#72: Homeschooling Eight Children While Working Full-Time Outside of the Home: How Did Melissa Do It?

Curious about how one mother manages a demanding career while homeschooling eight children, seven of whom are adopted? Join us this week on The  Homeschool How To as Melissa from Texas shares her incredible journey. Discover the emotional complexities of adoption, the unique challenges and rewards of managing a large, blended family, and the strategies she used to transition from school to full-time homeschooling while working as a railroad engineer.

Melissa highlights the importance of community and resourcefulness, revealing how she balances work and homeschooling through innovative solutions like sharing childcare responsibilities with other parents. We discuss the surprising benefits of homeschooling, including fostering an understanding of free market economies, property rights, and entrepreneurship, all while debunking the myth of extensive daily hours required for effective learning.

We also dive into the intricacies of choosing the right homeschooling curriculum, with insights on various educational programs and the importance of aligning curriculums with family dynamics and teaching styles. Hear about the transition from Easy Peasy's online curriculum to the Charlotte Mason-inspired A Gentle Feast, and why Melissa believes in the flexibility and dynamic nature of homeschooling. This episode is packed with encouragement and practical advice, making it a must-listen for any parent considering or currently navigating the homeschooling journey.

Easy Peasy Curriculum

A Gentle Feast

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:06

Welcome to this week's episode of the Homeschool How-To. I'm Cheryl and I invite you to join me on my quest to find out why are people homeschooling, how do you do it, how does it differ from region to region? And should I homeschool my kids? Stick with me as I interview homeschooling families across the country to unfold the answers to each of these questions week by week. Welcome With us. Today we have Melissa from Texas. Hi, melissa, hi, how are you? I am so good. I am excited that you're here today. You're going to talk to us about working outside the home and homeschooling. It's a question I get all the time. I didn't think that it was possible and you know I myself am leaving my career, but for more reasons than just to homeschool. You know, it's just more of like a overall. I just sat in a cubicle and wasted my days away, kind of thing. So I'm excited to hear about your journey. First off, how old are your kids? How many do you have?

Speaker 2: 1:09

So we have eight kids total. Our oldest is yeah, we have eight kids total, seven of them adopted, and so our oldest is our only biological child and she's 28. Then 22, 21. We have one about to turn 20 in a month, about to be 19, about to be 17. They're all like right there. So then my, my 18 year old about to be 19. And then my 17 year old, or my 16 year old about to be 17, and then 14 and 12.

Speaker 1: 1:41

Wow, so you got your hands full Um 14 and 12. Wow, so you got your hands full Um yeah, did you adapt them all, like as babies Did?

Speaker 2: 1:50

you have that many children under the age of eight? No, I had five that I had five, and four of them were four and under, and so they were yeah, um, they actually. So our oldest two boys are biological brothers and they were three and four when they came to us, and then my next set. So that's actually kind of an interesting story. But my next set of five are all biological siblings, but we adopted the first two when they were well. They came to us at 13 months and like 26 months. And then baby sister, who is now my 17 year old. Baby sister was born, but she stayed with mom, and so we adopted the oldest two we kept in contact, for baby was. She was about a year old and lost contact with mom. Mom went on to have two more children and we didn't see or hear from them for about eight years.

Speaker 2: 2:49

And then I got a call in Mother's Day of 2015. And it was mom and it wasn't uncommon. She would. She contacted me a lot on Mother's Day. Her and I would communicate and she would. I would always usually always get a message from her on Mother's Day, just thanking, just thanking me.

Speaker 2: 3:09

We have a good relationship, and Mother's Day came and she called me and I thought, oh, this is our annual or every couple of years, you know, kind of conversation. And that's when she informed me that the youngest three the baby that we knew and the other and two more were in foster care and they were in three separate placements and she wanted to know if I would be willing to take them. And I said yes, and that was that was a journey, because are my oldest, the older two, you know we had to have that conversation about well, they're coming but they're not staying, and things like that, and it brought up a lot of feelings that we had to work through with them. And then so we got three more kids and we were working towards reunification and then, at the end of 2015, mom just stopped showing up and so we moved towards adoption, so we finalized them in 2016. So all not quite 10 years apart. And then mom has another baby I believe she is about to be six now.

Speaker 1: 4:21

So yeah, she's still with mom.

Speaker 2: 4:23

She's still with mom.

Speaker 1: 4:27

Yep, yeah, that's an amazing story. I actually know someone that has like a kind of similar story and she's got eight kids, three of her own, five kept adopting from the same family. That mom was trying for a boy and just kept giving up the girls, so kind of an odd situation there. But wow, I really commend you for all that. That is, it's a lot to take on, not just the amount of children but the relationships and kind of bringing up, that post-traumatic stress as, especially as the younger siblings are coming into that and then what they've dealt with. Getting custody as a baby is one thing, but when you have one that has grown up in a dysfunctional kind of house and then they're coming into your house and you have biological children that are kind of like oh hey, you're shaking things up again, mom, I can't imagine.

Speaker 1: 5:15

It would have been interesting to have a little TV. You know, a video following you around. We could see some of these moments but what an amazing story. Now, what made you decide to homeschool? Because, as if your hands weren't full enough, you decided let's bring them all and educate them here.

