The start of the school season is fast approaching and so many parents in New York State are faced with so many difficult options. Send your kids to public school? Virtual learning with the school district? A complicated hybrid version of in-school and virtual learning? Or. . . trash all options and do it yourself. Wherever you find yourself this fall we can all agree that any decision made is a difficult decision to make. Let me be clear from the start. . . there is no right and wrong answer when it comes to deciding how your children will be educated.

All of the boudoir ladies here at The Boudoir Studio found themselves asking the same questions this fall. With the help of our all-star studio manager, Nicki, who has always homeschooled her children, both Andrea and Jill were able to make a confident decision. Take a step into our lives and see the how’s and why’s behind what made us all decide to homeschool our kids for maybe 1 year. . . or beyond!

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Andrea:

To home school or not. . . This has been a conversation in our house since our oldest was about 2 years old. My husband and I both went to the same public school K-12. While we both had very different experiences, ultimately we both really enjoyed school. We also are very happy with the district that we live in and would be sending our children to school. So why were we so heavily debating homeschooling for our kids. . . I think for us it comes down to the idea of letting kids be kids for as long as possible. Especially in the younger years.

We went to Kindergarten at age 5 with the expectation that a 1/2 a day of school was the appropriate time needed to be at school. Now at age 4, we are expecting kids to start their schooling with a 1/2 day of UPK so that by age 5 they are ready for a full day of school with higher academic expectations. I believe there is a great deal of learning and growth that happens at these young ages from play, exploration, and time spent with family. I fully get the need for socializing but for our house, I feel I do a pretty good job at setting up playdates and getting the kids involved in summer REC programs.

There is also a lot more out there that I worry about my young children having to deal with. A lot of outside influence on hot topics from both peers and other adults, social media, the ever-growing rate of violence in schools, ETC. With the exception of violence, of course, these truthfully are all things I actually want my children to have to work through during school, but I want to be able to set the foundation myself. I want to expose my children to healthy debates, internet safety, conflict resolution, and my list could go on and on. But I want to expose them to these things in a way that will promote growth and understanding to each of them individually.

So we as a family decided that for us if we decided to go the route of homeschooling we would take it one year at a time. With the intention of sending them to school when they are ready or sometime between grades 3-5. So this brings us to the present day! My oldest should be starting UPK in the fall and it’s time to actually make the decision. . . then COVID happened and our decision was ultimately made for us. It's been a nice weight lifted having the decision made.

We will be starting our homeschooling journey!! I have two close friends that we regularly play with (we all have kids the same ages!!) that have also decided to homeschool their UPK/K age kids this upcoming year. We have all purchased the same UPK/K curriculum (Thank you Nicki for the guidance!!) and will be jumping into this together. The intentions are to work individually but be able to once a week bring the kids together for school. Letting the kids work and interact together and also take direction from an adult other than their mom! Selfishly I am beyond excited for how this is playing out. Vanessa is getting to be homeschooled but also still getting that ever-important peer interaction! I also have the support of other parents to bounce questions off of, pick their brain, and ultimately all be there to support each other!

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Jill:

I want to start by saying that I NEVER wanted to be a teacher. EVER! I feel like after I graduated high school it was expected of me to pick either a career in healthcare or a career in teaching. I tried healthcare briefly and quickly got out of it. I also worked as a photographer for a school picture company and received a heavy dose of what a teacher has to endure and it did nothing but cement my thoughts that I could never have enough patience to be a teacher.

I have an almost 5-year-old daughter and an 8-month-old son. My daughter was born in November roughly close to the cut off date for kindergarten. My husband and I have always discussed whether or not to send her to kindergarten at 5 or 6. For the longest time, we thought that she would get an extra year of pre-k before enrolling her into full-blown kindergarten. In pre-k, she had an evaluation of whether or not she was ready to move up to kindergarten. Well, her teachers were fantastic and she was more than ready to move to the next grade, much to our surprise!! My husband and I debated the pros and cons of getting an early start in kindergarten. Ultimately, we decided that she would move on so that she is being actively challenged rather than repeating pre-k.

When COVID hit New York State, I was so surprised that our 2-week quarantine turned into months of social distancing. If that wasn’t enough, my husband and I recently bought a house in a different county and district from where we were. So. . . perfect, the new school will allow her to make new friends in our new town! We have been spending weeks working on our new house, packing, unpacking and I had these thoughts swirling around in my mind on whether or not to just homeschool kindergarten. Let me remind you. . . I never wanted to be a teacher. . . leave that to the professionals!!! Am I right?? I finally brought my thoughts to the attention of my husband. The way I saw it was that I am essentially a stay-at-home mom who works part-time. I could homeschool if I really needed to. I felt selfish to drop her off at kindergarten even though we were still working through a pandemic. I felt awful for the teachers who don't have a choice but to be flexible for the districts, for the parents, and for the kids. I already had homeschool thrust upon me at the end of my daughter’s pre-k school last year. . . maybe I could do it again.

