Where did the summer go? What happened to my dreams of lazy days
of reading junk fiction on the beach, whilst sipping ice tea? They
were swallowed up, that’s what, in camp, travel, a wedding, and
looking over a prospective horse.
Where did the summer go? What happened to my dreams of lazy days of reading junk fiction on the beach, whilst sipping ice tea? They were swallowed up, that’s what, in camp, travel, a wedding, and looking over a prospective horse.
So here it is, Sept. 8. Math class and rhetoric class start today, and I am not quite ready, psychologically.
I am ready physically. The house is clean, my lessons are planned, my supplies are at hand. Anne is ready: she has her notebooks and binders and textbooks and pencils. She has her list of 87 books she read over the summer to hand in to her English teacher for the promised extra credit. Anne had time to read junk fiction this summer.
She has even completed her first chapter of biology: read it, done the first experiment, written up the lab report, and answered the questions. She had to, because alone of all her classes, biology started on Aug. 30, while we were driving from Arkansas to Seattle. So Anne had to make up for lost time when she got home.
I cannot remember ever feeling unready when the kids were smaller. Then, most of their subjects were handled at home, or in co-ops, or on field trips. Now, with two away at university and 14-year-old Anne taking trig, biology, British literature, grammar, environmental science, Spanish, American history and civics, and broadsword, things are a little less flexible.
I would feel overwhelmed, except that I am not doing it all myself. Homeschooling changes as the kids mature. Many, if not all, homeschoolers, begin to find experts to teach their kids at least some subjects.
Anne’s biology teacher has a science degree from Cal Poly, and is teaching, at last count, 15 kids.
Anne’s English and grammar teacher has a bachelor’s in English and a master’s in linguistics. Anne’s class of 18 students will spend three months on eight Shakespeare plays, and then proceed to 19th century authors: Austen, Dickens, Bronte, Eliot, Collins, and MacDonald.
Her environmental science class is her old nature study class, which I think she is too old for, but she loves it and insists on continuing. During September, I will teach moths and butterflies, but for the rest of the year, the other mothers are going to focus on biomes, which will give us a fresh approach to the subject.
I teach her trig class to her and two classmates. I also teach Algebra I (5 students), Algebra II (5 students), and calculus (1 student.) She takes broadsword in a class, much as some kids take karate or ballet.
So she and I are only homeschooling two subjects in the good old way, sitting together on the couch: Spanish and American history, with a long interlude when we reach 1789 to study the Constitution.
The biggest change is that now both her brothers have gone off to university. Anne is virtually an only child. She has moved into Oliver’s old room, since it is almost twice as big as her old one. The house is quieter; Oliver used to play music a lot, and Anne has not yet begun demonstrating that hallmark of adolescence.
Anne does not miss Oliver; she says he was never around anyway, which is partially true. His last year and a half at home, he circulated around town with a huge and shifting group of friends. They would go wake-boarding together, or swim, or suddenly and gloriously descend on our house, to fill up every crevice with hulking teenage bodies, and eat everything in sight, then disappear again.
I miss him, and his friends. His brief, ecstatic e-mails leave no doubt; he is having a great time in college. He and some upperclassmen just painted an awesome mural. He’ll send pictures soon.
Nick’s e-mails are more traditional: the Air Force ROTC program hasn’t paid him for his summer field training yet, and of course, his stipend has not yet begun. Rent is due; he needs to buy books; could we send money?
I am treasuring these last few years with Anne.