Speaker 2: 5:31

So as a mom, I was never really a fan of public education, but I was also a working mom and I always wanted to homeschool. I didn't. As a working mom, I didn't know how I was going to do it. I'll just be honest. And my line of work? I worked for the railroad. I was an engineer. The railroad is a 24-7 business and it requires a lot of time. I mean, there were weeks that I would put in 60, 70 hours a week. It was not uncommon. So I didn't know how I was already having the struggle of how do I balance my home life with my job. So homeschooling was not something that I felt that I could do. I didn't know how to do it and so when we lived back in Arizona, our kids didn't go to public school, they went to charter schools, which they do have a bad name in very many places, but in Arizona, charter school better than the public schools. So that's where our kids went, to a traditional charter school. They, you know, of course they had to meet the Common Core standards, blah, blah, blah. They exceeded. We moved to Texas and we've been here for a couple of years. Texas schools are better. So we were in the public schools, but I just don't. I was just not one that I didn't like. Even the agenda when my oldest was a child there was just. I just felt that I just I didn't like what they were teaching, I didn't like the ideals and things like that, so I just wasn't a fan.

Speaker 2: 7:08

Covid hit in 2020. And my kids all came home and I'm still working and I realized that okay, not only can I do this, but I can do it better, because what we're doing here, what this is, this, is ridiculous. Like when I actually got to see what was happening with my own two eyes, I was just blown away. My kids came home for spring break, march, pretty much this week of 2020. By April, I looked at my husband and I said they're not going back and I said I want to homeschool. And it kind of gave me this like like there was a little bit of hesitation, you know like, but I didn't have to do any convincing. He just went okay, let's do it. And so by April, the decision had been made and we kind of we just let them finish out the year and I took that time to research and kind of land on how we wanted to do it.

Speaker 1: 8:15

And were they all in school or no? Your oldest is 28, my 21?

Speaker 2: 8:20

year old was a senior in high school, so I let. He obviously had to graduate, so I let him graduate. So at that time I would have had. So the year, the first year that we started homeschooling ourselves, I had a sophomore, I think, a seventh grader, a third grader and a fourth grader.

Speaker 1: 8:47

Okay, perfect, I think that's about right.

Speaker 2: 8:49

I think that's about right.

Speaker 1: 8:50

Yeah, I didn't want people to think oh well, her kids are all older, so of course she can work out of the home, because they all just do their own work on a computer or whatever. But no, when you have a third and fourth grader you got to be hands on and on top of what's going on and yeah, so how did that work in your household?

Speaker 1: 9:09

And I'm sure it didn't all lay into plan right away. Right, it probably took a learning curve on what how are we going to make this work, but that's kind of the beauty of homeschooling is yeah, you don't have to be doing it eight hours a day every day, you know, no, no, so, so, and that was one thing that I we finished out the year.

Speaker 2: 9:29

we took the summer. I put a lot of research into the method to use and and how, the direction that we wanted to go, and I landed on this beautiful curriculum that I thought this is it. We're gonna be so happy, and I purchased everything and I planned and I did this, and our first year was a disaster. It was an entire disaster.

Speaker 1: 9:53

Well, I think a lot of parents will be like, oh, all right, good, it's not just me, myself included.

Speaker 2: 9:59

Yes, yes, yes, because, yeah, I tell people all the time. So I'm four years into this and, yeah, my first year was an entire disaster. The curriculum that I landed on was just too intense. It was just too much. It was I needed, especially as a working mom, I needed something that was open and go. I needed, and that's what I thought I had landed on. However, that was not the case. So we started our curriculum, we started our, we were and that's what I thought I had landed on. However, that was not the case. So we started our curriculum, we started our. We're like everybody's happy and we're doing it and nobody was happy. They were absolutely miserable. I was absolutely miserable.

Speaker 2: 10:36

So one thing with the railroad is that I work shift work right, and at the time that we started, I worked 4A to 4P. So I'm getting up at probably 2.30 in the morning, I'm out the door by 3.30 and I'm at work by 4 am and then I come home at 4.30. I have to hurry up and get dinner on the table because I have to lay down. The beauty about shift work is that you're scheduled three to four days a week. However, my job demanded overtime. So, but getting back to the curriculum. You know I, on my days off, we would sit down to do this and I was absolutely tearing my hair out. My kids are looking at me and they're like, what did you do? Like, why are you doing this? Like, why are you torturing us like this? And so by Christmas, we were all just like, yeah, no, we're done, we're not doing this. So we closed it up. I boxed up that entire curriculum for four children.

Speaker 1: 11:42

You can tell us what it is. I'm not sponsored by anybody.

Speaker 2: 11:46

Okay, it was my father's world and it was just very, it was just too much, it was just too. It was not what it was not what I was looking for I was looking for. I really really believe immensely in Charlotte Mason and it was billed as a Charlotte Mason curriculum, but when you really start to learn what Charlotte Mason is, that's it. My father's world uses living books and beyond that, it's not Charlotte Mason at all other than just using living books. And so for the remainder of that first year, I put everybody on easy peasy. And so for the remainder of that first year, I put everybody on easy peasy, while I took time to really dig in and research and decide, OK, what am I looking for? And so they did their first.

