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That end of term feeling... · The BIG Home Ed Conversations | Home Education

0:00
Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of the Big Home
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Ed Conversations. My name is Kelly and as always
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you are here with myself and my Co host Ashley as we are going
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to delve into another topic that we think that you guys are going
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to find really useful. Essentially I am a qualified
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mindset coach and I work with families who are kind of
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transitioning into home education.
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Ashley is an ex primary school teacher and a home Ed mom of
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three and obviously I myself home educate my two kids as
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well. And we're essentially here
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sharing our experiences, conversations that we are having
0:32
behind closed doors that we just think that are going to be
0:34
really useful for you guys to be mulling over with us.
0:37
So grab a cup of coffee, come join us at the table, and we're
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going to be diving into today's conversation, which is
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essentially this yucky, weird feeling that we can sometimes
0:47
find ourselves having as we come to the end, the end of a school
0:50
year. Again, I say with a quotation
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marks, which as we know, doesn't really apply to the home Ed
0:54
world, especially in the UK. And that kind of weird vibe that
0:58
we sometimes get over the summer as we amp our way back up again
1:01
into another school year. And like the planning and the
1:04
worrying and the feeling like you've got to do something
1:05
different or change up your schedule or whatever it is that
1:08
you might be doing right now. And the reason why we kind of
1:10
found ourselves wanting to talk about it more than anything was
1:13
the fact that actually this is the first year that I actually
1:16
don't think it's even dawned on me that we were coming to the
1:20
end of a another year. That we have gotten into such a
1:24
good flow and we're seeing such constant gentle progression that
1:29
actually I just don't even really think about it anymore.
1:32
But I know that a year or two ago, even this time last year, I
1:36
was definitely feeling a lot more anxious.
1:38
So we wanted to kind of get into that today and talk about that a
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little bit. And I guess why it might not be
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the case right now, but hopefully in time you will start
1:46
to feel a lot more relaxed about this.
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But why do we feel this way? What is going on for us here?
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And, and what is it that's maybe led to us feeling this anxiety
1:54
at this time of the year? And we're, we're going to get
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into that a little bit more depth.
1:58
So first and foremost, we'll do our gratitude.
2:02
I'm, I'm going to go out there and say that I am grateful that
2:05
for at the very least two solid days, Ashley is back in the UK.
2:09
I'm not gonna physically get to set eyes on her, but I'm very
2:11
grateful to know that she's in the country, which is always
2:13
really lovely. She's jetting back off again
2:15
tomorrow, rather driving off. Bless you.
2:17
I can't even begin with two solid days in the car with your
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children. But apart from that, I think
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it's just nice to have you here. I'm glad to have you back for a
2:24
moment. Yeah.
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It's, it's so good to be home, that feeling of like us, your
2:28
own stuff and that calm that settles in on you when you come
2:31
in the door. So that was lovely.
2:33
And it is a quick turn around. So it's jam packed, mostly with
2:37
packing and unpacking and all of that fun.
2:40
All the washing in between. Yeah, yeah.
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And we have lovely sunshine both days, yesterday and today.
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So I think that I was kind of going to be.
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My gratitude is thank you, England, for some lovely weather
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while I have to run and do errands and stuff.
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And I'm not also getting soaked while doing it.
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So yeah, I definitely appreciate that.
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And our flight was also blessedly uneventful.
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So that was also amazing. As I say, you're really poorly
3:08
on the way out, weren't you? Bless you.
3:09
Travel sickness. This is horrible.
3:12
Yeah, I was going to say, I can remember being pregnant flying
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to Rome when I was having my son.
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And my goodness, it was the worst flight of my life.
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I've never felt. So I'll obviously I'm not saying
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that obviously Ashley is pregnant, not going down that
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line. No, she's not that I know, but
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just travel, just travel sickness.
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So I get it like the being I'll on a plane is.
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Horrific. It's the worst.
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It just makes you feel so horrible, so I really felt for
3:35
you. But yeah, so well done.
3:37
I'm glad you managed to get back safely.
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Yes, yes, we were. Everything arrived.
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All our bags were there. I mean, it's just, it's so
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funny. I, I feel like years ago,
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decades ago, probably traveling was, you know, air travel was
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such an experience and it, you dressed up for it and it was
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this like lovely thing. And now it's just like, I'm just
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thankful if our, all our stuff gets there and, you know, we
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don't lose a kid along the way. So yeah, it's it's a very low
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bar these days. I must admit that that proper
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home alone moment, it felt like a constant anxiety running in
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the back of my head. I remember watching that with
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the kids at Christmas for the first time in years and being
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like how how does a family fly to another country and not even
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realise they don't have one of their children with them?
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That's a horrendous parenting. But I can, I can kind of, I can
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see how that could happen with a massive family.
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It's very strange. Yeah.
4:27
But anyway, let's crack on. I suppose so, yeah.
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So I guess coming into this time of the year, the, I mean, let's
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just like straight up talk about the actual conditioning that
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goes into this time of the year. Because as individuals who grew
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up being schooled, this time of year was a time for assessment.
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It was a time for being very aware that something is coming
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to an end, that you have worked towards a certain level, you
4:51
have achieved a certain level. You're ticking boxes, you're
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finishing stuff off, you're clearing out the classroom,
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you're doing loads of word searches and chill out days.
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You're doing your sports day at school.
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You're you're seeing the end of an era come to a pass.
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And you know that you're about to move into a different school
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maybe or just a different teacher and you're going to be
5:09
in a different room. You're going to have different
5:11
expectations. Things are going to amp up a
5:13
little bit more and that whole sensation of something ending
5:17
and something beginning and a levelling up happening and a new
5:20
expectations, new levels to try and attain is something which
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carries with us into our adulthood.
