A 9 year-old’s Ultimatum: No Homeschool Without You!

If you’ve been following our homeschool saga, then you know that the 11 year-old wants to return to public school next year. And you also know that I am not too pleased with her desire to return to the rat-race for a number of reasons. She actually tried to convince her younger sister to tell me that she also wants to return to school next year. After I gave my “talk” on making your own decisions instead of being swayed by what someone else does, the youngster returned to her original opinion: She wants to continue homeschooling. Great, right? Well, that arrangement comes with an ultimatum: She will only homeschool if I stay home with her ALL  DAY.

The last time I checked, our family tree did not include any Hiltons, Kardashians, or Winfreys etc. That means I had to return to work on a part-time basis. I was very worried about how this arrangement would affect our homeschool routine but after only 2 days, the girls are doing as expected. I know that the youngster made her declaration because she:

1. is the baby;
2. likes spending time with me (without her siblings around);
3. REALLY REALLY likes being able to spend as much time as she likes on reading (what she wants) and drawing.

Those are just a few of the things she does while homeschooling that she can’t do in public school because kids spend most of their time doing worksheets and test prep. Really, who would want to go back to that? So it looks like we will have some very serious discussions (over hot chocolate or ice cream, of course) about our educational plan for next year.

What’s that saying: You can please some of the people all of the time. You can please all of the people some of the time. But there is no pleasing kids who’ve been taught to critically analyze issues and then use that skill to their advantage.

Tagged as: homeschool, homeschooling, homeschooling more than one kid, unschool, working while homeschooling