Speaker 2: 12:36

Well, the second semester of their first year on easy peasy, they were happier. I was happier there was still, I still had some hands on things in there and I took the time to research it. So the second year was back to mom's teaching lessons and we're going back into it, and we did find a Charlotte Mason curriculum that we love and we, you know, sit down every morning and we have our lessons and we do all of these things. But we had to learn to navigate it around shift work. Sometimes the beauty of shift work is that you work weekends and nights and things like that, and then so that gives you days during the week that you're off.

Speaker 1: 13:24

Well, it doesn't give you much time to sleep, though.

Speaker 2: 13:28

No, it doesn't so, and I'm one of those people that I pretty much have always my entire life functioned on about four and a half hours of sleep. I'm exhausted all the time. But that second year I actually switched to a night shift, which actually worked out much better. It gave me more time with my kids and it allowed me to. So I would go to work at 8 pm. I was usually home by 830. And that's what time we start lessons.

Speaker 2: 13:59

So you know, when you work in, when you work an eight to five job, you don't come home and go to sleep. You come home and you unwind and things like that. And it's the same thing when you work an 8 to 5 job, you don't come home and go to sleep. You come home and you unwind and things like that. And it's the same thing. When you're on nights, you have to come home and unwind. So the kids were up by 7.30. They were dressed and ready to go. I'm home by 8.30. We sit down, we do lessons For what I need to do. I'm with them till about 12 or 1230. And then by that time I'm I'm done, I'm zoning out.

Speaker 1: 14:30

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Speaker 1: 15:36

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Speaker 1: 16:15

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Speaker 2: 16:52

And so I would go to sleep. I would sleep until about 435 o'clock, depending on, like, what was for supper, like if my older teenage kids could manage supper, then I could sleep a little bit longer. Otherwise I was up by about 4.30, 5 o'clock, starting supper, then hop in the shower and off to work. I would go.

Speaker 1: 17:13

Oh my goodness, I'm tired just listening to your schedule.

Speaker 2: 17:18

The good thing is that I'm not doing that anymore. I am at home now.

Speaker 1: 17:22

Oh nice.

Speaker 2: 17:24

I am at home full time.

Speaker 1: 17:26

So did you. Were you able to like retire?

Speaker 2: 17:29

Or so I. I left my company, and then I switched jobs, and then there was a job loss and at that time my granddaughter had just been born, in May of 22. And so May of 22, my granddaughter was born. I lost my job in August of 22. And in I firmly believe that God's hand was in all of this. In October of 22, she started having seizures and developed a pretty severe seizure disorder, and so I felt like, you know, I was already feeling called to be home and I felt like that was, that was the you know we need, we need to do this. So I've been home ever since.

Speaker 1: 18:18

All right, there's a lot to unpack there. So your schedule was a lot more than I think, like a lot of moms that are like, hey, I like for myself. Okay, I worked for the government. It was eight to four every day, but then you have like the hour to drop the kids off and get there an hour to commute home, so your schedule was a lot more rigorous. Now you could work nights, what your husband must've been kind of opposite, so that for or the younger ones old enough, or with the older kids that they could be home If your husband was at work without you there, without another adult.

Speaker 2: 18:53

So my husband and I worked together actually. So we were on the same shift. So if I was on nights, he was on nights, if I was on days, he was on days, and my husband and I actually worked together for about 15 years. Yeah, he was on date and my husband and I actually worked together for about 15 years. Um, yeah, and and we love, we loved it. We, we miss it. I mean, I'm glad to be home, but we miss it. But so the as far as leaving the kids home alone, obviously I had teenagers so, yes, that made a difference for me, where, with other moms that don't have that, I can see where the challenge would be um another.

Speaker 2: 19:30

Another thing that um I for my overnights. My mom lived with us. My mom moved in when my dad passed away. My mom moved in with us so I had another adult in the house when it came time for overnights, which is why I was able to make that change. I would not have been able to make that change had I not had my mom living with me. So I do see the challenge that other working moms would have.

Speaker 1: 19:58

Yeah, there's ways to be resourceful. Is there another? Another mom that also? Maybe she stays at home, but she's looking for extra money. Okay, well, since I'm working and I might have a little bit extra, could you take my kids a couple days a week while I work? Or even you know I'll take your kids on the weekends for a weekend day. If you can take my kid a day, you know something to swap out like that, or parents.

Speaker 2: 20:27

Absolutely. And the other thing that I would say to eight to five parents is that, especially in the younger early years of homeschooling, we're not sitting down for four or five hours with a first grade. We're're just not. It's not developmentally appropriate, it's just not. I mean a first grader, we're talking maybe, maybe even a super advanced first grader. I mean you're talking maybe 40 minutes a day. You spend that time with your child when you get home from work, regardless, because you're sitting at the table doing homework, you're sitting at the table doing their reading. So you're spending that time regardless. We have to get away from the public school construct in our mind. We just have to, because homeschooling is going to be difficult as long as we have that well, they go to school for six hours. It's not developmentally appropriate.

Speaker 2: 21:30

For I'm telling you, I have graduated a homeschooler. She started her sophomore year and she is now since graduated. I currently have, when you're a homeschooler, I mean you know this, you don't know their grades, but I have a ninth grader and a 10th grader right now and they don't. They barely school for six hours, barely Like. They're probably more about like four and a half five hours. If you did, if you take all the breaks that they take out. You know they're like four, four and a half hours.

