_..l
GG j wrrnour SG Issue 100
Focus on Creating Useful Schedules
Japanese School Refusers
Handling Anxiety Challenging Tests
Celebrating 100 lssues
Theater Groups
- See p. 6
July/August 1994
(7_ h,,,Hi{,1-J;;:."11{:5#L,,o,, a7n2 ,Dto Aal plan for her each week' Twelve-year-
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News & Reports p. 3-5 Changes to CO Law,Japanese School Refusers
Theater Groups p.6-8 Resources & Recommendations p. 9 Challenges
& Concerns p. l0-f3
Handling Homeschooling Anxiety, Children with Disabilities Challenging Standardized Tests p. 14-15 Refusing to comply with the homeschooling law, Encouraging teachers not to test Making Decisions about College and Work p. 16-19 Watching Children Learn p. 20-23 Thoughts about Competition, Volunteering at Radio Stations FOCUS: Creating Useful Schedules p,2a-27 How Unschooling Led to Neu Moonmagazine p. 28-29
Rethinking Childhood p. 30-31 Celebrating 100 Issues p. 32-36 Stories by Pat Farenga and Susannah Sheffer about discoveringJohn Holt's work
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French and math. Fifteen-year-old Catherine Bercier follows a scheduled "To Do" list each day. Elevenyear-old Valerie Pickrell sits down at 9:00 each morning to work with her mother on academic subjects. Yet I think it's safe to say that all these kids consider themselves self-directed learners and susbcribe to the notion that homeschooling doesn't have to replicate school in the home. So what's going on? Are they contradicting themselves? Are they not as self-directed as they had thought? No, on the contrary. They are self-directed, their homeschooling is not at all like school, and to me, understanding why this is so is crucial to understanding what selfdirected learning, or unschooling, is all about. Julie-Ann ashedher mother to write up a list of suggested activities in each ofthe subject areas because she decided that she would like to learn "more formal stuff," and she figured out, for herself, that she would like help coming up with ways to begin and finding time for everything.Joanna experimented with many different t)?es of schedules over the year before settling, this year, on one that includes regular time for French and math, because she had been frustrated with her progress in these areas and eager to carve out a specified time for working on them. Catherine herself writes up the "To Do" lists, and completes the tasks in consultation with her mother, because she has found that "having a schedule is actually very freeing" to her. And when Valerie sits down to work
with her mother, they work "in unconventional ways" in
Book Reviews p. 39
Issur, #100
oldJoanna Hoyt regularly spends half an hour a day working on
Dooltrrle
Holr Asso<;rarns Boeru or DInr,<nons: D.w FenrNca, Parrucr FenrN<;e (Conror.lrt Pnrslor:Nr), lWqnv Mnnen, Mero.; Peorr, SusaNNen Snmrtn Aolrsons ro rse Boano: Tov Mesnn, Mer.vVaN DonrN, NaNcvWerlecr (]nowM; WrrH<rT Soroor,rrc #1@, Vor.. 17, No. 3. ISSN #0475-5305. Pusrrst*rr nv Horr Assocwrts, 2269 MAss. Avr., CAMBRu)GE MA 02140. $25/R. DA'f!: oF rssuE: Auc. l, 1994. SE(:oNH]IA$ posrAcx reru lL Boston, MA lrtr ar,ronnox.tl, MAIl,tN(: ()$l(r!ts. POSTMASTER: Sr:rD /u)DRss cHNcLs 1o GWS. 2269 l\4ss. Avr, CAMBRTDG:, MA 02140 ADVERTISERS: Copy DlNr rNEs ARE THlr lsr'H ()F oDDNUMBETD rIoNTHs; spA(li MLrsr BE MSER1ED THElsl. 'WRrrlt F()R RATts.
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subjects Valerie has decided to focus on. Of course, this is not at all like what happens in most schools. In these homeschooling families, the schedules serve the students, helping them to make time for what they want to accomplish. In school, the students serve the schedule, without ever being asked what they want to accomplish or what kind of schedule would help. When we asked young GWS readers to write about schedules for this issue's Focus, we invited them to write about 'what kind of schedule, if any, you do like to have. ... How much and what kind of scheduling do you find helpful in terms of your own needs and goals?" These are not questions we could have sensibly asked students in school, or at least not with respect to the academic subjects and the daytime hours. Some homeschoolers write to us with a rather apol-
ogetic tone and say, '1Ve're not totally unschoolers." Then they go on to describe how they follow some kind of schedule or make a point of covering some academic subjects regularly, as if these facts disqualify them from being true unschoolers. The point of unschooling, to me, is that the kids have a chance to figure out what they want to learn and what will help them learn it. Yes, they often do this in conjunction with their parents'; the parents' input is indeed important. But so is the kids', and that's what makes $11s2nnah Sheffer the situation so different from school.