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And this constant reflection. Like we find we do it at New
5:28
Year's and we find ourselves doing it in the summer where we
5:30
kind of look at the year and go, oh, half a year has gone by,
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What have I achieved? And like we do it all the time
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with this constant measuring ourselves against some random
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yardstick that nobody even has a clue what the actual kind of
5:41
attainment levels are supposed to be, where we constantly feel
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like we're never quite enough. And this really plays into kind
5:47
of education. And I think that an awful lot of
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what we feel around that comes from being educated that way is
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that constant kind of clawing towards the next level of
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something. And the way we home educate.
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Personally, my children don't have set grade levels.
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They don't have sort of set like, for example, my my son as
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he was learning to read, I considered him reading at the
6:12
point where he was mostly reasonably fluently reading a
6:15
sentence without too much intervention from me, wasn't
6:18
perfect, wasn't polished, wasn't like he wasn't getting every
6:22
single word. But for the most part, he was
6:24
able to decode a passage of texts and figure it out mostly
6:27
by himself. And I would say to him like, oh,
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look, you can read stuff now. And like my daughter, for
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example, the other day has stopped saying that she can't
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read and has started saying she can barely read.
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And I pointed out the distinction to her that she's,
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she herself has acknowledged that she can now read a bit.
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So, so try and look at it from a more positive perspective.
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At one point you felt like you couldn't read anything and now
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you can read a little bit. And she was like, Oh yeah, I
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kind of see what you mean there. So it's like they themselves
6:54
might make a distinction that they are now capable of a little
6:56
bit more than they were before and feel more confident dimming
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it. But we certainly don't sit them
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and go, right when you've achieved level 2 of reading,
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we're moving on to Level 3 or whatever kind of grading and
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test. We don't test it.
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We don't put it on some sort of assessment.
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We just gently observe and monitor and notice and just
7:13
gradually increase difficulty or they kind of do on their own as
7:19
they feel more confident and capable of doing it.
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And I think what's really lovely about that is just that sense of
7:24
self achievement. I don't, I don't feel like they
7:26
are constantly worrying that they should be at a certain
7:29
grade level right now and they're not or that somebody
7:31
else is and they're not or somebody else is older than them
7:35
and achieving certain things. They don't seem to compare
7:37
themselves to their friends or to anyone else in their
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community. Sometimes they compare
7:41
themselves to me, which I find amusing.
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But they say like, I mean, it's so easy for you.
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I'm just like, I'm 36. Like I've been reading for 30
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years. Like of course it's easy for me.
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Like, and I just sort of like really I'm, I'm really sweeping
7:57
about that. Just like, of course I could do
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that easier. Like I've had loads of practice,
8:00
like when you're my age, this will be super easy for you too.
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And they're like, oh, OK, fair enough.
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Yeah. But aside from that, they don't
8:08
tend to compare themselves all to each other actually, which I
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really love as well. I don't see an awful lot of
8:13
inter sibling comparison either, which is lovely.
8:17
But yeah, I don't know how how your girls are with stuff like
8:19
this. Do they?
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Do they tend to worry too much about this?
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They. Don't I think what's so like
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glaring when, when that becomes like a question.
8:28
We were in the States just recently, obviously and someone
8:32
asked them, we were at the library and they do summer
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reading over there. So obviously it's different in,
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in England, your school is still going on Here in the state,
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school typically ends end of May, sometime in June, somewhere
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in that time frame. And where we were, the schools
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had ended that first week of June.
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And so we were at the library getting our summer reading
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packet so the girls could check off the days that they've read.
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And at the end of the week you get a book to keep.
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And the teacher asked them, the teacher at the library and asked
9:02
them what grade they were going into.
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And my middle was like, I don't know.
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And it's one of those things where I just pipe in and say it.
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And I think the teacher must think, oh, because they don't
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know, because they're changing grades like that, you know, are
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they saying they're in 3rd grade or they're they're going to be
9:18
in 3rd grade? Like they're not sure.
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But I just don't even go into it.
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I'm like, Yep, they're in this grade and they're like.
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She's like, oh, OK. And checks off so she knows
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which book they get at the end of the week or whatever.
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But we've never been very concerned with that.
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Like we've never celebrated the last day of school.
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We've never, you know, kind of done what is more traditional
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for kids that go to a traditional school.
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We've always been all year round and only ever taken off for our
9:53
holiday breaks, like we go on vacation or something.
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Otherwise, even though in the States or in Italy, there's a
9:58
large summer break and we still are doing school throughout that
10:01
time if we're at home, if it if it works.
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So there's never been this big. You're now done with this grade
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and entering this grade kind of hoopla.
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It just it just yeah. And.
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I find it quite funny as well because I mean, my, my mum being
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sort of fairly traditionalist around this sort of thing, she's
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like, you don't let them have a summer break.
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Like that's crazy. Like they need a break, Kelly.
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And I'm just like, you know, they don't need a break from
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their lifestyle, but their lifestyle is a break.
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Yeah, it's fine. Like, most of their schooling is
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done entirely on their own terms when they want to, like, at the
10:40
time of day, it makes sense for them when their energy's in the
10:42
right place. Like these kids are not being,
10:44
like, sit down at 9:00 everyday and work through for five hours.
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Like these kids are not needing a set six weeks off to recover
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from the intensity of school because school is just life and
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life is school and it's just everything just blends together.
11:00
Yeah. And yeah, absolutely.
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We we as well when we're on holiday holiday.
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I don't actively pay attention whilst we're doing it, typically
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to school stuff, with the exception of the recent trip we
11:12
took to Cornwall actually, where I was curious and found myself
11:15
reflecting on it a bit more as we did it.