Speaker 1: 22:00

Now are they on like book curriculums, or online, or a mix of both?

Speaker 2: 22:13

There. We don't. We don't do any online curriculum. We are all in the books. Most of it is Charlotte Mason led. We do. I do supplement some of the things that I don't think are rigorous enough with Charlotte Mason, such as like STEM work. So we do our. You know, we do have textbooks for our science and things like that. But yeah, if you, if you took away my kids' breaks when they go break, if you took that away from them, they would be like we're talking like four, four and a half hours series from start to finish, and that includes our morning time.

Speaker 1: 22:43

Yes, so when I had reached out and became in contact with you, that was in the tinfoil hat homeschooler Facebook group, right, yes, yes. So there was a woman that I interviewed the other day and I had you guys confused and I said to her something about like me being like in the tinfoil hat group and she looked at me like I was so crazy and I'm like, oh, I got the wrong lady. But you gotta figure, most homeschoolers have a little bit of questioning the authority, or else we wouldn't be homeschooling the kids.

Speaker 1: 23:20

But, she was like what I was? What I was like, yeah, no, they're my people. And that grew up with tinfoil at homeschoolers. Um, yeah, so that's hard too. So, especially with the career, like what I have found in, what do I want to teach my child is you know? Especially like in history and in science, it's like you're reading the thing and you're like, ah, that's not how it went down. How do you navigate that with your kids?

Speaker 2: 23:48

Okay. So this is one that we're we're learning to navigate together right now. We we recently took on the moon, landing and flutter. So obviously my kids are, like, you know, 50% public school, 50%, you know, homeschool right, and nevermind the fact that literally every science curriculum teaches that we landed on the moon and that the earth is a globe. So and I'll be honest with you, until recently I did not.

Speaker 2: 24:23

I thought that people that believed in flat earth I didn't even know that not landing on the moon was a thing. Okay, just like I mean, I've been awake to some things for a long time that was not one of them. Okay, I'm just gonna, that was not one. I thought that people that believed in flat earth, I thought they were like trolling, like I was like no, people don't really believe that, like they don't believe that. And so when I realized that, no, these people really believe this. So I have to like, take this dive because I need like, like why do they? I need to understand. I didn't take the dive because I wanted to know, because I, because I wanted to change my own mind, I took the dive. Okay, I'm just going to be honest with you. I took the dive because I needed to know what I was poking fun of. Okay, like I need to know, like if I'm going to make fun of these people, I need to understand what I'm making fun of. And so I took this dive and I wish everybody had that perspective.

Speaker 2: 25:31

No, I really did. I was just like, like my mind was when I realized that there were people that truly believe this. I had to know why. I just needed to know why. And so my husband tells a story. I got up and when I left for work the earth was round, and when I came back the earth was flat, we didn't land on the moon, and she was wearing this tinfoil hat. Like that's literally the story that he tells people.

Speaker 2: 26:00

So, with the kids, it's, I sat them down and I was like here, look at it yourself. Like you tell me, like you tell me what you think. Like they, they were on board before I was. I was absolutely like, okay, nasa, I'm with you. Like that didn't happen. Okay, I'm tracking it, I'm picking up what you're putting down. The earth was a little bit more and even still, to this day, I will tell you. I will say I don't know that we'll ever know the shape of the earth, but I will tell you that I don't believe that we rotate. I will tell you that, like that's so, that's where I'm at. But my kids, like they went down the rabbit hole. They did they. They came to their own conclusions, conclusions, and that's kind of how I approach everything. You know when we talk about kennedy assassination.

Speaker 1: 26:47

So this is what. This is what 9-11.

Speaker 2: 26:50

Exactly this is what we're taught. These are some alternate theories that are out there, and let them kind of decide. We belong to a co-op and so we go one day a week to co-op and one of our co-op classes I think it was last, I think it was last spring or maybe the spring before, I can't remember, but it is actually led. That class is actually led by one of our group members and it's called Decoding History and it's basically how she teaches it. Okay, this is what, and it's literally, it's a conspiracy theorist class.

Speaker 2: 27:30

So she touched on the Kennedy assassination. She touched on like all of these things. And then we got to go to the Kennedy museum, the book depository here at DFW. They have the museum and so we go as a field trip and my kids get up to the sixth floor and they're doing, you know, we're doing the whole tour and everything. And they're looking out the window and they can see the X's where the car was and I believe it was. My son looked at me and he goes this guy was a sniper. Why would he shoot him? Why wouldn't he shoot him head on? Why did he wait till he passed him and shot him in the back, like my son who at the time was like 12, you know, and I was like, okay, there you go. So we kind of just present, like this is what it is. These are the alternate theories.

Speaker 1: 28:24

I'm with you too. I don't know what shape the earth is, but I find it interesting that every time you turn on a movie, they have to have a big globe, and it's like why, why?

Speaker 2: 28:33

was that here?

Speaker 1: 28:35

Like you have to put it in the face and it's like everywhere and all the time, always in your face. It's like, yeah, now that I look at things that way, I'm like anything that's in your face so much like it's safe and effective and it's safe and effective, I have to question.

Speaker 2: 28:53

Yeah, so, and you know what was kind of one of the things that somebody said to me was water always finds its level, and I was like oh, you're right, it does. Water always does find its level. You know that was kind of that was kind of key for me because I was like, yeah, water doesn't bend it like finds its level.

Speaker 1: 29:13

you know, I'd like to hear like uh two people on the extremes like debate each other. Same thing with religion is have like an atheist. And I've looked for these videos and you know sometimes they get, but a lot, of, a lot of times they have weak arguments. But really like here, cause I, you know, that's just how you can kind of really like people that know what they're talking about, arguing with each other and see if their their opinions change in the meantime.

Speaker 1: 29:38

But it's interesting that you were talking about the curriculum, because I started releasing a bonus content for this podcast strictly on curriculums, because it is so hard to know what's out there. And it's just really funny that you talk about my father's world because I interviewed someone the other day that used that and absolutely loved it. So it's like, and that's why I started the series, because it's just the homeschool how to curriculum series, because, like, not everybody is going to like one curriculum, not every curriculum, you know, not the like, everybody talks about the good and the beautiful or you know that's not going to be. Just because 90% of the people might like, it doesn't mean that it's going to work for everybody. Or it might just mean that they have a really good marketing strategy behind their product and that's the most commonly used because of marketing.

Speaker 1: 30:32

So, yeah, I really wanted to get into what each one is about. So she broke down what my father's world is and then so, depending on you know your family type or whatnot, but I can see in what she was explaining it did sound intensive. So, having the eight kids all at different levels, it's not like you have like, well, I can teach these three the same stuff. You know we can cover it all with just them, like you're teaching all the different levels. So it really does matter on what your family dynamic is and how your kids learn and how you want to teach, because I know there's great online stuff out there for them.

Speaker 1: 31:10

But if you want to concentrate more on textbooks, that's going to be different curriculum. So yeah, I do have that as well. I'd love to invite you back on to really like delve into some of the curriculums that you've used and what you liked about it. But you had mentioned easy peasy. Now is that I'm not too familiar. I have heard of it. Is that an online thing or a textbook thing?

Speaker 2: 31:31

that you are just less involved with. So we used easy peasy online and it was. It is all online. It was actually super easy and it's free. Easy peasy is free After I had spent a really lot of money on my Father's World and we weren't using it. I needed something else. So Easy Peasy is free and it goes all the way up to high school. So that was really great. But also, with Easy Peasy, you can also print out the worksheets. I've heard that you can actually buy easy peasy workbooks on Amazon. So the to print online is free, the to use it online is free, and then you can buy the workbooks if you kind of want to go the workbook route.

Speaker 1: 32:12

What did you delve into for that next year, when you were like, okay, now I want it to be more hands on.

Speaker 2: 32:19

So I knew again, I knew that I wanted Charlotte Mason. And so I started putting a lot of research. And again, I'm a working mom, so I, I need it put together for me. Like I need my lesson plans done for me. Like I, I need as minimal planning as possible. Okay, I am not the homeschool. And I will just be perfectly honest with you even now, like I do spend more time now planning my school year than I ever have, but I, I have the time to do it now, but I'm not. I'm not that homeschool mom that's like you know puts everything. No, give me the lesson plan. I'm going to go through, I'm going to make some edits and we're printing that and that's, that's it. Because I don't, I'm, I'm, I, I am a very type, a personality, but I need it laid out for me because I'm too all over the place.

Speaker 2: 33:15

And so I spent a lot of time researching. I knew that I wanted Charlotte Mason. Um, I was in love with the Charlotte Mason philosophy. I really believe in it and I do, and I've gotten a little bit further away. I still believe in Charlotte Mason in theory, I still do all of that, but with the dives that we're taking with history. I've kind of gotten away from that, but we still use Charlotte Mason for literature. I still use the style of narration to test knowledge and to test comprehension. I ended up doing my research and I settled on A Gentle Feast and it is made by oh my gosh, her name escapes me right now. I'm so sorry, but A Gentle.

Speaker 1: 33:59

Feast oh, that's all right.

Speaker 2: 33:59

People can Google that. Yeah, I loved it. I'm so sorry but I loved it. I love everything that she put into it for states that have to have their scope and sequence and everything like that. She includes that. So everything it's right there. So if you have a high schooler and you need to know what the scope and sequence is and everything like that, it's right there.

Speaker 2: 34:20

People kind of have a hard time with high school assigning credits because of the way Charlotte Mason teaches things like history and can kind of break it down. I'm in Texas so I don't have to worry about that. So if we did year so with Charlotte Mason, it's you're in a history cycle kind of like my father's world, you're in a history cycle, a history cycle kind of like my father's world. You're in a history cycle. So our history cycle last year was basically, you know, 1776 to the Civil War was our history cycle last year. So we did that for an entire year. So for my high schoolers I would assign that's a credit. That's, you know, you got a half a credit at the beginning, you got a half a credit at the end. So but some people do struggle because Charlotte Mason, because the history tends to kind of be fragmented and so we, it was all right there. It was cohesive for me. I could look at it and I could go okay, I can see what we're doing, I can see this and it's all together for basically first grade through eighth grade, science is done family style.

