Homeschool Highlights
- debbocg1
- Sep 14, 2023
- 3 min read
Sometimes a picture says it all. Lounging on a couch with her kitty, our five-year-old Quinn works on completing a Language Arts assignment. I thought she would really love working online since she is obsessed with her iPad, constantly playing Roblox and Minecraft. So far however, she has been bored and restless anytime I sit her in front of the computer screen for her lessons. It doesn't seem to matter if she's watching videos or listening to the content and catchy songs in her curriculum. She just hasn't seemed engaged. Instead, she has been asking to draw or practice reading actual books. I struggle with making sure to click through all the screens so it doesn't mark her lesson as incomplete. It is very distracting and counterproductive to her learning process. She seemed to do slightly better with me sitting at the desk while she dances around the office and listens to me explain the subject matter. "Mom, school is so boring." This is exactly what I didn't want to happen. I am convinced that, for my children at least, learning needs to happen more organically.
Homeschool co-op to the rescue! Our local co-op meets weekly on Thursdays for kids of all ages to get together for fun activities and as a supplement to their learning. Today they had a guest presenter from the Colville Fish and Wildlife Department. Senior harvest biologist Isaiah Martin was animated, excited, intelligent, and very clearly loves his job. He brought a pair of five year old salmon, one male and one female, and dissected them on a table in front of the kids. The group of about thirty kids, ranging in age from 18 months to 12 years old, watched intently while he discussed salmon life cycles, their habitat, and anatomy as well as some very interesting facts. Did you know that salmon have an incredible sense of smell and maturing adults use retained odor memories to guide their homing migration?
Martin shared with the kids that he was also homeschooled and that he became a biologist in large part because of a homeschool trip he took as a kid to a local hatchery. He provided confirmation that homeschooling can provide an amazing education without all of the time wasted in a traditional school setting. He graduated at 16 and went to college at the University of Oregon where he got his BS before subsequently getting hired on with the Fish and Wildlife Department. Morgan and I had a sidebar about the kind of jobs she might like and that if it was something cool like his job that she might consider going to college. I appreciated him sharing his homeschool experience with the children and planting seeds of a brighter future than their developing minds might yet comprehend.
"We'll be worth the wait, Cus we're still growing, still growing, still growing, still growing, still growing, keep holding on. Everyone you've ever known, has been behind you all along" -Schoolkids by AJR
Gavin, who only minutes before was throwing a fit when I had him come over from the playground where he was having a perfectly amazing time, became fascinated as Mr. Martin took the huge salmon out of the cooler and wasted no time in gutting them...following a brief safety blurb on how sharp the filet knife was. He asked questions of the children to gauge their knowledge and encouraged them to ask their questions as well. Quinn answered several questions and made great comments herself. Her face lit up when he told her that she was very smart. Her final question left the adults in the group laughing, "Mr. Martin, what is the box of Goldfish under the table for?" She had spotted it with her eagle eyes and wanted to make sure that it would be a snack for the kids. Gavin made it to the end of the presentation when smaller groups broke out for reading, a huge game of freeze tag, and coloring handouts before he reminded me loudly that he wanted to go back to the playground. So I headed over to watch him while the girls went down to the soccer field to play tag. Today was an absolute success and not a lesson was done. We didn't even login today. Today marks one week since the start of homeschooling this year and we've already been on two amazing field trips. This Momma is happy!
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