11:16
As I know I mentioned in one of our last episodes because I was
11:20
noticing just how much we were doing without even meaning to
11:23
because it's so naturally ingrained in our days now.
11:26
Like bits of colouring, doing a word search, chatting about
11:30
something, investigating, using a wild RDID guide.
11:34
These things are just part of their fun.
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Like these are just things they enjoy doing for entertainment.
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So actually they are ticking off vocabulary in school and
11:42
spelling and like all sorts of stuff without even realizing
11:46
they're doing it. And I think this is where
11:47
unschooling obviously for us, that kind of element of
11:49
unschooling in our life really comes into its own.
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Because it helps you to really show you that with the right
11:54
kind of encouragement and environments and just keeping
11:58
things interesting for them that actually it's happening all the
12:01
time. And so it's really lovely to
12:04
kind of reflect on that sometimes and to recognize that
12:06
for the most part you're just chilling.
12:08
So like I know that whilst you guys have been away with all of
12:11
the amazing wildlife you've seen and the hunting for shark teeth
12:15
on the beach and like just swimming and playing in a
12:18
different environment and just witnessing a different culture
12:21
and going to different places. Like, all of that amounts to
12:25
extra information that helps them to process and understand
12:27
the world around them, that adds to their education.
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And I think, yeah, it's just, it's really fascinating how we
12:34
sometimes really worry about like, well, I know for example,
12:37
in the schooly world, you hear an awful lot about the summer
12:41
slide where kids end the school year, They take the summer
12:46
break, and everyone's really panicking because they come back
12:49
in September and they can't remember half of what they
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learned beforehand. And everyone's super worried
12:54
about it and make sure they have tutoring and all these extra
12:56
things over the summer to try and stop them from forgetting
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all of the skills. And I worried about this an
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awful lot as an early home educator, that you teach them
13:05
something and they completely forget about it.
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And you'd be like, Oh no, like, but they need to remember this
13:09
because it's important for them to learn the next thing.
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And one of the real benefits of a life that you spent constantly
13:16
touching base with these skills and using them is that actually
13:20
things like addition and subtraction and manipulating
13:22
numbers or reading or writing, it doesn't slip away because
13:26
it's just always being used in a really natural way.
13:30
And I think that's what's really, really quite reassuring
13:33
for me as a home educator, having now witnessed it for a
13:35
few years, is that you panic about this a lot at the start,
13:37
but it actually doesn't work that way when you follow a more
13:41
kind of like year round approach.
13:44
And even if you do take a break, they will naturally pull in some
13:47
of these fun things because they're used to just doing them
13:49
all the time. Yeah, it is definitely something
13:52
that you can get concerned about if you do take a a full break
13:58
where you're not doing anything for let's say two months.
14:01
But even then like you mentioned, you are still leaving
14:03
it in because it's just your way of life.
14:06
You're always kind of looking for that next question to answer
14:10
and finding fun ways to do that. So for us, I at least I knew
14:16
when I was teaching at a school, we typically spent the first
14:19
like 4 weeks or so rehashing what they would have learned the
14:22
year before. So just a quick reminder that
14:24
that's a month, that's a lot of school to be doing that.
14:27
And for us, because it's just ongoing, the biggest gap we're
14:32
ever facing is a couple of weeks.
14:35
Now I will say this summer we are taking a larger job.
14:39
I don't want to call it a vacation because it's not.
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We were visiting my family and then we're going to visit my
14:43
husband's family. And so because of the timing of
14:47
the trips being back-to-back, we are going to be without doing
14:51
any formal curriculum or where they're like sitting at a desk
14:55
filling out and reading along, you know, with a book.
14:59
That is a solid break for us, which is in my mind, not ideal,
15:04
but it's just the way that our vacations fell this year and the
15:07
way it worked with my husband's job and so.
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We kind of have to roll with. That and that that is.
15:12
Great that we're able to do. That with the homeschooling
15:15
lifestyle. But I'm just being a little more
15:19
diligent around making sure the girls are reading and making
15:22
sure that we're still taking time to go to the library.
15:25
We were at the library every week when we were in Florida,
15:28
reading all sorts of different books.
15:29
My girls love reference books, which is great.
15:32
So, you know, yeah. Like, what are the top ten birds
15:37
to have as pets? And it talks about each one.
15:39
I mean, it was just, we're reading all of that.
15:41
And so I just, I love the library in Florida is so
15:46
fantastic. So that was a great experience.
15:49
And then lots of games to keep the math skills up.
15:52
Like there are. So many ways to to keep up with
15:55
math with games. So I just make sure we keep
15:57
doing that. I do imagine the biggest
15:59
pushback that we'll have when we get back in mid-july won't be
16:03
the actual curriculum or have them having forgotten anything.
16:07
It'll just be getting back into that routine.
16:09
You know, that will be the challenge.
16:11
And so I think for so many of us, like you were saying, you
16:14
don't need a break from your life because it, it already is
16:17
so different than school when you're having to, you know, be
16:20
in, in your desk at 8:00 AM and all of that.
16:23
But it is, it is hard to get back into the, into the routine.
16:29
And so I think that will be our challenge.
16:30
I'm anticipating that. But otherwise I I don't think
16:35
we'll have any issues in terms of content, which is good.
16:39
Yeah. One thing you said there as well
16:41
is actually a good point that I often forget about, which is the
16:44
fact that all of the groups and clubs and things stop over the
16:47
summer holidays. And that can sometimes be super
16:51
like message with my head, Like everything just suddenly goes
16:54
off and stops kind of functioning like it should.
