Wednesday, May 23, 2012

The Beginning of Something Beautiful


One of my current homeschooling projects is something near and dear to my heart. Two other homeschooling women and I have begun the process of starting a homeschooling Co-Op in our area. It all started when...

A friend of mine asked if I'd like to get together with her once every other week so that our homeschooled children could get together and play. I suggested that maybe we make it a homeschooling project day and plan something somewhat educational for each meeting. Then we realized a mutual friend of ours might like to join us for this homeschool gathering of sorts. We started meeting every other week in January 2012, rotating homes and sharing the responsibility of lunches and lesson plans. One of our first projects was for each family to make a family tree. It was kind of an art project and study of each family's unique history. We were thrilled with the results, a bit proud of ourselves if I do say so myself, and we kept the ball rolling from there! There were bumps, of course, and we quickly discovered what things helped and hindered the productivity of our times together. For instance, one strong-willed, older child needed lots of responsibilities helping the Moms so as to keep him occupied and out of trouble; two three year olds (bless their little hearts) needed “gentle guiding” in order to “love one another” as they should; and, perhaps most valuable of all, eating outside is always a plus when feeding 9 children at once! I learned that art and craft projects are best done in someone else's home lest I have a nervous breakdown, but that science projects, just as messy, are not as stressful to me (for some strange reason...don't ask me why).

Between the three of us Moms we each had individual strengths and weaknesses. We filled each others gaps in the homeschooling department and before long we realized that we were forming a close bond ourselves simply by being able to vent, talk, get out of the house together and encourage each other. Soon we didn't know what was more important to our family's health – the interactive education the kids were receiving or the Mom-to-Mom time we were receiving!

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