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GnowrNc;
Wrrnour Scuoor.rNc #100 .JulylAucusr 1994
r'lreru E.frqortt
Changes to Colorado Law Several Colorado readers sent us copies ofthe recent changes to the Colorado homeschool law. The law now allows for greater flexibility in the way homeschoolers submit their
annual notification to the school district and in the way that homeschooled children are evaluated. The bill passed 33-2 in the Senate and 53-9 in the House, and was signed by the governor on April 14, according to the May 1994 issue of the Christian Home Educators of Colorado newsletter (1015 S Gaylord St #226, Denver CO 8o2oe).
The law now allows homeschoolers to be evaluated by a "qualified person" outside the family, instead of by standardized tests, if the family so chooses. A "qualified person" is defined as "an individual who is selected by the parent of a child who is par-
ticipating in a non-public home-based educational program to evaluate such child's progress and who is a teacher cerrified pursuant to aritcle 60 of this title, a teacher who is employed by an independent parochial school, a licensed psychologist, or a person with
in education." This qualified person then signs a statement sa)4ng that the homeschooled child has "made sufficient progress according to the child's ability," and the family submits that report to the local school orto an independent or parochial school (in the latter case, the family submits the name of that school to the local public school district). a graduate degree
Other changes to the law make the evaluation procedures still more flexible for homeschoolers. The law had previously said that homeschoolers needed to be evaluated when they reached "the equivalent age for grades three, five, seven, nine, and eleven." Now the phrase "the equivalent age" is
in Colorado had already been allowed to participate in public school extracurricular activities, but they were charged fees for this participation that were sometimes much higher than what public school students were charged. This bill originally restricted
deleted, so that the family can determine when the child reaches each grade level. For parents who do choose standardized testing, the law had previously specified that they had to use the achievement test "used by the local school district of residence to evaluate children in Ithe homeschooled child'sl age group." Now the only requirement is that the family use "a nationally standardized achievement test," so they can choose which one to use and it need not be the one that the local school uses. The law had also previously said that the purpose of the evaluation of a homeschooled child was "to evaluate the educational progress of each child, as compared to the child's age group in the public school system." Now the final clause is deleted, so that the sentencejust reads, "to evaluate the educational progress of each child." Finally, the law now allows families to choose the format in which they submit their annual written notification of intent to homeschool. Previously, the law had allowed school districts to require parents to use the district's forms, and the Christian Home Educators of Colorado newsletter says that these forms had sometimes contained requests for informa-
tion not required by law. Another bill, SB 72,
has
just been
signed by Colorado's governor, and this one makes it easier for homeschoolers to participate in extracurricular activities in private schools that allow such participation, according to a memo from Concerned Parents of Colorado (PO Box 547, Florissant CO 80816). The Colorado High School Athletics Association can no longer prevent homeschoolers from participating.
Furthermore, another bill which deals with participation in school activities has gone to the governor's
desk for his signature. Homeschoolers
GnourNc Wrruour ScsoolrNc #100 oJulylAucusr 1994
districts from charging homeschoolers more than public school students, but in the Senate this provision was changed, so that now the bill says districts may not charge homeschoolers more than 150Vo of the public school fees. Concerned Parents of Colorado writes that this is an increase for some districts but an
improvement for others.
