The following is a post by contributor Angie Kauffman of Real Life at Home.
Homeschooling is such an amazing educational and lifestyle choice. The benefits of it are plentiful, and often get touted by homeschoolers.
There’s another side to homeschooling, however. That other side is that homeschooling can be challenging.
It can drain you mentally and physically. Even if it’s worth it, it is not an easy lifestyle to choose.
On the up side, however, there are things you can do when you’re feeling discouraged in your homeschooling lifestyle to help change your mindset and lighten your mood. Sometimes, it’s just about making changes in logistics and in your thinking.
As an added bonus, it may also help your children feel better too.
Things to do when you’re feeling discouraged as a homeschooler
Make changes to things that aren’t working
Sometimes, despite your best planning, some of the things that you thought would work well in your homeschool just aren’t working.
Make tweaks to what you’re doing or even completely change some of your curriculum choices. Homeschooling can be challenging, and you don’t need to add to it by staying with a curriculum choice that makes it harder.
Take a short break
Even if you live somewhere that has attendance requirements, such as 180 days, it likely won’t shift your schedule too much to take a few days off of school. Sometimes a little time off is just what everyone needs.
Read inspirational books and blogs about homeschooling
Seek out references, such as books and blogs, that fill you up with encouragement.
Likewise, you might consider not reading resources that always make you feel pressured. Fill your reading with things that are going to be helpful while also building your spirit.
Seek out other homeschooling families
When I was upset last year, and just couldn’t shake the constant fears about what homeschooling in high school would look like, I finally sat down at a local pizza place for four hours with a homeschooling friend whose daughter was already homeschooling in high school.
She showed me how they were documenting classes, gave me options that might work for our family, and acted as a sounding board for my concerns.
Nothing else that I did or read helped as much as those four hours with a friend who understood what I was going through.
Photo by Iuliia Sokolovska
Travel
Not only can travel be a great way to break up what can sometimes be homeschool monotony, but it’s also an amazing way to learn.
I have always been shocked at how many educational experiences come up while traveling. If I could make changes to things we had done in the past, one would definitely be to travel as often as we were able to do so.
Work on planning ahead more often
If you happen to be one of those people who is always planning at the last minute, then I would highly encourage that you start planning earlier and for a longer period of time.
I’m apt to put off planning and then have had to do a lot of planning on Monday mornings.
Every time that has happened, I’m in a horribly discouraged mood. Not only does that make me dread homeschooling on those days, but it puts my kids in a pretty bad mood as well.
On the flip side, when I have everything well planned, it makes days go more smoothly.
Incorporate some child-led or hands-on activities
If you are not currently doing either of those things in your homeschool, they are a great change of pace.
Plus, as a bonus, incorporating some child-led work into your day or week can give your children a greater sense of ownership over their education.
Photo by Martin Fisch
Take care of yourself
Spend time on yourself. Make time for more sleep and exercise. Try to have some time outdoors every day. Make sure that you are spending time in prayer. Prioritize spending regular time with your spouse.
You won’t have anything to give to your kids if you are an empty shell of yourself. Taking care of yourself is of vital importance.
What do you do when you start feeling discouraged as a homeschooling parent?
At the heart of homeschooling
This was a blessing on this morning.
Oh, I’m so glad, Pam! I hope that if you’re having difficulty that your day gets a little better.
Angie Kauffman’s latest post: 9 Reasons You Should NOT Homeschool
Even to a non-homeschooler like me, “changing things that aren’t working” is major.
What sometimes works for me is getting up from the computer, moving around and singing a song as badly as possible. Then I can laugh, stop taking things so hard, and feel a little creative boost!
Thanks for your inspiring post – was a good start to my day.
I totally agree about working on changing things that aren’t working in all areas of life. It’s easy to get stuck in a rut of doing things that aren’t working just because it’s what you’ve always done.
Angie Kauffman’s latest post: 7 Reasons I’m Glad I Merged All of My Blogs into One Site
Changing things that aren’t working and taking care of myself are two big ones for me. The second one can be hard for me but I just tell myself over and over that if I don’t take care of myself I’m useless to the rest of the family.
Steph’s latest post: A Quick Read, a Reference and a Return to Childhood
I’m really bad about making sure to take care of myself too. Instead, I end up eating lots of junk and being sleep deprived. Not good!
Angie Kauffman’s latest post: 7 Reasons I’m Glad I Merged All of My Blogs into One Site
I have been having issues with my middle child not taking instruction. My Certified Teacher (we are with the charter school) told me to get him a tutor. I can teach these subjects where he is struggling, I need him to obey me also. I am at a loss 🙁
I was having trouble with that too a few months back. I found https://teachingselfgovernment.com/ a few weeks ago. Although I had already focused on just working on teaching obedience and relationship, I am hopeful with what I saw on the website. I will be implementing those ideas soon. Check it out!
tereza crump aka mytreasuredcreations’s latest post: How Unique is your Family? A little about our Homeschooling Style.
Wonderful advice here, Angie.
There are many seasons to homeschooling and unfortunately, no one ever seems to talk about the discouraging ones. Good to be having this conversation.
sheila’s latest post: Treading Water
Since homeschooling from birth 4 children ages 11-4 y.o., I have done all these suggestions when I find myself discouraged and I would say they work! 🙂
tereza crump aka mytreasuredcreations’s latest post: How Unique is your Family? A little about our Homeschooling Style.
Great post! Self care can be my Achilles heel, and I just wrote about taking better care of myself today!
Annie’s latest post: Self-Care for the Homeschooling Mom
This post was so timely! School has been extremely rough this week, and I’ve found myself in tears more than once. Thank you for the great suggestions and reminders!
Patty’s latest post: The forbidden “D” word
I hope that this week has been better!
Angie Kauffman’s latest post: 7 Reasons I’m Glad I Merged All of My Blogs into One Site
Taking care of ourselves is so important! Moms need to recharge their batteries on a regular basis. It’s so easy for moms to do for everyone else and forget ourselves. Great post and advice.
Camie’s latest post: Consider Seeing This Movie
I found often I start not sharing and isolating myself as I feel I might be alone in my struggles. Then when I do share, I learn that there are so many of us out there. Teaching high school is hard work!!
Martha Artyomenko’s latest post: Trading Secrets by Melody Carlson
Yes, self-care is soooo important. I found out the hard way, and it led to complete burn out and depression. I had to put my children in school, which has turned out to be a positive experience, but i think it can be avoided. This really needs to be discussed more because i have found through helping women on my blog that so many are suffering.
Lisa’s latest post: Comment on 31 day writing challenge: Giving up Facebook by LLMom
Thank you for this article. I had been stay at home mom for 7 and half years and husband and I have 4 beautiful kids. 2 of them are homeschooled. It has been very challenging to teach the children to work hard even though they are at home. Homeschooling has definitely pros and cons, but it is always better then public school.