My Charlotte Mason Homeschool Adventure

Watching my amazing daughter in law as a homeschooling mom was quite inspirational. She made it look so easy, so when Noah was in the third grade and was having serious attention deficit issues, I volunteered to homeschool him. I was so confident, especially after reading Charlotte Mason’s book, that I volunteered to homeschool the whole family. Carson and Bailey were about to begin first grade and Mackenzie was just starting preschool. I had always loved teaching preschool, so I set about to stock supplies, like art supplies and blocks and puzzles and charts. I also made many trips to Goodwill to build our library.

Now, you may be wondering about Charlotte Mason and her inspiration. Charlotte's method is a three-pronged approach, which involves one-third of a child's education coming from the atmosphere – their home environment, another third from learning and developing good habits and discipline, and the final third from simply living their lives.

Imagine my excitement when I moved to the church’s house, “fondly called the farm”. How much better could it get. I had a school room with bookshelves from floor to ceiling on one whole wall and a huge tree in the back yard for spreading a blanket to read, a screened in porch and a huge couch for reading great literature after lunch and a large dining room table where Papa taught Bible as we ate breakfast. Charlotte Mason would be so proud.

Now with the perfect home environment, a growing library of the best children’s literature and an amazing Bible teacher, affectionally called Papa, we were ready to go!!!

I am not sure she had tried this with four children between the age of four and nine. I am pretty sure she didn’t also have ADD like this homeschool mom (Nana). Needless to say, it was interesting. For instance, the beautifully spread quilt under the large oak tree where we gathered for reading with my basket of books was “hot and itchy” and had flies and bugs and every distraction in the world. Oh, well, back inside for reading aloud.

Many nights I stayed awake for hours making new schedules and plans, only to find that adding these wonderful, active, crazy little people in to my plans didn’t always work. My ADD was working both for me and against me. Staying on track wasn’t easy, but learning to roll with it, was.

Was this what I was expecting? No! Did I feel like a complete failure on a daily basis? Yes! Would I do it again? Most definitely!

So this month and maybe October, I will take you on homeschooling adventures, including the good, the bad, and the downright crazy. And you can be the judge of what works and doesn’t work. Maybe it should come with a “Caution: Don’t Try This at Home”.