Japanese School Refusers From Pat Montgomery, director of the Clonlara Home Based Education Program:
\44ren I visitedJapan in 1984, my hosts pointed out a l0-storey hospital in Tokyo. They told me that every storey in the hospital was filled with school refusers. These are children from 3 or 4 years old to adolescents who have refused to attend school. In the hospital they were supposedly
being rehabilitated for their phobia, so that they could return to school. Since then I have learned that the number of school refusers inJapan is phenomenal. The pressure is so great in many of the schools that the children just cannot take it, and there is also a lot of bullying, which I see as a direct result of the pressure. There is pressure to be admitted to some of the schools that are considered better than the regular schools. Then, once the children get to school, they are subject to a very rigid routine, and the pressure continues. They go to school for 280 days a year, 6 days a week. After-school "cram schools" become a part of their life early on. They're cramming for the exams that will determine which high school track they will go on - if they make the academic track, that's considered good because it will get them into the university. The central administrative authoriry in Tokyo just turns its head about this problem of school refusers, because they don't know what to do. As I 3
.i. understand it, many of these kids refuse so strongly that there's just no way to make them go. They become catatonic or throw violent tantrums. In the past, these kids either stayed home, not doing much of anything, or were hospitalized. Some were made to feel very ashamed for being school refusers. We had oneJapanese child over here at Clonlara who was clearly a very depressed and troubled child. When her mother came over to the U.S., we learned that the girl had been a school refuser and her father had badgered her at every meal, telling her what a failure she was and what shame she was bringing on the family. Her mother had sent her to the U.S. in the hopes of having her escape this, but of course the girl still felt terrible about herself. The exciting thing that has happened in recent years is that many free schools are being established specifically for school refusers. In the early 1980s books about Clonlara, and other alternatives, were published in Japan, and interest spread. The word got around that alternatives were possible. For years someJapanese families have sent their children to the Clonlara Campus School and to Summerhill in England. As word spread,Japanese people began to create their own free schools as well. When I was inJapan in 1984 I met a woman named Keiko Otsuko, who was at that time teaching in public schools. She told me that the school refusers were breaking her heart, and she asked what I thought she should do. She asked if she should continue working in the public schools and try to make changes there, or should she pursue a vision of creating a place that would help to heal the school refusers. I don't even remember saying this, but she tells me now that I told her to follow her vision and see what she could accomplish. She opened a free school called Tokyo Shure, and it has been in operation for ten years. They have 130 students now, and they're about to open a second campus. They serve these students, who were formerly school refusers, in a very fluid way: they can come all day, or for part of the day; whatever they want. It's a marvelous set-up that deals with the needs of these students.
NnWS
& Rnponrs .i.
Alternative Community Schools that
into the school. I believe there is already a lot of interest among the Japanese in home education. Our Clonlara program serves hundreds of Japanese families now. As far as I know, the Tokyo Shure program will be the first homeschool program for Japanese students that is based in
we have here in the U.S., and some
Japan.
InJapan, people are not officially allowed to start schools unless they have 1000 students, but people are simply starting small schools any^/ay. Again, the central authoriryjust turns its head. Many of these schools now belong to the National Coalition of
come to our conferences and bring teachers, students, and parents. It's interesting to observe the differences between theJapanese free schools and the ones in the U.S.. As a culture, we are very individually oriented in the U.S., whereas the Japanese have a group mentality. They have a saylng, 'The nail that sticks up will get hammered down." People just don't do things on their own. The woman who started Tokyo Shure would never have succeeded ifshe had tried to do it all by herself. She had to gather many like-minded people around her first. \Alhat I've seen in theJapanese
free schools I've visited is that the students operate very much as a group. They are doing things that are very different from what kids in other schools are doing, but they are doing them as a group. You don't see one
child off in a corner doing one thing, and two other kids off somewhere else doing their thing, as you do in free schools here. I think this is wonderful, because it means that theJapanese have found a way to develop free schools that fit with their culture.
