Learned so far:

After two days of homeschooling, I have the following wisdom to share:

*Have your children brush their teeth before you start the day.  Other than that, pajamas are OK.
*Take your shower before you start the day.  (Today I snuck mine while they were writing about our Bible lesson because I just couldn't stand myself any longer.) 
*Put gold stars or stickers on their papers even if you and they are the only ones who will see it.
*Having one computer per person would be ideal.  I had no idea how much computer and printer use there would be.  Yesterday when I had three kids home, plus myself, and only two computers, it was a constant dance of who is using it and who is doing something not requiring them to check the wiki, print something out, or do an online activity.

New journey

So I started this blog to practice my writing since I was teaching writing to Jr. Highers.  Now we are starting  our homeschooling journey.  There are a million blogs about homeschooling out there, and I know no one but me and maybe my sister will read this one.  It's just for my own practice and thinking.

I went to the annual conference put on by our charter school through which we homeschool today.   I came away inspired to:
*create a dedicated physical space
*view education as discipleship--coming alongside your child
*use a discipline/reward system
*remember the objective of the lesson, not just check off the boxes that it's done
*focus on my children during our school time and resist the urge to multi-task.  If I want them to value it and take it seriously, I must do the same.

Today I thought, instead of how I am like my mother, because females usually do that, of how much I am like my father.

We both like to sit and just look.  He may be looking at a Wisconsin lake, sitting on the seawall at dusk, while I am on a bench by my back door watching the darkness fall gently on the San Pasqual Valley while I wait for the owls to appear, but we are both watching.  Just being,  meditating on God, and our blessings, and the beauty of the evening.

We love the country.  Long bike rides down farm roads.  Drives at dusk through Wisconsin woods looking for deer.

If he could visit me here in California, I know where he would sit.  Right where I am now, thinking, thanking God, loving.

We are both meek.  We are content to let the others in our lives take the lead, going where we are led, with the rare flare-up of protest.  We both are in our element in the classroom, where we have the autonomy and are the respected expert in our fields.

We are both suckers for nostalgia, moved to tears at the good old days and pouring over old photos for hours.

We both married wrong, though he would deny it, and our lives have been harder because of it, but we have both stuck it out for the greater good.  We are keepers of commitments.

And music.  There are no words.  It is not just in our blood, it is our blood.  Some of our tastes overlap and some don't, but without it we would be husks of ourselves.

When heart and duty don't meet up

Sometimes we end up in commitments that are duties, not joys.  I am struggling with the juxtaposition of doing my best at everything for the Lord, and having a very bad attitude because I don't want to be doing it in the first place.

I could spout a very spiritual homily about how God puts us in areas that are outside our gifts or desires sometimes because it's good for us, and it helps us grow and stretch blah blah blah.  That's not how I feel though.  I am stuck in a ministry I hate because I opened my big mouth and complained about how it was being run, and now I have to stick it out. 

I guess what I'm saying is, did God put me in the preschool ministry intentionally as a growth experience and trial, or I did I put myself in it by opening my big mouth (called consequences) and now He expects me to do my best at it with a good attitude?

Either way I know that I need to continue to pray over my attitude and over my duties, and truly do my best for His babies, at least till my commitment is over.  I  know that quitting and leaving the others involved in the lurch suddenly is definitely NOT what the Lord would have me do.   So I plug away, but it is ruining church for me.  I feel like I am going to work, not church on Sunday mornings.  On the positive side, I have made new relationships with people I didn't know and in one case actively disliked, as a result of being involved in the preschool ministry.  So there you go.  It's Sunday morning and I have to go get ready for church. 

Guilt. Where does the line lie?

I feel guilty.  Yet I feel right.  How does one reconcile that?

I feel guilty because out of about 50 rough drafts turned in by my students today, I have reviewed and made suggestions on five.  If we don't have the corrected drafts for class tomorrow, I will have to change my lesson plans at the last minute.  I put in five paid hours a day at work.  Grading all the papers would have taken me another two or three hours, ballpark. 