16:57
And we're bored, we're restless, we're knocking around the house
17:00
too much. I have to go out of my way to
17:02
make sure I've made play dates and we've organized fun things
17:04
to go do, but everyone's really busy and honestly, it's an
17:07
absolute nightmare. And I think it's one of the, one
17:09
of the things I do find a bit frustrating about the summer as
17:12
a home educator is the fact that most clubs and groups stop
17:14
during that window because everyone is just so busy.
17:16
And a lot of providers obviously think that everyone just wants
17:21
term time as well anyway. So it just gets a bit boring.
17:24
And I think you have got to kind of work with that a little bit
17:26
and be a bit kind of, you have to have some forethought.
17:28
You have to put some stuff in play to know that you've got
17:30
some plans and you've got some things coming up.
17:33
Otherwise it can fill really long and then that kind of
17:37
slowness sometimes I think can be really hard on everybody,
17:40
kids and you, which then I think makes you amp up a bit too hard.
17:45
Ready for September. And this is, I guess the next
17:48
stage of this conversation is like you come off the end of a
17:50
school year, we're reflecting, we're kind of thinking about
17:53
what we've been up to and where we've been.
17:55
Like I've been kind of collating photos, for example, and putting
17:57
them all in a photo photo album on my phone are just really
18:00
amazing home Ed moments. Just just to help me to to
18:03
actually notice all the amazing stuff we've done, which has been
18:08
a really nice thing to do this year, which I'm going to try and
18:09
obviously scrapbook it a little bit for the kids as well.
18:12
But the coming out of the summer holidays and kind of getting
18:15
into September, I find that the boredom that can sometimes be
18:19
created during those months will lead to me over scheduling for
18:24
the September, October, November months.
18:26
And so you've got to also be really mindful of like that
18:28
actually there's still a balance that you were striking for a
18:30
reason and to try and be really careful with how much you end up
18:33
booking in. Yeah.
18:34
And so this summer we're, because we have this long break,
18:38
I am really taking the time to let the kids kind of have the
18:42
break again, aside from, you know, some basic math and
18:45
reading that I'm sneaking in without it being anything
18:48
formal. But I personally am going to
18:51
spend a little bit more time. So I am very thankful for the
18:53
break in the extracurriculars because it'll allow us to get
18:57
back into our routine in August. We do have a couple little
19:01
things planned, but for the most part, end of July and August, we
19:06
will be able to really start to get into the kind of the meat of
19:10
the academics. So that that part hopefully is
19:13
pretty solid. But in the meantime, what I am
19:17
doing is reviewing this past year, taking a minute to just
19:21
say, OK, what went well and what didn't go well.
19:23
And an example of this is I tend to do it in the summer and then
19:28
over Christmas break, like between Christmas and New Year's
19:32
when I'm kind of thinking, OK, and that's a natural time
19:34
because you start to do like New Year's resolutions, you start to
19:37
kind of think about that. So last time I was like, OK, we
19:40
are over scheduled and this is impacting my ability to feel
19:46
like calm and to feel like we're not constantly rushing off
19:51
somewhere. And I also felt that we were
19:53
doing so much that it was causing a lot of pushback with
19:56
the academics because we only had a certain amount of time to
19:58
do it and then we had to be somewhere.
20:00
So I ended up peeling back some stuff at the end of last or the
20:05
beginning of last year in January.
20:07
And so now I'm doing the same thing this summer.
20:10
What did we do last year? How did it go?
20:12
Is there anything that? We want to peel back from Are
20:15
there other things we want to add in now that the kids have
20:18
expanded their interests or want to try something new?
20:21
And I'll take the time to organize so we end up.
20:25
Collecting a lot. Of stuff I'm trying to be really
20:27
good about, like you were mentioning pictures of just
20:30
moments, but also I'm trying to just take pictures of stuff and
20:33
then throw them away because I just don't have, I mean, every
20:38
homeschooler has so much, so many art, so much artwork, so
20:41
many crafts. Like it just piles up.
20:43
So I'm like, let me take a picture of the macaroni necklace
20:45
and then nothing is getting thrown away.
20:47
So all of that safe for like a few keepsakes.
20:50
And there is this one woman who I got this idea from, which I
20:55
thought was brilliant. She does not homeschool, but her
20:57
kids are doing crafts and art and everything throughout the
21:00
years and so she every time something would come home in her
21:03
kids book bag, she would put it in a folder and then
21:06
periodically she would go through the folder.
21:08
She had a white big piece of poster board that she puts on
21:11
her table and she would take a picture of everything against
21:14
this white poster board background and put it in a
21:17
folder on her phone. At the end of the year she would
21:20
go to like the photo book making printing places or do it online
21:25
and print out a book and it would be that kids artwork for
21:28
the school year. And I like that is so brilliant.
21:30
And one of the questions that she had was what do you do with
21:33
the art after she take the picture?
21:34
And she's like, I throw that stuff away.
21:37
Nothing gets kept. It's kept in the book.
21:39
And then that that's so cool, right?
21:42
Because I'm not, I'm not looking at my old crafts from when I was
21:45
in kindergarten or first grade. But if there were pictures of
21:48
them, that could be kind of cute.
21:49
So I think it's cute. Doing.
21:51
Stuff like that A. Few things couldn't you?
21:53
You could, you could just set up a scrapbook for them each year
21:56
and they can just stick some stick in their favourites and
21:59
that's your lot. And I think it's so great for
22:01
noticing progressions. Taking photos of them can help
22:04
you to then flick back through time.
22:06
Definitely. And it puts it into like order
22:08
of timing. So it means you can flick back
22:10
to the month and be like, oh, interesting.
22:11
Like this is what they were doing that year.