Speaker 2: 35:26

That is included in Gentle Feast. We have always supplemented science so I wasn't concerned about that. But for those that do enjoy the family style science, it's already included. You just buy a book and there's a book that's your spine and you just do that. It includes your literature. It includes a separate purchase as your morning time but includes your literature.

Speaker 2: 35:52

The main bulk of the curriculum includes your literature, includes your history. There are plans for foreign language. It includes your family style science, foreign language there. It includes your family style science, geography. I mean, it's all. It's really just not everything. The curriculum itself is affordable. You get a members only facebook group and where you can kind of talk with other parents and you can do it the expensive way and buy all the books, or you can do it the inexpensive way and use the free audio books or the library books. And my kids have enjoyed it, I've enjoyed it, we love it, we love it and I I am having I do. That's why I'm like, okay, I'm gonna buy it so that we have the literature and we can do this, and then we're just gonna go off on our own little trip here, can do this, and then we're just going to go off on our own little strip here and do this history this way. But I really do. I love A Gentle Beast.

Speaker 1: 36:49

Yeah, that's the first time I had heard of that one. Now, have you seen any differences in your kids from like when you were working to being the kind of stay-at-home mom?

Speaker 2: 37:01

I think that my kids are number one. I think that they are better about doing their work because they know mom's checking. Now, when mom was a working mom checking the work was not always being done, because I was a crazy person and I was tired a lot.

Speaker 1: 37:20

Are you trying to pick a curriculum but feel a little overwhelmed at the variety of options? Me too. I mean, how do you pick a curriculum when you don't know what each one has to offer? That's been my biggest problem. Well, I am here to help. I just launched a premium content series, Psst. That means it's $3 a month, which will just help cover the cost of running the podcast.

Speaker 1: 37:40

In my curriculum series, I interview homeschooling students and parents and curriculum creators about specific curriculum each week so that you can take the guesswork out of your curriculum choices. I'll be asking questions like what does the day-to-day look like with this curriculum? What does it cover from a bird's eye view? How long does one lesson take to complete? How many lessons does the curriculum contain and what does it cost? Did you have to order the book or could you download them and print them somewhere like your library?

Speaker 1: 38:07

Does this curriculum have a lot of games, writing or crafts, and did your child enjoy this curriculum? Can you do it with more than one child at a time? And if I did this curriculum with my child, would I need to add any sort of supplements to it? These are all questions that I've had while I search for the perfect curriculum to suit my son's personality and my expectations. Let's face it there is no one curriculum out there that will work best for every child and adult, so I invite you to join me in my search to find out what every curriculum has to offer, so that you can feel confident in your curriculum choices and enjoy your homeschooling journey that much more. Right where you find all of the Homeschool how To podcast episodes, you'll see my curriculum series and you can subscribe today.

Speaker 2: 38:52

So I do think that work is being done more thoroughly, but I think that they enjoy it more because we're doing things together more. I mean, even with my high schooler, you know who. She's more than capable of working independently. We work together. She does a lot of her work on her own, and but part of the reason that I'm home schooling them and home with them is for togetherness, so I still try to spend as much time with them as I can still try to spend as much time with them as I can.

Speaker 1: 39:25

So what advice would you give the mom who is working, maybe even a single mom that wants to homeschool but just doesn't feel that it's within their grasp Because of you? Know, what would I do with my child? Would they fall behind? Do I have enough time to devote to the prepping and planning and checking the work?

Speaker 2: 39:40

I would say, yes, you can. I am a firm believer that anybody can homeschool, working, non-working. As a matter of fact, when my children were small I ran an in-home daycare and I actually had one of my daycare kids was a school-age homeschooled child and he would come to me and he now they were kind of a of course I don't know what they used in particular because I was not educated on homeschooling back then. I was like I was like in my 20s, but he would bring like workbooks and things like that just to keep himself occupied, because of course you know I'm he's not napping, right, while my daycare kids are napping. So he brought things to keep himself occupied and so he did our crafts with us and he did all of those things and he was like seven, eight-ish, I believe. So even back then there was moms that were, and she was a single mom and she just sent them to an in-home daycare. But I would just encourage them to number one get the public school idea that they have to be schooling for five and six hours or seven or eight hours a day. That has to go away. We cannot consider homeschooling, whether we're a working parent or a non-working parent, if we have that in our minds, parent.

Speaker 2: 41:04

If we have that in our minds, the next thing that I would say is plug yourself into a community and start talking to other homeschool moms who, like you said, may have the need to maybe earn a little bit of extra money so that they can take your child and you kind of work with each other. Homeschoolers are always willing to help other homeschoolers. That's one thing that I have learned being in this community. Homeschoolers are always willing to help other homeschoolers. That's one thing that I have learned being in this community. Homeschoolers are always willing to help other homeschoolers, so there's bound to be somebody. Talk to your parents, ask your parents to take your younger children. They don't necessarily have to do the schoolwork because again, we're talking like a first grader should really only have this short amount of time. Honestly, I mean I would personally would say no more than like 40 minutes. You know what I mean. So you're already spending that time with your child when you get off work at five. That can be done while you're cutting the vegetables for supper.

