shifting gears

After much emotional wrestling, Jen and I made the decision to put Dylan and Zachary into public school following the Christmas recess. Hence, today was their "first day" of school. Education choices have been one of our biggest parental struggles, to date. In theory, we are very pro-home education. In practice, though, we have a difficult time pulling it off.

In our state, we have the option of enrolling our kids in a privately run, publicly funded charter school. Most of these are distance learning options, sometimes referred to as "public school at home." It is a compromise between public school and traditional home school. Because it is considered a public school, our boys are on track with their age peers at our local district, with the exception of a few differences between the curriculum. It is essentially like moving to a new district, except they need to transition from the casual home atmosphere to the more structured classroom atmosphere.

We initially felt that we would be able to continue teaching them at home with the addition of Lily. But, the addition of Lily AND Ben made this plan much less feasible. As much as we wanted them schooled in the home, we had to be honest with ourselves and admit that we were being stretched in too many directions and were not doing all things well. We take these decisions very seriously and do not switch education plans on a whim, but nor can we continue to pridefully ride out a plan that we determine is just not completely effective. We try to plan long term, but we have to continually assess and make course corrections, as necessary and available. Perhaps home education can be a part of our future plan... perhaps not. For now, we feel this is the best option for our family dynamics. Dylan was home-educated for Kindergarten, but we did not like the charter school we used. He attended our local district for first grade, then we brought him back home for second and the first half of third, with a different charter program. (As I said, we've really wrestled with these decisions). He was slightly nervous, but excited about the change. He had a pretty good idea what to expect, because of his first grade experience. He is now in the middle school, though, so he has to learn a new building. He had a good first day, and was able to reconnect with many of his friends from first grade.

Zachary has been home educated since Kindergarten, so this was a brand-new experience for him. He is more social than Dylan, so he has been lonely as a homeschooler. He, too, was slightly nervous, but very excited to go to school.

Unlike Dylan, today was Zachary's first experience riding the "Yellow Screamer". There is something sad about a parent putting their kid on the bus for the first time, but Zachary was undaunted. He did not hesitate to go to the bus stop and did not want anyone accompanying him. He went out (in the cold) about ten minutes before the bus was even scheduled, and stood, rocking on his heels, rearing to go. He came home excited, reporting that he had a great first day, didn't get lost, met several kids, and even had a little girl blowing kisses at him... which he said he wasn't too excited about! (Boy, they start early these days, don't they...)