Our first venture into homeschooling wasn't too bad. We had three days of school and one day on a field trip! The more structured school work went pretty well. The kids like having a "to-do" list and goals to accomplish. The less structured activities presented more of a challenge with behavior issues, I hadn't expected.
A comment many homeschooling parents have told us proves to be true already. Character and behavior lessons are much more important than academics...the academics will come, but not as smoothly when there are character/behavior challenges to overcome!
Basically, the kids and I need to develop more of an understanding of school time with mom vs. regular life with mom. At a typical school, they leave the home atmosphere and transition into a different environment with a different authority figure called "teacher". Mom as teacher in the same environment as home, doesn't have the same obvious cues to expected behaviors.
On the plus side, we finished school by lunch time most days. That was wonderful! And I really enjoyed being able to have a set time for bible devotions with them. They really enjoyed the activities we did that were hands-on and group oriented. The adventure continues this coming week...our first week of five full days of plain school (no field trips or holidays).