Nicki, our studio manager, who homeschools 3 of her kids and has a huge part at The Boudoir Studio seems to be able to juggle everything. So I am harnessing her strength, patience, and juggling skills to give homeschooling a good ‘ole college try. If she can homeschool her much older kids. . . I think I can handle 1 kindergartener!! Nicki is an excellent resource for figuring out this homeschooling thing and I don’t think I would’ve been able to make this decision without knowing someone successful at it! HUGE kudos to Nicki!!

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Nicki:

I always knew I wanted to be a stay-at-home mom and homeschool our kids, at least for the elementary years. So when our oldest was 5, I began my homeschooling journey, feeling nervous and a bit overwhelmed. There was so much to figure out - What curriculum do I use? What does my school district require of me? What the heck is an IHIP, an LOI, and a quarterly report?!? Am I going to be able to pull this off and effectively educate my child while following all the laws that apply to me??

On one hand, there was no lack of resources that were available to help: blogs by homeschooling moms, curriculum websites, homeschooling communities, curriculum reviews, Facebook groups, YouTube videos, etc. However, it was the fact that there was so much out there that overwhelmed me and made it nearly impossible to know what to do! Everyone had their opinions and they were all different! How could I possibly know what to choose?!? And then there was the philosophy behind homeschooling. I didn’t have a clue what kind of homeschooler I was: Religious? Secular? Unschooled? Student-led? I liked aspects from each category and yet couldn't commit fully to any single philosophy.

Thankfully my older step-sister had been homeschooling her kids for years and gave me some helpful links and guidance. Because of her recommendations, I started with a wonderful curriculum called “Moving Beyond the Page.” This was the perfect match for me because it included everything I needed and required minimal planning. I was able to teach kindergarten to Jaedon while his younger sisters napped, it was fairly easy and enjoyable! First grade was about the same, we did school during nap time and I used the same curriculum.

My first difficult year came when Jaedon was in second grade and Jasmyn started kindergarten. Homeschooling two kids was a lot more challenging than homeschooling just one. On top of that, I was pregnant and we had moved into a very tight space the week that school was supposed to start. I started the year late, had our 4th baby in November, and never quite caught up that year. I felt like I had failed my children and was scared to admit it because I was afraid the conclusion would be that I should stop homeschooling. Well, when I finally did tell Asif what I felt, quite the opposite happened. Within a week he had been connected with someone who runs a Home School Academy (HSA), where homeschoolers can attend a day of classes once a week to get some social interaction and to give moms a break. It was such a godsend!!! The following year was so much better and the structure that came with being involved with HSA helped me immensely. The following year I started homeschooling my third, Jordin, and the transition to three was much easier than transitioning to two had been.

That was last year, and now I’m gearing up for this year, my fifth year of homeschooling, feeling more confident and excited than ever. I feel like I finally have confidence in myself and confidence in the process. I’ve learned that homeschooling is not about trying to fit into a particular philosophy or belief system, it’s not about fitting a certain label or group. It is quite the opposite - homeschooling is about having the privilege of choosing. I get to choose what we do, why we do it, how we do it. I get to really tune into my children and their learning styles, interests, strengths, and weaknesses and decide how to approach these things. And most importantly, if I fail or miss the mark in my goals, I get to make the shifts that are needed to do better. No one school day or school week or even school year is the determining factor about my success or failure. As long as I keep going and reassess and learn, I will get better and they will be ok. That is the beauty of homeschooling. It’s a journey, not a destination and I am so grateful for all that it is teaching me.

Now with all the craziness from COVID, many moms are being forced to make the decision to homeschool, not necessarily because they want to, but because they don’t have a better option available. I want to say to them, the fact that you are choosing to homeschool in this crazy world shows that you already have what it takes to do the job, whether you feel like it or not. You want what’s best for your kids and have chosen to do what you believe is best for this time, even if it isn’t an ideal situation. That’s what it takes to be a good homeschooler. Bravery and willingness to do what you believe is best for your child(ren). And finally, please don’t try to fit into any mold, homeschooling is as unique as the families that choose it!! Just tune in to your kids and your mom instincts that you already have, and don’t give up. It will all work out ok and you will have chances to try again when needed.

Finally, I don’t want to add to the overwhelming plethora of information, but I figured I’d share some of my favorite resources in case they help someone out there:

Curriculum:

https://www.movingbeyondthepage.com/

https://timberdoodle.com/

https://www.thriftbooks.com/

and Amazon :)

Worksheets and more:

https://www.worksheetfun.com/

http://education.com/

Apps:

Starfall (Pre-K through 2nd grade)

Epic (books)

Templates to copy for all legal paperwork requirements: