought up here in the United States, English is not my first language, I don't have teacher credentials, teaching techniques here might very well differ greatly from teaching techniques in Malaysia (heaven yeah, they do!), I'd have to do major research from scratch, as to the scope and sequence should be covered in each grade level. This in itself was intimidating enough to stop me in my tracks.
3. I was also apprehensive about when the time will come when we will eventually have to relocate to Malaysia, and were I to do the traditional homeschooling, I will most probably not have an 'official' school record for the kids. What do I do then?

After doing OHVA for almost 5 years now, I have learned a great deal about the techniques of teaching, the scope and sequence, and most importantly, that I don't want to recreate a classroom at home for the kids.

I have been reading about the different methods of homeschooling; unschooling, unit studies, classical method, Charlotte Mason, Moore Formula, to mention a few.

What I read about education also struck a chord in me. Why do we take our kids out of public school if we only end up recreating a classroom at home? With OHVA, that's what we have been doing, and with muktiple students such as my case, it's getting worse and worse. I have grown to really despise it, when homeschooling should be enjoyed and 'lived'. Learning is a life process, and a child naturally has this drive to learn.

It's when we treat them like empty vessels and force information down their throats that we kill this natural tendency. The 'factory model' is what they call it. A textbook for a whole group of children, regardless of their individuality and personal interests.

A simple example would be to look into my own life experiences. When I graduated with my Bachelor's, the first thought that ran through my mind was,

"YES! now I can read whatever I want!"

Of course, with three kids under the age of 3 that wasn't really a reality, whcih I realized later on, but my interest in learning blossomed, having been given this 'freedom' from a 'one for all' curriculum. From a very young age, I have always been a bookworm, probably because of my lonely childhood, but I also remember sitting in front of the TV, with a notebook, trying to take notes from a kid Science show. I had great ambitions, but school destroyed them.

Ok, now I may sound like I'm just thrashing the whole education system and complaining, but really, think about it, why do we settle with a uniform approach when our children are individuals with varying ambitions, capabilities, interests, and learning styles?

Bogged down with homework, subjects that they have grown to hate, kids may very well develop a negative attitude about school, as is the case with S. School to them is a chore. Learning shouldn't be a chore, though of course there are some subjects that, whether you like it or not, you have to just pinch your nose, hold your breath, and swallow.

When I ponder upon this, I think of all those college graduates who go the normal routes; find a job, get married, have children, wait for the pension. Do they still have this drive to learn? They all went to school. They're all educated. They became 'people', right? But do they go on learning, or have they stopped because they were too burned out learning in the 'education system' and because they are already 'educated'?

I don't think I'm doing this issue justice at all, but the one core point I extracted from all of this is; I want my children to love learning for learning's sake, not because they have to finish elementary school, or go to college, so they could get a job.

My children read for pleasure. Here in the United States, public libraries always have summer reading programs to encourage children to read, bribing them with prizes and gifts, just to get them to read. Alhamdulillah I don't have that problem with my kids. We have always been surrounded by books. Even Baby Z now (considering that all toys we found at the store were Made in China) plays with books. I hesitated buying any toys for him because of the recalls. Yeah, yeah, not all of them are recalled, but it's like the case of drugs - a few years down the line, they make a public announcements like these;

"The ________ pill is recalled because research has found that it increases the risk of heart disease. "

Wouldn't it have been too late by then? I'd rather be safe than sorry.

S has a natural love for animals, and she would read about animals without me telling her to. We even call her our 'Animal Expert'. Alhamdulillah I invested (without realizing it) in non fiction materials when they were younger, drying up my own savings. Despite hubby's complaints of

'What do you do with all these books?"

I stubbornly held on to them, keeping in mind that he's not a reader. Now, alhamdulillah, he sees the kids picking up 'these books' and realizes their worth, or at least I hope so.

What I also realized is that, while a child may not display interest in something you bought for them to use, they may very well pick it up, and explore it with keen interest a few years down the line. So I have learned to not throw these things away, despite a very strong urge to do so when my brain experiences 'clutter attack'.

So, here we embark on this new journey in our homeschooling adventure, and I have chosen Unit Study as a homeschooling method, as I find that it's the one the kids and I are most interested in, and it's also a good method for families with multiple students.

I strongly believe, with the help of Allah, that inshaallah this will be a good change for us, and what brought it on?

Having Baby Z. Remember how I used to fret about how I was going to homeschooli once the baby's 'here'? Well, the baby's here and it ain't pretty (the homeschooling scene, I mean. Baby Z is very beautiful alhamdulillah thank you very much). And that has pushed me to look for a solution. Four years ago I wasn't ready to embrace this, but now inshaallah, I am in a different stage of 'homeschool mom', and I am ready to take this challenge head on. I have accepted the fact that my lifestyle has changed from when they were all younger, and that they no longer take naps which provided me with some 'me time' and 'workout time'. I am older, and inshaallah *cough* wiser. By the way, hubby turned 31 today, but the kids said,

"Abi's 31 but Ummi's still older, but she's shorter."

With this change, the kids and I have come up with a name for our homeschool, and it's HAZENS HOMESCHOOL, created from a jumbled up first few letters of the kids' names. As for OHVA, well, we'll complete it -I'm not that much of an idiot to chuck it out completely ...yet. As I learned from a friend,

"It's always good to have back up."