I don’t mean the things that we long for, but the things that we homeschoolers tend to overlook.
When I had to get up at 6:15 to get Captain Science off to school in a timely fashion and received a backpack full of reminder notes every day, life was quite different for us than it is now. More predictability. More routine. That’s not to say that we don’t have a routine now, but it’s different each day of the week, as we have co-op on Tuesdays, science at Patchfire’s house on Thursday, piano lessons two days, things here and things there. It’s not 7:45 to 2:15 every Monday through Friday. It’s not on someone else’s time.
This sort of nonreliance on the schedule of others is wonderful in almost every aspect, save one…we’re totally, completely responsible for keeping track of stuff for ourselves! That means that, sometimes, things just don’t get done. We don’t think about them. We don’t remember them. Here are some examples:
1. Picture Day. There is no official homeschool picture day. As a result, Captain Science is almost through with his 4th grade year and has not had formal pictures made. We keep saying we’re going to get them done, but that just hasn’t happened.
2. Hair cuts. Without planned picture days and school field trips, for which I didn’t want my child to look like he was being raised by stewbums, hair cuts tend to fall by the wayside. I wasn’t the best about scheduling them regularly as it was, but at least three times a school year (for first day of school, fall pictures, and spring pictures), Captain Science got a really nice hair cut. Once we got that “picture day is coming” notice, we’d schedule the hair cut. Now, it’s more like Officer Daddyman spends weeks complaining about Captain Science and Tank’s ever-growing hair, I swear I’ll make an appointment to have it done, Daddyman gets frustrated and just takes the boys to his barber, at which point I complain about their hair being too short. OH THE JOYS OF HOMESCHOOLING!
3. Watching what we say. If the boys were in full time public school, I think I’d watch my mouth a little more carefully. Since they’re home so much, I have developed an unfortunate tendency to just say the things I’d normally have saved for times I wasn’t in their presence. My worst offense is, “So’s your face,” which my brother says is the appropriate response to absolutely everything (and the response to “So’s your face” is “Your mom”). Captain Science will announce, “Mama, I’m done with math,” and I’ll say, “Oh yeah? Well, so’s your face!” Captain Science will say, “So’s your mom,” and Tank, who is the classiest among us, yells, “So’s your BUTT.” I know I should correct it, simply because it’s not socially acceptable for my kids to say that, but it’s not like they’re going off to school and saying it to their teachers, right?
4. All that important non-curriculum stuff that kids still need to learn. Did you know that you were supposed to make sure your kids memorized their address? I know I totally didn’t think about it until Patchfire told me Eclectic Girl was six before they realized that she didn’t know her address. Oops! Public schooled kids get it drilled into them in kindergarten, but our homeschooled children are going to grow up with no clue as to where they live. Someone needs to put together a checklist of non-curriculum stuff that our kids need to learn. That list will also include how to spell their last name, their parents’ names, and their phone number.
5. Cops and firemen. Unless you’re luck enough to have an Officer Daddyman in the house, your kids may be missing out on the awesome public school experience of fire fighters and law enforcement officers coming out to the school to teach your kids about safety and how to dial 911 while mama and daddy are sleeping late (they say that’s not what they’re doing, but you KNOW that’s what they’re doing). There’s always the option of trying to get your co-op in to the fire station, I suppose.
6. Fire drills. You should be having these for your family anyway, but I bet you don’t. I know I don’t. At school, your kids would be having fire drills. They’d learn to “stay low and go” and to “stop, drop, and roll.” Maybe when you plan that visit to the fire station that you aren’t actually going to plan, you can make sure the firemen address those topics.
What things do you think that you’re missing as a homeschooler? What critical gaps in your child’s education (academic or social), appearance, or experience are you completely overlooking?
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[...] Things Homeschoolers Miss – SmrtLernins [...]
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[...] also going to make sure I address some of those things that he might otherwise miss as a homeschooled student, things like knowing his parents’ names, address, phone number, and how to react in a fire or [...]
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[...] Secular Thursday: Things Homeschoolers Miss at Smrt Lernins. Here she’s listed a few things that her children don’t take part in since they are no longer in public school. Oddly enough, my children have been introduced to all of it, except the fire station tour, which is still on our to-do list. And they are still memorizing their address. That said; Sonlight has a list of non-scholarly things children should know by various ages–things like measuring food, following a recipe, erm…and lots of other things–that’s included at least in their Core K program, possibly in the others too. Honestly, the list is so long that I’ve only begun to tackle it. But it is there, and it’s great, and it includes a lot of things I would never have thought of. [...]
Ridiculous holiday crafts. Like the foam-tray ornaments, or needlepoint drums with painted matches for drumsticks.
The Pledge of Allegiance. Which we intentionally don’t teach the youngers for multiple valid reasons, but I still fear having them put on the spot one day and being dubbed stupid in comparison to typical second grade patriots.
However, I do think that’s outweighed by their ability to time the garbage truck’s arrival in order to get the trash cans out and back in in a timely manner. THAT’s a skill they can use every week!
Yes! Great suggestion!
Our solution for picture day is just to do it around her birthday. We’ve been doing pictures around her birthday since she was one. I never liked the school photos anyway.
I think the one thing I didn’t think of was teaching her to tell you how old she is. I didn’t think of it until people started asking her.