I feel right because my family is my MOST. IMPORTANT. JOB.  When I leave the school, I need to turn off "school me" and turn on "mommy me."  Other than an evening email check in case of urgent questions about homework, I try to leave work behind me when I come home. 

But still, the guilt.  The feeling that tomorrow will be utterly overwhelming because I left something undone today. 

Lord, Please help me to make peace with my humanity and my imperfection, with myself.  Please help me to adjust and cope.

A position of confidence

Much of the time I have a lot of self-doubt, especially related to my job.  Only my relationship with Jesus gives me the strength I need day to day.  But occasionally something comes up where I am able to speak up confidently, using the knowledge and experience the Lord has given me to approach an issue on solid ground.

Today my child's kindergarten teacher pulled my husband aside at drop-off and said that our son is behind in his reading.  Behind in filling out bookmarks, that is, compared to the other kids.    In certain situations, such as if he were truly struggling in reading, I would meet this with meekness and humility, asking help in an area where I need it.  However it is refreshing to sometimes be able to speak confidently.  This is the body of the email I wrote his teacher (also a coworker of mine, so it's a situation requiring extra tact in which I am usually pretty deficient):

Dear Teacher,
My husband said you talked to him about B's reading today.  That's good, he could be more involved, but I happen to know that B is a good reader and I am not at all concerned about him.  I taught the Abeka curriculum at the first grade level at MMCS for six years, I have a master's degree in elementary education and did my thesis on reading at the first grade level, and I am very confident that B will be more than ready for first grade.  He is reading just as well as my girls did at the same point in Kindergarten and they are all straight A students.   

I have four kids and I am working now, and I guess I don't have the time the other kids' parents do to spend hours apparently racking up bookmarks.  It is quality, not quantity, that counts with me and I am very happy with the quality of his reading.  He also reads to me every night at bedtime from one of his story books and I never write that down, having too much else to do to worry about busy-work record-keeping like that.

You have done a great job teaching B to read and we appreciate it, and I feel great about him starting first grade in the fall. 

If I weren't sure that I am right, I would lie awake feeling a lot of self-doubt and praying for Brian's reading and stressing myself out that I am failing.  Well, I will save that for another situation because I know Brian is doing great and I really don't care how many little colored bookmarks he has completed.  I have confidence through my years of parenting and teaching that I don't need to worry about Brian's reading.  I am so grateful to God for this and I lift up praise to Him right now for small victories.  I am wrong so so so often.  It is so merciful of Him to let me be right now and then.

I am average.

You know what?  I am not setting the world on fire at my teaching job.  I depend on the Lord daily to guide my plans and my actions, and I know He is enabling me to do the work, but I am an average teacher at best.  I don't invite students to hang out in my classroom during lunch.  I don't stay late or come early to tutor the struggling ones.  Sometimes certain students know more than I do about grammar and vocabulary.  I  have a hard time with students who don't do well or who don't try, even when I know that they don't have very good support at home or a history of academic success.  I don't use the latest technology.  I tried to make a class website and gave up.  I didn't do a very good job of tracking some of my students' late and missing assignments last quarter and consequently their grades were affected.

So what do I bring to the job?  An assurance that the Lord put me in this position and He will enable me to do it.  A passion for reading and a desire for all to love to read, to be able to write decently, and to have adequate English skills so that they seem educated and not ignorant.  I bring love for each and every one of my middle schoolers.  They are so precious.  I wish each one could know and believe that.  Even if I told them, they wouldn't internalize it, they would just cast it off like one more greeting on a Hallmark card.  I pray for them when they struggle.  I praise them when they succeed, to their faces and to their other teachers and their parents.  I try hard to stay on top of my grading; if they put work in, I should respect that by putting my part of the work in in a timely way. 

I am feeling inadequate today.  I want them all to succeed.  Do all teachers feel like this?