Home-Life Balance

Nov 11, 2022
Barefoot Learning Club
Home-Life Balance
11:29
 

This topic is really an important one because this was a really big topic for many parents who are considering moving their children into a homeschool setting.

(Kristy) I have a story about a boy that I homeschooled from the time he was eight years old. His parents had to pull him out of school because he was too ill to attend regular school.

His mom didn't know what to do. She didn't have any idea how to homeschool him. She had four other children, all young, so she had her hands full.

Conrad and I started working together and we found the joy in homeschooling and I was able to work with him much in the way that we're teaching in the Barefoot Learning Club. 

He was so much happier. He did so well. I spent only a couple of hours a day with him when he was little because that's all it took. We were able to really maximize the benefit of the time we had together. 

(Alysia) That’s one of the biggest mind shifts for parents to make—time. It was a shock for me that only a couple of hours were needed—even for my older children—but I remember also feeling a sense of, that could be really awesome. How amazing that would be for my kids to have THAT much freedom in their lives. 

 

For me, freedom is a really important aspect of my life, and I'm always seeking ways to feel more and more freedom, and to be able to give that to my kids gave me a sense of excitement.

 

Even though the fear was stronger, there was also that excitement at the idea. Life is learning, but the idea that academic learning could be done within just a couple of hours a day was incredible. 

(Kristy) I have to tell you, Conrad's whole family just relaxed. I watched them relax because Conrad was progressing, he was learning, and on the days when he was ill, I was still there as a backup for his mother to be able to do everything that she had to do.

We really found this rhythm. But what was fun was that when he got healthier, he didn't want to go back to regular school. He was set that I was his teacher and that we did school together and that was it.

And so, we just kept doing it. He called it real school. Sometimes we would go off and do something. He'd say, “Hey mom, Kris and I are gonna go do real school. See you later.”

He's 29 now. He’s served in the army. He’s just completed his master's degree. He's going to be starting his own business and he's just blossomed because he had that support. 

And he told me, “You know, Kris, when I go to school, I just can't believe how disorganized people are. And they get lost and they get behind in their assignments and I tell them, you just have to be organized. And I tell them to do what you taught me to do and it's so easy. I don't understand why they don't make it easy.” 

So that's what Alysia and I want. To make things simple for people. 

(Alysia) It did get so much easier. It's only been about four months total since my kids have been homeschooled and I look back now and wonder what I was so afraid of. I had a big stigma in my mind that if my kids were homeschooled, I would have no time to myself because I work from home. I like to be at home, and when they would go to school, my home became my sanctuary.

I would get some quiet time to meditate or take a bath in peace, and I thought, “What's going to happen when they're home all the time and I just don't have that time? I can still make the time, but then there will be interruptions. It's not the same. And also getting work done in between.” 

 

Yes, there were some adjustments to go through, but they weren't that huge. I actually started enjoying having my kids home with me. 

 

I always look for the good in any situation, and as soon as I started focusing on the good of this, all of the fears I had disappeared. Now, I look forward to watching what they're going to discover through the day now that they have the time to explore and expand and do something they enjoy. 

Their sisterhood has been getting really strong and they're becoming very close friends, as well as sisters.

They're three years apart right now—12 and 8, almost 9. This is the age where they bicker a lot because of the age difference. One’s moving into young womanhood and the other one's still moving out of being a child. 

But now, they've been sharing this bond because they're both on this new journey. They go out and jump on the trampoline together or play the games they enjoy to play together. It's been really enjoyable to watch. 

 

There's just this big freedom opening up around us that, if I hadn't taken the step and just done homeschooling—even though I was terrified that it was actually going to restrict my life more—then I wouldn't have ever discovered that it was the most freeing decision I could have made.

 

I think that's what my kids are realizing right now. They're starting to realize and embrace this idea of, “I can really just do this and it's okay, and I won't get in trouble, and there's nothing wrong with me because I'm doing it.”

(Kristy) Conrad, he just blossomed. I would come in on a Monday and he would greet me with this big, huge grin and show me what he did over the weekend. 

One that I remember vividly is when he was watching, Shark Week on Discovery and he got interested in it. He showed me a project on great white sharks. I came in and there are posters and pictures he’d printed out. And he wrote notes underneath and he even had a thing about the myths about great whites. He couldn't wait until I got there so that he could show it to me. 

What was so cool about that is he did it on his own. I didn't tell him to do it. He just got excited about something and made it into a cool project that he was interested in. 

It’s this really beautiful, vivid memory for me of how powerful it is when children aren’t limited just because of what they tell you in school. We're here to support parents because we know academics are hard and we know that little kids need to be taught to read and write and do math.

In Barefoot Learning Club, we make it as simple and easy as possible. 

That's what we want for all parents and children—freedom, ease, and joy in learning and living. 

Homeschooling can be fun & easy for kids and parents! 

This Daily Planner & Record Keeper to help you easily track your child's learning.

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