She gives her full name though, sort of. She did create her own nickname due to not being able to pronounce her first name at first. Now I think she just likes it and we’ve all stuck with it.
Age/birthdate. That’s going on the list.
I was able to give my son a brief lesson on police officers when Mommy got pulled over for speeding the other day. :-} Talk about seizing the moment. I even had the officer talk to him for a few minutes. I miss the days when I could curse and complain about the police instead of (with a smile) “police are are friends, they help protect us”.
I think I’ll try not to burn down the house for the fire fighter lesson though.
Dottie, as the wife of a police officer, I heartily thank you for teaching your son that police are here to help! Too many parents make negative comments about law enforcement in their children’s hearing and some even use the police as a threat (“If you don’t behave, that policeman over there will come arrest you!” Yes, my husband has heard it!). The result of that is children who are so fearful of the police that they don’t go to them in emergency situations.
I know, I’ve seen it as well. I could never understand using the police as a threat – what happens if your child needs the police? Gets lost and needs to find help? This has always seemed to me one of the most irresponsible things a parent could do.
Ugh, that is so sad. My father was a pediatrician, and he always complained about parents who would say “if you aren’t good, the doctor is going to give you a shot!” Yeah, that’s the relationship you want your kid to have with healthcare providers.
We went to a “truck day” sponsored by a local preschool, once, and a teenage volunteer fireman put on all his gear – including the face shield/gas mask – to show my daughter. Then he explained to her, “now, if you ever see someone who looks like this, you’ll know that there’s a regular person like me inside.” It hadn’t occurred to me before, but he told me that there have been problems with kids hiding from firefighters because they look so scary.
Yes, firemen look scary in their gear. That reminds me that I should see about scheduling something w/ our local fire station!
Well the firemen at the fire station covered fire safety for me, got to handle the police offer thing. We got a lesson in ambulances and EMT’s last night, nothing like hands on learning. School drilled in his address and phone number even though some days I wish he would forget the number (like when I’m trying to have some mommy time). Apparently according to the child psych the boy child’s social issues will go away if I let him hang out with more kids his age and if he was in school. HA HA HA
Nice. I should try to get something set up w/ our local fire station.
And *pshaw* of course public school is the answer to all socialization problems! I know it totally fixed my kid. Except not. The complete reverse of that.
My kid too. Bullying 101 is what DS was learning.
We called up our local fire station and just asked if we could come down. They gave us an INCREDIBLE behind-the-scenes tour since it was only the four of us. We saw stuff that most school kids never get to see. Don’t be afraid to call and ask.
As far as real life learning, I’ve tried from the beginning not to do too much for my kids. For example, the rule in my house was, “If you want a library card, you must be able to fill out the form yourself and be able to answer the librarian when she asks for address confirmation,” (thus learning name, address, phone number). I think it took Ryan until age 6 to learn all that.
Oops, I’ll be back. Kids are….
The library card is a powerful motivator. That’s how my brother learned to write his name! Good call on that, though.
I wonder if I know anybody who could get me a behind the scenes tour of the police precinct 3/fire station 4 combo-building? I seem to recall a handsome police officer who might be willing to help me out.
Cool. I wish he’d come lock my kids up for 10 minutes. Especially today.
On #5, I actually lived with kids once (long story) who called 911 about a (non-existent) brush fire while all the grown-ups were still in bed. The cops nearly hauled their mom to jail over it. Yikes!
So’s your face. AHAHAHAHA!
We’re getting a crash course in hospitals and by the time we are done here, big kidlet will be able to tell you the ins and outs of IVs. He’s already a pro at calling the nurse on his own, and he’s not shy about telling them what he needs.
Did you forget about Brad? He could get you into a fire station or talk to the kids about fire safety.
LOL…around here, I cut to the chase and just say, “So’s MY mom!” right up front. “I have to pee!” brightly: “My mom has to pee!” The only real response to this, which isn’t even funny anyway, is “Your mom lives in Los Angeles!” Duh.
I also have a friend who uses, “Upside down.” As in, “Where are we gooooing?” “Upside down!”
This blog has 122 fans on FB. I didn’t even know fan pages for hs blogs were, like, a thing.
My kids go to public school and we all say, “Your face,” and “Your mom’s face,” which I will retort to my kids even though they point out it makes no sense. I don’t buy the pictures either, they are a racket!!! So I’m not sure you are missing out on anything except teachers who send home notes with misspellings and rogue apostrophes. Or should I say apostrophe’s?
What, you don’t like it when they talk about all they’re favorite student’s?
How to jump rope. One day I realized they weren’t playing on the playground and just absorbing all those pat-a-cake clapping girl games and chants.
Shoot…I’ve been meaning to teach my Kindergartener our address and phone number…but we had a move planned for almost a year before it happened, and so I figured there was no point in teaching her an address and phone number that was going to change. We’ve been in the new house for over 2 months now, and I hadn’t even thought of it.
I also never thought about teaching her how to spell her last name…I thought I was doing pretty well that she knew our last name and both mom and dad’s names…
We have homeschool picture day once a year…it falls somewhere between the girl’s birthdays (August and November) and we get birthday pictures of each girl done, and then dress them up in Christmas dresses and do a Christmas picture. Saves all sorts of time…and we make a whole day out of it (since the nearest WalMart with a portrait studio is about an hour away.)