School Begins

So fast forward to the start of school.  Let's just say that I did a ton of research about homeschooling but did not actually make any concrete plans. (Sort of like when I was pregnant I read everything I could about pregnancy but basically nothing on what to do once the baby arrives)

Anyway, we started school last week, on the same day as many of the local schools.  We are doing a virtual classroom for Judaic studies for the older 3 kids.  So for 3 30 minutes classes per day, they log into a website and they can see the teacher and the other students and everyone can see them.  So far it is going well.  We are going to try it for a month and reevaluate.  My youngest one and I will be studying Judaic studies together.

We have a math curriculum, a grammar curriculum, a social studies plan and a science plan is in the works.

My main goals for this year are as follows (in no particular order)

#1 Everyone will love learning

#2  Everyone will excel in math

#3  Everyone will learn the basics of cooking and cleaning

#4  Improved family time

We have had one week of school now and I already see a huge improvement in #4.  We do not have homework, which means at night when my husband is home, we can all just spend time together.  No one is rushing here or there while trying to finish our homework.  Are the lunches packed?  Do you have your permission slip?  You forgot what at school?

We have not had any of that this year.  Our quality of life has improved so much in this past week.  Hopefully it will continue . . .

New School

Picking up where we left off...

We decided to look at a few schools with a lower price tag.  We visited a few schools, went to a parlor meeting and eventually we signed our kids up for a new Yeshiva.  We decided on an established Yeshiva where a few other local families sent their kids.  They had rave reviews about the school and we liked what we saw.  Did I mention that we also saw a 40% reduction in our tuition bill?

So we informed the school that we were not returning, told our kids, took them to be fitted for new uniforms and finished off the school year.  We started at the new school in the fall.  The new school was overall excellent.   When people asked how we liked the new school  I always answered them, "we love the new school,but we do not love the distance."  It took our kids 1h 15m on a bus to reach their new school.  And their new school had a longer school day than their old school.  This was a big adjustment, not only for the kids, but for us as well.  Their old school was 6 minutes away.  

Fast forward.  We stayed at that school for two years and were extremely happy with the quality education our children received.  They had some amazing teachers and we were very happy.  However, the long days took a toll on the family. 

We always felt like we were rushing.  Gets up at 5:45am, dad leaves for work at 6:20am, get kids on bus at 6:45am, mom leaves at 7:30 for work.  Mom picks kids up at 5pm at the first bus stop and hopefully mom and kids get home around 5:30pm.  Cook dinner, do homework, check homework, everyone shower, pack your lunch, etc . . .  No time to spend with the kids, or to do activities (even though we tried to squeeze them in) and no time to relax.  We were stressed, the kids were stressed and it was just too much.  We began to ask ourselves, "why are we working so hard to afford tuition, when we never get to spend any real quality time with our kids?"

And so a new idea began to hatch.  Homeschooling.  What if I quit my job and homeschooled the kids instead?  And you can guess the ending.  At the end of the last school year, I quit my job (school nurse) and we decided to homeschool the kids.  So here we are.