I often think both cultures would benefit if we learned a bit from one another. We could benefit from learning to be more generous, to think of the needs of the group, and I think some of theJapanese might welcome a greater freedom of individual expression, particularly in the creative arts. This past spring, a group of students and teachers from Clonlara went to visit Tokyo Shure, and then a group of them came to visit the U.S.. In the fall, I will be going over there to help Tokyo Shure set up a home-based education program, much like we have at Clonlara. Just as we did years ago, they see a home-based education program as a way both of serving the needs of families who would like to teach their own kids and of bringing more money GnowrNc
Office News [SS:] We are sorry to say goodbye to Dawn Lease, who has been our capable order processor for the past two years. If you've called the office to place an order or ask questions, you've probably heard Dawn's cheerful voice. We'll miss her and her children Spencer and Eliza, but we wish them luck in their new home in Florida. Milagros Chil will be taking on Dawn's job, after having worked at the Latino Health Institute in Boston for the past year and a half. She will be bringing 7 l/Z-year-old Sharvl and 2year-old Luisa with her to the office, and is looking forward to starting homeschooling with Sharyl this fall. We are in the process of restructuring ourJohn Holt's Book and Music Catalog to have fewer items and a greater focus on the ideas and approach that people associate with us. We will be adding some new items in the fall (as usual) and cutting more than usual, so now is a good time to purchase books that you've been meaning to get from us. We'll be enclosing lists of the cut books in with your orders, and you can also call and ask us for one of these lists or just call to inquire if a particular book is going to be cut from the catalog. Having fewer items in our fall 1994 catalog will mean that the catalog itself can accommodate longer descriptions of the books we do carry. We will also be including questions and answers about homeschooling in this full catalog, so that rather than having a full catalog and then a separate introductory catalog, as we now have, we'll have one catalog that lists all the books we carry and has questions and answers. We hope many of you will use this catalog to acquaint people with homeschooling, as several of our readers and customers have WnHour ScHoor-rNc #100 oJur,v/Auc;usr 1994
*
subsequent issues. If that listing is still
already done. As you may have seen in our spring-summer 1994 catalog, we are now selling a small booklet calledJohn Holt's Reading List ($2 + s/h), which
correct, you don't need to do anything - it will automatically appear in GWS #102. Ifyou need to change that listing, now is the time to do it. Please fill out the form at the back of this issue and send it in by October 31, 1994. Ifyou are part ofa homeschool group, check the list of organizations and make sure that the information is correct there as well (remember that
gives information about all the books we have sold at one time but no longer sell. Over the years we have had to cut
books that have gone out ofprint, have not sold well, or that we have chosen to replace with new titles. Most of the time, we still love and enthusiastically recommend the books we have cut fiom the catalog, which is why we wanted to make this list of titles available. Now that we are cutting many more titles from the upcoming catalog, we are thinking of creating an Unschoolers' Resource Guide (that's a tentative title) that would describe all these wonderful books and materials that our review committee has taken the time to evaluate. So look for our new catalog in the fall and this resource guide sometime next spring. GWS #102
Nsws & Rr,ponrs'!.
info: Kim Gordon, 6501 SW Macadam Av, Portland OR 97202. Sept. l6-18: California Coalition of People for Alternative Learning Situations Southern California Regional Campout at Leo Carillo State Beach in Malibu. For info: 310-831-4150. Sept. 28: Alternative Education Conference at Fitchburg (MA) State College, with Pat Farenga speaking.
For info: 508-345-2151
we have included address changes in every subsequent issue, so the infb might be incorrect in #96 but cor-
Sept. 30-Oct. 2: National Homeschool Association annual conference at Camp Ernst, Kentucky. For info: NHA, PO Box 157290, Cincinnati OH 45215-7 290 ; 513-7 7 2-9580.
rected in a later issue).
Oct. B: West Virginia Home
Calendar
Educators Assoc. annual conference in Clarksburg. Pat Farenga, featured speaker. For info: WVHEA, PO Box 3707, Charleston WV 25337-3707; l800-736-\eryHE. We are huppy to print announce-
Aug. 26-27. 1994: Minnesota Homeschoolers Alliance 3rd annual conference at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul. For info: 612-4972828.
Sept. l1 & 12:John Taylor Gatto lecture and workshop at Southern Oregon State College in Ashland, sponsored by Ashland Homeschoolers. For info: 503-482-6961 . Sept. 13-16: Oregon Homeschool Chautauqua, with Grace Llewellyn. For
will contain our
complete Directory of families and organizations. Please take a moment now to check your listing as it appeared in GWS #96 or in any of the
ments about major homeschooling events, but we need plenty of notice. Deadline for GWS #101 (events in
mid-October or later) is 9/10. Deadline for GWS #102 (events in midDecember or later) is 1 1/ 10.
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Wrrrrour ScsoollN<; #100 o lur.y/Aucusr 1994
.
A&rrceuzz
@ Handling Homeschooling Anxiety Laurie Hulfman (CO) twites:
as homeschoolers entirely. They
pointed out, human beings have the ability to choose their attitudes in a given set of circumstances. No one can deny us that option. So, I started thinking in new ways.
In response to Deborah Goldeen's "HandlingAnxiery" in GWS #98: my first reading of this letter left me feeling anxious. Then I got depressed, then totally discouraged, then - I snapped out of it! It was like I had been pulled backward into a pit that I had, with great determination, climbed out of years ago. It isn't that I don't believe in this thing of homeschooling anxiety. I most certainly do, but I think we're approaching it from the wrong frame of reference.
John Holt said in
Freedom and
Bqond, in the chapter, "Some Tensions of Freedom":
"Our language and habits of thought make it hard to deal with this idea of tensions. When we think of conflict, it is always between opposites. usually one Good and the other Bad ... Also, we like to get things settled. It irritates us when a difficulty keeps coming up again and again. We think, Why do we have to go through this, we've been through it before? If we could just find the right balance, the point of equilibrium, between those two conflicting forces and demands, they would cancel out and leave us alone. But in a tension, this never happens, can't happen. The conflicting pulls are both legitimate, they keep on pulling, and so the tension is permanent. ... \A/hen we attempt to put more freedom, autonomy, and choice into children's lives and learning ... these tensions appear." When I first read this statement, after four or five years ofunresolved anxiety, it dawned on me that I was fighting proverbial windmills. I was never, in my lifetime, going to defeat homeschooling anxiety, but I could accept it as a norm, and get on with my life. As Viktor Fankl so wisely 10
That has made all the difference in the world. So what if I feel anxiery creeping up on me? Aha! There it is again - I recognize that feeling! But I
don't have to give it the right-of-way
anymore. At about the same time that I made this wonderful discovery, I made another. I realized that part of my anxiety and frustration had more to do with my environment than with my homeschooling. My house was literally bulging with the so-called necessary educational paraphernalia. I started realizing that little of it was ever being used. So I put into action another powerful concept: simplification. I had four garage sales in tlvo months and got over $400 out of them. I quite literally emptied half my house, and had a ball doing it. My kids got involved too, and to this day, almost ten years later, they are still avid "dejunkers" and live simplified lives in their own homes. These days, when I start feeling the pinch of homeschooling anxiety, I go into my well-established selfdefense pattern. First and most important, I refuse to give way to the emotion itself. I think of it as an oversensitive alarm system, a smoke detector that screeches when a match is lit. I consciously decide whether or not the alarm is legitimate, rather than expending energy on every little noise it makes. Second, to vent my feelings and get the adrenaline moving more effectively, I attack my environment
with a vengeance. After an hour or so of de;junking in a part of the house that's been irritating me, I feel great.
No more anxiety - no more junk. I have seen far too many good homeschooling families buckle under the anxiery factor, feeling somehow that it was a sign of weakness. Some have thought it meant they had failed
weren't capable (who is?) of maintaining constant fun for their kids without some occasional depression. All of this is such nonsense. Now, I realize that my personal system for deflecting anxiety seems simplistic, but that is precisely why I like it - it zs simple. And instead of worrying about how to solve the anxiety, I am on my way to a really enjoyable day. Alxiety is a part of homeschooling, inseparable from the decision itself. We just aren't accustomed to willfully injecting high Ievels of anxiety and frustration into
our lives. It feels counterproductive. ButJohn was right, again - if we can once and for all accept the fact that tensions (or anxieties) in homeschooling aren't a matter of Good vs. Bad, but are a legitimate part of our decision, we would probably be unstoppable at best, and more cheer-
ful at the very least. From Cherylze Duncan (MO):
I have an 1l and 8 year old. This year was our first year of homeschooling. It was an anxious time for me, but it was also a very growing and learning time for us all. When I first started homeschooling and wrote for help just like Deborah did, I got so many encouraging, helpful letters. In fact, two of the people who wrote to me asked me to write back, and now I have two homeschool pen-pals. I didn't write to ask specifically about anxiety, but I was asking that indirectly because I was asking, "How do I know how to unschool? How will I know if I'm doing it right? How will I know if my kids are going to get enough of everything they need?" All those questions boiled down to anxiety. It's funny - in all the Ietters I received, there was much encouragement and helpful advice, but, of course, nobody was really able to answer all my questions and alleviate my anxieties. Nobody could give me the concrete answers I was looking for. It wasn't until I jumped right in and started homeschooling that I realized our whole family would have to learn as we went. And that's exactly how it worked. When we would try something, if it worked, we kept it up. If it didn't work,
GrowNc Wrruour Sr;HoolrNc #100 oJuly/Aucusr 1994
we'd talk about how to change it. If it was so-so, we'd figure out how to make it work more to our liking. All of this didn't make the anxiety go away, but it certainly toned it down. I think another thing that has helped is that I began to immerse us in homeschooling-related things. I joined a homeschooling support group, started going to homeschool Skate Day once a month, invited another homeschooling family to learn to draw with me and my kids once a week. One of the support group moms started a homeschool day once a week at the local Boys and Girls Club. We also joined a mostly homeschoolers 4H CIub. We went once a week to another art class taught by a homeschool mom. In other words, we