22:13
This is what they've been doing this year.
22:15
Yeah. And it does make for a really
22:16
great way of kind of reflecting on their progress as well.
22:19
If you do have to do any reports or if you do like to reflect on
22:22
it properly and really think about it, then it's I'm sitting
22:24
here thinking four years in, maybe it is about time I sat and
22:27
did a bit of reflection to be fair and like really analysed
22:30
where my son was at and what he's been doing.
22:32
But also, as I say, you just need to see the progress and
22:34
you, I feel happy with where we're at.
22:35
So I'm not panicking about it, but it certainly is a thought
22:38
that actually maybe it would be quite nice to sit and actually
22:40
do that and actually really respect the progress he's made,
22:43
especially as an autistic ADHD young man who's clearly he's
22:47
struggling with fine motor skills and all the rest of it.
22:49
That actually some of his recent work is, is really coming along
22:52
and it's really rewarding to see how they've progressed.
22:55
But yeah, sorry, carry on. No, I think that's a huge part
22:58
of it too, right? Just to see that over the years,
23:00
it's so nice. And with like you have been
23:03
saying, like planning out for the year, like that's, that's
23:05
kind of the next thing that we do.
23:06
So I'm looking to review, organize what we have, get rid
23:10
of stuff we don't need and then plan for the coming year.
23:15
So that includes obviously all those extracurriculars and kind
23:17
of working that calendar out for the week and then the curriculum
23:21
that we're doing. So in fact, I just brought back
23:23
a bunch of stuff with me from the states that we're going to
23:26
try to do for English and history.
23:28
And we're I think in a kind of have a focus this year on the 50
23:32
States and actually try to really tie everything from
23:36
history and geography into and even English is more like novels
23:41
that we'll read and stuff. I kind of want it all to to tie
23:45
into that theme. So we'll see how it goes.
23:47
That's my plan now. There's a lot more planning to
23:50
come from that, but it really does help me to kind of think
23:54
that way. And then we were even thinking
23:55
about next summer what we're doing.
23:57
And I was like, well, if we go to the States and maybe we'll
24:00
loop into these museums because that'll tie into what?
24:03
So if there is a, there's a beauty in the chaos.
24:06
But there is also definitely something to be said for having
24:09
some plan out there to be able to then pull back and tie
24:16
everything together. So I think we're going to do
24:17
something like that, but more to more to come on that.
24:20
But that's my that's my plan. So this summer I need to really
24:23
get that a little more nailed down.
24:26
I'm hoping that the the break when things are hectic because
24:29
all the kids are out of school here in England for the
24:32
basically the six weeks once we come back that we'll just, you
24:38
know, stay and stay to ourselves and get the new school year
24:40
rolling. Yeah, I kind of get things up
24:42
and running and first thing, this is the first year, like
24:45
Christmas I did it and the February kind of half term I did
24:49
it where I actually took that little pause, kind of just
24:53
quickly rethought about the topics with the kids.
24:56
So I sat down and had a chat with them, found out what kind
24:58
of thing they're interested in learning about and we put some
25:01
planning together because I found that actually week to
25:05
week, it wasn't that we weren't doing anything, but I found the
25:08
tiring brainness, terrible sentence of trying to just keep
25:12
thinking of something to do. Like, what are you interested
25:16
in? What should we learn about
25:16
today? What do you fancy doing today?
25:18
Like where should we go? Like it was just so tiring.
25:21
So I, I do a very top level kind of like brain dump kind of
25:25
planning, which is one piece of paper that's literally split
25:28
into like ideas for maths, ideas for English, ideas for art, like
25:32
entrepreneurship, like all the different sort of sections that
25:35
they maybe typically consider in a school and anything else that
25:38
matters to us. And I just put some ideas in and
25:41
we'll try and we'll just try and do as much of it as possible.
25:43
And actually, I was looking at the other day and ticking stuff
25:45
off that we've actually found ourselves doing and enjoying and
25:50
being really pleased with it. Actually, we've done an awful
25:52
lot of it. And instead of me standing there
25:54
staring at my fridge, which is where my plan thing is and
25:56
going, we need to do some English.
25:59
Like what? What should we do?
26:01
I don't even know actually. I've got a few ideas like if I'm
26:05
feeling stuck and I can't think of anything, then there's some
26:08
ideas there. And it just again, it just gives
26:10
me that little bit of just like I don't have to use my brain
26:12
right now. I can just grab and do.
26:14
And that's really helping. And I've recently kind of all of
26:17
the different worksheets and random stuff that I printed off
26:19
a good old twinkle fills my house with papers that so often
26:23
end up just sitting in a massive stack somewhere and nobody ever
26:25
does anything with them. And I sorted them out into these
26:27
sort of sleeve folders for them. So they've each got one now
26:29
that's full of all the stuff that I'd printed off for them in
26:32
random fits of conversations around something.
26:35
And they love it actually, because I, I say, you don't have
26:38
to do anything specific in there.
26:39
Just flick through it and pick something, whatever you're in
26:41
the need for. And I'm happy with anything
26:43
that's used in it, any of it's good.
26:45
And they're happy that they get to have that autonomy.
26:47
And so whether it's a bit handwriting practice or a maths
26:49
worksheet or something, it's, it's just really easy.
26:52
It makes it really easy to get them to kind of just buy into
26:55
doing a little bit of sit down work, which is obviously again,
26:57
super hard. Poor little ADHD brain just
26:59
wants to run around that. He doesn't want to do it for
27:02
long, but it will help him just sit and focus for a little while
27:04
and do something. So I think that little bit of
27:06
planning time, that little bit of like I'm just going to focus
27:09
for now, Just a few hours of sitting and organising myself,
27:11
printing some stuff off ready, getting it all organised.