Speaker 2: 41:56

I'm just a firm believer that there's always a way. I really do. I really believe that there's always a way. And school do? I really believe that there's always a way and school doesn't have to be five days a week. That's the other thing. That's something else that's very mind-blowing when people leave the public school system is that school has to be five days a week. We school three days a week tops. I will tell you that right now, we school three days a week tops and we have one day of co-op.

Speaker 1: 42:22

I mean, so we're schooling four days a week, but Right, Because you can do all summer long or only take a week or two off in the summer. Because if it is only a couple hours a day, a couple times a week, sometimes taking the summer off gets them out of their groove and then it's harder to get back in. So it's actually easier just to keep with it all year long and you don't need the week off for all the breaks that they have either if you don't want them to be so. That just spreads it out so much more.

Speaker 2: 42:55

And that was another thing. So when I first started homeschooling, I wanted a September to June traditional schedule and we did that like the first year, I think and my kids didn't like the long summer. They did not like they wanted to start in August, which I was like I'm going to start in August and I'll tell you I still don't appreciate starting in August, but we do school year round now, just for the simple fact that life happens and that's kind of the beauty of being able to be a homeschooler, right is that life happens and we can pivot and we can. Just as an example, I had some health issues beginning of this year and I think we were in school maybe four weeks and I had to have surgery and I had to be laid up for six weeks. That didn't mean that I couldn't come to the table and do and homeschool that, but I I did have to take some time off. Well, four weeks after that, november 1st, my granddaughter had brain surgery and on November 1st our homeschool just pretty much stopped. That that was just. That was. This is our, we're taking this time, this is our holiday time. So we typically Thanksgiving kicks off our holiday and we don't go back until that first Monday in January. That's our normal holiday break, because I don't want to do the short craziness between Thanksgiving and Christmas and there's too much going on and you know what.

Speaker 2: 44:24

The other thing here's another secret with homeschooling You're always they're always learning. When they're baking Christmas cookies, they are doing math, because nobody makes one batch of cookies. Okay, they're adding fractions, but those are just things that non-homeschoolers don't. You don't think about that until you're immersed in the lifestyle, because it was not something that when I first came, when we first came out of public school into homeschooling, I thought we have to do Monday through Friday, we have to have these books open, we have to do. And then it wasn't until about year three for me that I was like I like finally, like kind of let that guard down and was like oh oh, we're learning if we're making cookies. So I normally we don't, we don't school in the month of in between Christmas and New Year, we don't, we don't do any school.

Speaker 2: 45:16

Well, this year we had to stop early because of my granddaughter's brain surgery. So we stopped November 1st and we didn't go back until the first Monday in January. November 1st and we didn't go back until the first Monday in January and we're going to end where our summer was already planned to end. What we finish, we finish. What we don't finish, we'll pick up at the beginning of August when we start up again. I used to think we had to finish all 36 weeks in those books. You know, and we'll finish it, but I'm not going to worry about finishing it by the end of this school year. Yeah, and you know what, we'll finish it, but I'm not going to worry about finishing it by the end of this school year.

Speaker 1: 45:47

Yeah, and you know, what I enjoy too is I can never get my kids to bed like at a decent hour. Um, not because of them, really, it's just I. It just isn't conducive to our family. My husband gets home a little bit later from work, depending on what time the job he's working on gets done. So sometimes it's six, sometimes it's 7.30. So we're not typically eating until maybe eight o'clock at night and they're getting to bed around 10 o'clock, but then they get to sleep in a little later in the morning.

Speaker 1: 46:18

But it's so nice to just not have that stress, because I did used to be a working mom sending my kid off to daycare and it was like that.

Speaker 1: 46:29

Every moment of the day felt like this rush, rush, rush, rush, rush, rush, rush. I got a rush to pick them up from daycare because I haven't seen them all day. I got a rush to get dinner on the table because we have to get a bath in and we have to get the meals prepped for tomorrow. And we got a rush to get him to sleep because he needs to get a certain amount of hours before. I have to rush to get him up in the morning, to get him off to daycare so I can get to work. And it's like when you take that I must say it's to myself five days a week at least, when we're eating dinner at eight, eight, 30 at night. Oh, this is so nice that we don't have to be up tomorrow morning and I know that if you're the working mom, you know it's not always going to be like that, but I know some working moms at homeschool.

Speaker 1: 47:08

Sometimes they can afford to work from home, so it's like it actually is better for them if the kids sleep in a little later in the morning. I, for instance, I'm taking my friend who works, I'm taking her homeschooled son to the play group that I'm bringing my son to on Tuesday. But in turn when they do a wilderness group on Fridays that starts in a couple of weeks, she's going to take both kids. For me, take my kid and hers to that group, so I don't have to leave the house and she's going to do her work from her computer. You know, at a nearby Panera or Starbucks, you know. So it's like it is this give and take. Her son can come over here and play anytime, which is nice for me, because my son I always at five, six years old. You know I just put a post up about this the other day that I'm never going to give up an opportunity for play to put in box curriculum. I will always welcome the opportunity for play over a box curriculum time.