surrounded ourselves with support and opportunity to share with others who have the same doubts. Also, I checked out tons ofbooks from the library about homeschooling. We sort of do a combination of textbooks and unschooling, leaning more towards interest-based learning. This year we did very little math from textbooks because the kids were convinced that they hated math, so we mostly concentrated on getting down the basics, working on multiplication tables. Most any other math we did was related to everyday experiences such as cooking, measuring, weighing, price comparing at the grocery store, counting change. We also played a lot of games like Monopoly and such. I checked out books at the library that involved math but were fun, and I let the kids choose what they wanted to do out of them. What does this have to do with anxiety? Well, every so often I'd have severe doubts about what I was "doing to" my kids. I'd go on a tense rampage, get out their textbooks, declare that we were going to do some math, at least a little, every day. Then we'd start doing it, I'd hate it, they'd hate it, I'd get frustrated and feel all those feelings I'd had way back when, and then I'd throw my hands up and we'd forget about it until my next guiltridden rampage. So, after talking to lots of people and sending off to lots of companies for sample brochures, we've decided to go with Saxon Math for next year. I explained the concept
to my kids and my daughter said that she was glad we were going to use it. I
think they're relieved thatl mightbe less inclined to rampage next year! After being away from a textbook and
being subject to my anxieties, they're looking forward to a book. I didn't have good experiences in school. I hated it and got bad grades from fifth grade on. That gave me much anxiety about whether I could homeschool or not. Now, after our first year of homeschooling, I don't feel that way because I'm learning right along with my kids, and I'm enjoying it and am more excited about learning than I've ever been in my life. I think that's one thing that has really helped me and the kids - I don't think of myself so much as their teacher, but as someone to help guide them and learn along with them. There are things I think I want to change for next year, but I feel fairly relaxed about it because I've begun to believe in us and what we're capable of. My believing wholeheartedly in homeschooling has made a big difference for us. You have to learn from experience and from mistakes as you go along. Once I trusted thatl would learn to adjust as we went along, I was able to relax more. My husband and I have seen great leaps in our children's self-confidence, emotional stabiliry, respect for themselves and each other, and especially the sincere friendship and caring that have developed between them. We've seen them become very self-motivated, which is the opposite of how they were when attending school. Personally, I learned that I am capable oflearning and that I enjoy learning, particularly about history, which I hated as much as math before. My husband and I have learned that the more we take control of our own lives, as with homeschooling, the more we feel we can do. This may not sound that impressive, but if only you had known us in our more passive daysl From Jeanne
Fenari-Amas (HI) :
Homeschooling involves tradeoffs like other decisions in our lives. \Ahile it is true that homeschooling seems to put the responsibility for the child's education on the parents, having
Gnou'lNc WnHour Soroor_ruc #100 o lui_v,/Aur;usr 1994
children in school is not without anxieties either. I have my anxious periods, but it's usually because I'm comparing our home school to what I imagine children are doing and learning in school. This usually happens when I read our small community paper and read about various projects and activities that school
children are doing. It always sounds like so much, but so much of what is written is for show. My children enrolled in a very structured keyboard class with ten children this year. I go with them and it's made me realize how little attention children have in group situations. how little learning really goes on in class, and how repetitious and slow it has to be to accommodate everyone. I think we give too much credit to what
children learn in schools. The music teacher is amazed at how my children are able to teach themselves new songs, whereas the other children have a "teach me" attitude. Having my children in this class has helped me relieve some of my anxiety about their
learning. A friend of mine has children the same ages as mine and she is full of anxieties about their schooling. Hearing her talk, I always feel that we have much more quality to our days, more control of our time and of what we learn. She is always anxious that her children will be behind in math and reading. She's constantly having to nag them about book reports. When her family goes on vacation during school time, the school gives her work for them to do which seems like such burywork to me. We recently took a two-week vacation and the children learned so much just being in a
different place, doing different
things. I couldn't imagine giving them schoolwork - it would have interfered. And who's to really know what they learned during this time? I point all this out to my friend and she agrees, but she says, "I couldn't be with my children all day." That's when I tell her it's about tradeoffs. I also believe that whether our kids are in school or homeschooling, we will continue to be anxious at times, because caring and anxiery go with being parents. The world does 11