27:14
It just helps me anyway. I just find that as someone who
27:17
does like to be a bit more flexible and do things when you
27:19
want to, that little bit of pre planning, it doesn't have to be
27:22
we're doing that then and that's that it.
27:24
It can just be, I've got some ideas and I want to run with
27:27
those when we feel right to do them.
27:28
And we won't do them all, but it will give us something to work
27:32
from which I just think is really important.
27:34
But that's, I will definitely be doing a bit of that over the
27:36
summer as well. I will probably wrap up our
27:38
ocean topic and we'll start to think about what we want to do
27:41
for her the autumn term and pick something else.
27:43
And again, we'll just hopefully have some fun doing some random
27:47
things with that. But I think it's what's really
27:49
nice now is that I definitely felt a sense of anxiety coming
27:53
into a new school year and we sometimes do a not back to
27:57
school like day out. So we celebrate.
27:59
We celebrate the fact that we're not going back to school after
28:02
the summer holidays. Typically we've done Legoland
28:05
because as soon as it's quiet, it's quite nice.
28:07
We use our Tesco club card vouchers and we'd we'd go and
28:10
have a day at Legoland. But some people do like a picnic
28:12
or like the local community will do a big kind of home Ed, not
28:15
back to school picnic or something.
28:16
And that's really nice. It's just a nice opportunity to
28:18
just kind of reconnect and enjoy the peace, the peace and quiet
28:22
that is left behind when all the the chaos crowds go back into
28:25
the classrooms, poor things. And anyway, so we're, we're like
28:28
left with this lovely kind of big open playground and we can
28:30
go and just just chill, which is nice.
28:33
But yeah, I think it's, it's really a lovely time of year to
28:36
be kind of stopping and reflecting again.
28:38
And I'm really appreciating what you've done already and what's
28:40
kind of coming and like how much they've progressed.
28:44
But I know that back in the early days, the fear was real.
28:46
Like the anxiety around how much you had to achieve and like, oh,
28:51
they would be going into year 3. So what would that mean?
28:53
I'd need to make sure they were doing this, this and this now.
28:55
Or like when you print off the like the tick sheets that
28:58
teachers are kind of your top level like intentions, I guess
29:02
for the kids learning like the levels that they would be
29:04
expecting in schools, which I sometimes do just to kind of
29:08
have a once over. I printed off the one for year 3
29:11
and it was like 4 pages long compared to like year 2.
29:15
And I was like, Oh my goodness. Then I realized that it was for
29:18
the whole of like key stage 2. So it was actually three to six.
29:22
Like it wasn't just for year three.
29:24
It was like, this is the what we'd look at after the key stage
29:27
two kind of section is completed.
29:29
And I was like, OK, that was a bit better.
29:30
But actually reading through it, I noticed that so much of it was
29:34
just automatically being done as part of life anyway.
29:36
And it's really not a lot of stress.
29:38
And there's also opportunity there for you to really
29:40
consider, like, do you actually believe through your own
29:43
research and your own child and what you can see their skill
29:46
sets are and where they're kind of headed, how much of what's on
29:49
that is actually necessary anyway?
29:52
Really. Like, do we actually agree with
29:54
that sort of target? And is that the age that you
29:57
think that this child is going to be working or something like
29:59
that? Or actually, is it OK if that's
30:00
a little bit later or whatever? And yeah, it gives you a chance
30:03
to kind of, I, I sometimes do it just to kind of see if I've
30:06
forgotten something, which would be important to teach them
30:09
because I'm not going to ever say that I'm infallible.
30:12
Of course I'm going to forget things like anybody would or not
30:15
think to touch on something. So I need to make sure that I am
30:18
looking for other ways to be sure that we have coverage of a
30:21
broad range of conversations. But for the most part, I do feel
30:24
like most things come up quite naturally in life anyway.
30:27
The stuff that's being covered on a school curriculum is, is
30:29
coming up. If you are actively spending
30:32
time with your children, going out and about and doing things
30:34
with them, you're going to notice stuff anyway.
30:36
So I guess my point is not to stress it too much.
30:39
You don't need to be sitting there planning out how you're
30:42
going to meet every single one of those targets and intentions
30:47
that actually most of it will come on its own at some point.
30:50
And where you are seeing that maybe a subject isn't, then it
30:52
gives you an opportunity to, I think how you can try and
30:55
integrate that somehow and how you can bring that into their
30:58
world. But I guess it's from the
31:00
mindset perspective, it's, it's really trying to remember that
31:02
this time of year, the reason why we're feeling these feelings
31:05
is because we were conditioned to do so.
31:08
And that the the reality is there is nothing in human nature
31:13
that actually says that we should be sitting there judging
31:16
ourselves and seeing what we've done and seeing how productive
31:19
we are and whether or not we should be doing more and how we
31:22
should be doing it for the next year.
31:23
That isn't actually a necessary part of being human.
31:27
It definitely doesn't have to happen in September.
31:30
It definitely doesn't have to happen in the new year either.
31:32
But like even just to like the reason why school even started
31:35
in September. I don't know if many people even
31:37
know why it falls how it does and why we have the long summer
31:40
breaks and stuff like that. But actually it all comes back
31:42
to rural communities. They couldn't get the buy in
31:45
from rural communities to send their kids to school until the
31:47
harvest was done. So that was September, October
31:50
time, sometimes even November in some areas.
31:52
And then they obviously wanted their children home over the
31:54
summer because they needed them at home to help with the summer
31:58
harvest. So this was all just because
32:00
they were trying to please the rural communities.