Speaker 1: 48:07

That's just way more important Within the homeschool communities that you find often if a homeschooler is maybe of their 11th, 12th grade year again you said it's not six hours a day that they're doing schoolwork. So if they can get their schoolwork done either early in the morning or in the evening, you could even pay them or have them do an internship coming to your house and watching your child while you are at work or working from home you know, whether it's every day or certain days, or or maybe they're taking a gap year where they've graduated and, you know, before they go on for their next thing.

Speaker 1: 48:43

I heard that that is a big thing in the homeschool community taking that year off to just kind of figure things out. Maybe they could watch your child or your children for you. So there are lots of things that would not be afraid of being a working mom as thinking that you can't homeschool, because there are different things popping up all over my area and I'm in upstate New York so I know it's got to be everywhere farms that are saying like, hey, we want to bring kids in here and have kids come and help on the farm and that's their school work. You know, that is their schooling, but they're also helping a person that maybe needs help milking the cows, feeding the chickens, cleaning up after the animals, and so I would look into things like that as well.

Speaker 2: 49:28

Oh, absolutely. And my soon to be 20 year old when she graduated her senior year and you were saying that you know we're not schooling for five or six hours a day, so she actually worked her senior year and she would take her. She worked in a tea shop so she would take her books to work with her and she would do her book work and stuff like that. But she did a lot of babysitting for people that were. You know there was a gym owner who offered childcare.

Speaker 2: 49:58

Homeschoolers are available to do those kind of things and especially, most homeschooling families are large families. So the older kids absolutely know how to change diapers and do all of those things and they know how to make those five-year-olds listen, because they're probably the oldest of however many, and they've been helping mom homeschool the little ones as well since they were, so they know how. So it doesn't even necessarily have to be a situation where you're coming home from work and then you have to do school. There's a lot of those teenagers in those communities that know how to lead school as well.

Speaker 1: 50:41

absolutely, absolutely melissa, this has been a wonderful chat. Is there anything else that you wanted to make sure that you touched on before we close up for the hour? I think just.

Speaker 2: 50:52

I think for a working parent, especially somebody that works outside of the home, first of all, the first year is going to be a disaster. I'm just first year is always going to be a disaster. Don't don't lose heart, because it's hard. I am four years in. I still have hard days. They still have hard days. Sometimes it's their tears, but sometimes it's my tears because I'm just like don't lose heart, but it's absolutely possible to do. Don't think that you can't do it. But probably my biggest piece of advice for somebody who works outside of the home is to find something that is open and go. Decide what your philosophy is, decide which direction you want to go, and find something that is truly, truly open and go.

Speaker 2: 51:42

Everybody's still going to have to do a certain amount of planning. That's just. We can get the most boxed curriculum there is, and there's still going to be a certain aspect of planning to it. Don't become overwhelmed by it. Plan in chunks if you have to. Okay, I'm going to sit down this Sunday and I'm going to plan two weeks out. You know it doesn't have to be. You don't have to be the super duper homeschool mom with the cake that plans an entire 36-week year. I don't plan an entire 36-week year. I plan six weeks at a time. So don't become overwhelmed with the planning and just plug into other homeschool moms that can help you. That's probably the biggest. The biggest thing is to find other homeschool moms that can help lead you.

Speaker 1: 52:32

Yeah, and there are more than we think, because I didn't think there were any. And in just the you know year or two with having a tiny kids, it's like they came out of the woodwork. They've all just been like hiding under.

Speaker 1: 52:45

you know, you don't know that they're all there because they're not in the public school setting or the daycare setting generally. But once you're like, oh you homeschool, oh your brother homeschools, oh your cousin homeschool. And now you know we have, without even trying, there's definitely a large group of five, six year old boys that I could make a play date every day of the week If I wanted to. It has come to a point where it's like, okay, can we have a day where we just sit at home? And that's without even the co-op. I backed out of the co-op that I was supposed to do this spring because he wants to do a wilderness class once a week and on top of the mountain biking class in the evenings and soccer, and so it's like there's just so much. Socialization is not an issue.

Speaker 2: 53:33

No, my kids are more socialized now than they have been whenever they were in public school and because and I'm literally like, okay, like we go to co-op First of all I am like a zombie when we get back, Literally I have to take like a good hour and a half and like completely unwind before I even remotely try to think about humaning with anybody else. We have church, we have the extracurriculars, we have all of those things, and those are things that my kids didn't get to do prior to homeschool. I mean we went to church, but I mean Wednesday, you want, you want to go to Wednesday night youth group. What I have to get up in the morning? Absolutely not. And so, yeah, no, socialization is absolutely. That is probably the biggest homeschool myth.

Speaker 1: 54:22

Yes, thank you so much for for chatting with us today. This has been really insightful. I hope it helps out a lot of parents who are contemplating homeschooling and not sure if it can work. Maybe give them a little bit of encouragement there, or a lot. Thank you so much.

Speaker 2: 54:37

I hope so. Thank you.

Speaker 1: 54:41

Thank you for tuning into this week's episode of the homeschool how to. If you've enjoyed what you heard and you'd like to contribute to the show, please consider leaving a small tip using the link in my show's description. Or, if you'd rather, please use the link in the description to share this podcast with a friend or on your favorite homeschool group Facebook page. Any effort to help us keep the podcast going is greatly appreciated. Thank you for tuning in and for your love of the next generation.