32:01
Even just the structure of how a school year falls isn't relevant
32:05
like to actual human nature. This isn't like a isn't there
32:09
for any other reason. That's that's why it was like
32:11
that. So you've got to try and
32:12
remember that as well, that actually there's no step timing
32:15
in terms of a child's psychology or development.
32:17
That's not where where they suddenly pivot and can do more.
32:20
Like that's not the point. Yeah.
32:22
In school, I think we know that child development wasn't part of
32:27
the educational curriculum outline when schools were
32:32
established. All kids develop at different
32:35
rates. And actually what's interesting
32:37
is just to kind of pivot here for a second, in Italy, there
32:41
was a question around when I was teaching in the school there, if
32:45
the children would be held back if they weren't passing, let's
32:49
say, a math level or an English level.
32:51
And the thought, at this particular school anyway, was
32:53
that we don't keep children back because by the time they get to
32:58
5th grade, which is year 6IN England, they're all sort of
33:02
back at that same level. So that even if, unless someone
33:05
is like truly struggling for some very serious reason, they
33:11
won't hold children back even if they're not getting top grades.
33:16
I think there's pluses and minuses to that.
33:18
But that way of thought is sort of what we were saying around
33:21
kids come into it at a different pace and every child's going to
33:25
be different. And it's something that you just
33:27
have to. Be aware of.
33:29
Yeah, and not not stress too much about right, because at the
33:33
end of the day, like your kids might be the equivalent.
33:35
Like, for example, my son is coming to what would be the end
33:37
of Year 3, and if I wanted to, I could then start to have that
33:41
major anxiety that he would be like, yeah, 456 away from going
33:46
to secondary school. And that in itself feels like
33:49
really, really stressful. Like I've only got 3 years to
33:51
have him mentally prepared to be taking on secondary school level
33:53
education. But the truth is, he'll be ready
33:56
when he's ready. That will naturally just happen
34:00
as he gets to that age. He'll start needing more.
34:03
He'll start wanting more input. He'll start about to go into
34:06
things in more depth. He'll be able to focus for
34:07
longer. He will start to show more
34:10
interest in going deeper on subjects.
34:12
He'll be able to handle more complex conversations.
34:14
And ultimately, I'm not worried about these things.
34:18
And it's actually an interesting question.
34:19
You get asked quite a lot as a home educator, which is the
34:22
whole like, do you think he'll carry on doing it through like
34:24
secondary school and stuff? It's just like, yeah, Well, like
34:27
the. The intention is to just carry
34:29
on all the way through, really. Yeah.
34:30
Like if he, if he wants to carry on home educating even up
34:35
through college and even if he wants to do like Open University
34:38
courses from home, etcetera, like I couldn't care less.
34:40
Like he can carry on getting his education, being at home all the
34:44
way through if he really wants to.
34:45
But I do actually suspect at some point he's going to want to
34:47
go and have some fun and like go off to university and go off the
34:50
rails. Someone who's going to need a
34:53
need to go stretch his wings like we all do.
34:56
But I know that they'll do that when they're ready and when they
34:58
want to and it when it feels good for them and when it's
35:00
going in a direction that makes sense for their career.
35:02
And ultimately I've, I've just got so much faith in this
35:06
process now. And I think if you don't right
35:09
now, I guess I want you to listen to me and understand that
35:12
the reason why I now have faith is because I have stressed about
35:16
it. And I have over planned and I've
35:18
over scheduled and I have cut it back and I've over scheduled
35:20
again. And I've like put loads of
35:23
effort into stuff and then have my kids go, I don't want to do
35:25
it and then make me really miserable.
35:27
And I've had to reassess how we plan and over and over and over
35:31
again, we have reinvented what a school year looks like or what
35:35
kinds of things we do or the kinds of outings we do, or what
35:38
their kind of zone of tolerance is around their sensory needs
35:42
and all of the things. And you are going to be doing
35:45
that. You're an incredible parent,
35:46
whoever you are, because you are going to be observing and
35:49
noticing and changing and twisting and reconforming your
35:52
entire home Ed model so often. And it's just if you are being
35:56
intuitive to that and you're noticing and you're seeing that
35:58
things aren't working and you're changing stuff up, then just try
36:01
to see that as a positive. It's not that you've got it
36:03
wrong, it's just you're trying stuff and it's not always going
36:06
to work. And this the real conditioning
36:09
that's coming at you this time of year.
36:10
I just want to really stress that.
36:12
Please take a big deep breath. There is no Big Brother watching
36:15
you. Nobody cares.
36:17
You and your children are allowed to live the life you're
36:20
living. You are not breaking the law by
36:22
deciding to do this differently. You do not have to attain any
36:25
certain grades or meet any certain expectations or levels
36:28
that anybody outside of your home is putting in place for
36:31
anybody else. Like you are allowed to choose
36:34
to allow your children to gradually meet certain levels.
36:37
If it helps you to have some sort of marker reflection
36:41
process. Scrapbooking, report writing,
36:44
whatever it is that you like to do at the end of a school year
36:46
just to reflect and to think there's a process, then great.
36:49
But do it because it makes you feel better or you feel more
36:52
relaxed or helps you to get a better grasp and understanding
36:55
of what your children are doing and how you can better help
36:57
them. Don't do it because you're
36:58
worried that you're not doing enough or that you need to prove
37:01
to anybody else that you are. Do it for a reason that's
37:05
actually a +1 for you. And trust yourself and trust
37:08
your kids that actually, this time of year is the summer.
37:13
It is designed for frolicking and for water parks and for
37:17
like, chilling out in the sunshine and going to the beach
37:19
and eating too much ice cream and doing some fun exploring and
37:23
learning along the way. It is not all about stressing
37:27
about school and what you've done and what you're doing next.
37:31
So just try and strike a balance.
37:32
Do what makes sense for you, your family and make sure that
37:35
you're you're not stressing your way through the summer months.
37:38
I guess is all I have to say on the subject.
37:40
Yeah. And if you are in an area where
37:43
you are required to have some formal testing or portfolio
37:48
reviews, I've been there and I, I can understand how much effort
37:53
you put into preparing for that and how important it can really
37:57
feel to do that. I think that it's just always
38:02
good to remember that there are other people that can share
38:05
their experiences with you on that.
38:08
I know for Italy, I reached out to a lot of people to get their
38:11
perspective and then once I went through the 1st iteration of it
38:14
that first year, I had a much better feeling for how my
38:18
district dealt with it, how my area was, and I was able to
38:23
really have a much calmer experience the next time around.
38:27
So you, you will get to that point where you have a good feel
38:30
for how to do it. And the same thing for friends
38:33
of mine that do it in the States.
38:35
I have one friend who went into her portfolio review and had
38:40
just put so much stuff together for it.
38:42
And then the she was just, you know, first time concerned.
38:46
And I think the feedback was just really lovely and saying
38:49
like, all this is so great, love it.
38:52
Let me help you with the recommendation.
38:53
Next year, focus a little more on this.
38:56
So it wasn't even this like you're doing it wrong, don't do
39:00
that. It was absolutely just a, all of
39:02
this is so great. I'm seeing that maybe your child
39:06
could need a little bit more writing, for example, or
39:09
something. So maybe do this a little bit
39:11
more of this when you're, you know, going through your next
39:13
school year. And she actually at the end was
39:15
like, you know, that was really helpful because I wouldn't have
39:17
thought that. But now that she pointed out to
39:19
me, I see like, yeah, maybe we were lacking in that.
39:21
And so. You, I know it's, it can be so
39:24
overwhelming. It certainly was for me the
39:26
first time. But I think once you get a feel
39:28
for it, just know that it will, it will settle down.
39:31
It will get easier. You will, you'll get a feel for
39:33
it and hopefully that end of your vibe will be calmer and
39:37
then you can just carry on after it's done.
39:40
Yeah, I think that real kind of fear of being judged or having
39:45
to prove yourself to anyone is just so real.
39:48
And it's OK to have some compassion with yourself.
39:50
You're definitely going to be feeling a bit anxious around
39:52
that. But like anything that's new,
39:54
it's always going to feel way more daunting the first couple
39:57
of times you have to do it, like whether it's submitting a report
40:00
to the local authority or having to get your kids to do some end
40:02
of your assessments or whatever. I say depending on the country
40:05
you're in, you'll have different rules.
40:07
But yeah, it's it's not fun. But I think we have to have
40:10
faith that we can do hard things, that we can we can get
40:14
through tricky moments and that you'll be surprised quite often.
40:19
I think we're quite hard on ourselves.
40:21
And as home bed parents, 9 times out of 10, we are absolutely
40:26
amazing people and care a lot about our kids and are doing an
40:30
awful lot for them. And sometimes we, I think we're
40:32
really, really hard on ourselves and think that we're not doing
40:34
anywhere near enough. I mean, I had our the play
40:37
therapist that works with my youngest today saying like, you
40:40
guys are amazing. You're so self aware, like
40:42
you're doing so many of the right things that she gave us
40:44
some really great suggestions, stuff that we hadn't thought of
40:46
yet, sort of improving on things that we're already doing.
40:49
But it really made me every now and then you get these moments
40:51
when someone raises you and reminds you that actually you
40:54
are doing a lot of good already. Like you are doing the right
40:57
things, you are making good progress.
40:59
And it's OK if you haven't figured some of these stuff out
41:01
yet. You don't know everything.
41:02
And we're going to keep learning every single year.
41:05
So it's all good. Just keep rolling forwards and
41:08
supporting yourself along the way.
41:10
But yeah, so hopefully that's been reassuring for you all.
41:14
And yeah, we're, we think we're only a couple of episodes away
41:18
from the end of this season officially anyway.
41:20
But we are going to do some mini teaser episodes over the summer.
41:23
Myself and Ashley have got some fun little plans of things.
41:25
We're going to do some episodes on individually just to ease
41:29
things a bit because obviously we've got various travel bits
41:32
going on. And we also do try to take a bit
41:33
of a break with our kids a bit over the summer, at least full,
41:38
full next season. We'll obviously start again sort
41:40
of September time. And we have some brilliant
41:42
interviews lining up already. I've been reaching out to some
41:44
people this week and got some stuff in the diary and I'm very
41:47
excited. So yeah, keep keep tuning in and
41:50
keep rating and all the rest of it.
41:51
Please, please be pleased because we are getting huge
41:54
growth in the minute, month on month in terms of listenership.
41:57
We peaked a new kind of milestone this week as well,
42:00
which is really exciting. So yeah, just just keep
42:04
listening, keep sharing, keep getting involved, and we'll see
42:06
you again soon. Bye guys, take care.
42:08
Bye. You've been listening to the Big
42:15
Home Ed Conversations podcast. Thanks for tuning in.
42:18
Don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share with a
42:21
friend. Follow us on Instagram and
42:23
TikTok at Big Home Ed Podcast for updates.
42:27
And we can't wait to see you next week where we talk with
42:29
Luna, who is currently world schooling.
42:32
You can follow her to learn more about her experience on
42:35
Instagram, she's at Luna Flower Day, LUNAFLOWERDAY.
42:44
And remember, if you want to talk about a topic, do let us
42:47
know. We love hearing from you.
42:49
Until next time, take care. Did I stumble over a word?