Sleep, or lack thereof

I am a nurse. I work at night. Which means, I (at least sometimes) must sleep during the day.

I am also a mother and wife, which means that I need to be functional during “normal” daytime hours at least part of the week. Herein lies the problem.

If I’m going to be off for more than two consecutive days, I make a concerted effort to “flip” my sleep back to normal night-sleeping hours. That’s the easy part.

The hard part is flipping back to sleeping days. I tried to pull an all-nighter last night, so I could sleep during the day today in preparation for work tonight. My willpower gave out around midnight last night, and I found myself fast asleep. Whoops.

Fast-forward to now: I’m lying in bed, covers askew, pillows everywhere – a sure sign that I’ve been tossing and turning for hours in an attempt to get some more sleep.

It doesn’t seem to be working. If I can’t get more sleep now, that means by the time I get home tomorrow morning, I will have been up for 26 hours. Ugh.

I guess I’ll try some more ….

Pin of the day – Organize small things (great for teachers and homeschoolers!)

Down the Learning Road had a great idea for homeschool organization (or even just organization of small things in general – toys, teaching supplies, etc.): get a hardware organizer from Home Depot (about $20) and add decorative labels. Voila!

Homeschooling Myth #4 – I don’t have the time to homeschool my kids

This myth is based in the notion that kids inherently “need” to be in school 7 hours (or more) per day, five days per week, just like in a “traditional” classroom. I’ll get back to that “need” later in this post.

The first place to start is your state laws – many states require “180 days” of instruction per calendar year, but most do not specify how many hours per day. Make a quick visit to HSLDA.org, where you can look up your state’s homeschooling laws.

Outside of making sure state requirements are fulfilled, how much time you spend is totally up to you and the needs of your children. A quick perusal of popular homeschooling forums finds that most homeschooling families “have school” 4-5 hours, 4-5 days per week. Some much more, some much less.

One thing to think about – what qualifies as “school time?” Again, check your state laws to make sure, but think outside the ‘sitting in their seats, filling out workbooks’ box. A trip to the park where the kids are actively observing nature (and maybe writing in a journal about it)? Sounds like school to me. Listening to a history CD in the car on the way to ballet lessons? Count it! Reading books at the library, attending a local play, comparing unit prices at the supermarket – the educational opportunities out there are as big as your imagination. And I say, if they’re learning, that’s “school time.” It’s easy to see how you can squeeze learning in, even with a busy schedule.

The type of curriculum you use will also be a determining factor in how much time you need to spend on homeschooling – online or CD/DVD-ROM based teaching requires a lot less parent instruction time. This might be a good option for families where one parent has to work from home, whose kids are fairly independent learners.

Keep in mind that one of the biggest perks of homeschooling is flexibility. Who’s to say that you can’t teach your kids at 7 p.m. for a couple or a few hours, or on Saturday? If you have to work, you can tweak the kids’ schedules around your own.

There’s a saying that goes something like, “you find time for what is of value to you.” If you really want to make homeschooling work for your family, you can do it!

Now back to the perceived “need” to spend 7-8 hours on schooling, 5 days per week. Two things to consider:

1. As I’ve quoted before on my blog, homeschoolers’ test scores far exceed average scores in public schools. If the average homeschooling family spends 4-ish hours, 4 days per week on homeschooling, it must be working just fine for them.
2. You can find data from both ends of the spectrum if you look at the worldwide figures on how many hours per day kids spend in school. Kids from some Asian countries spend many days and hours in schools and are high performers, but then some other high-performing countries, such as Finland, spend much less time per school year on direct instruction.

So I think it’s pretty easy to make the case that our 7-8 hour school-day/five day school-week isn’t necessarily the gold standard for successfully educating a child. I think once you get started, you can get a feel for what your children’s needs are, and how much time you will need to spend with them to make sure they’re getting a solid education.

Pin of the day: Homeschool artwork organizing

While browsing around online today, I came across this neat organizing idea: IKEA’s Dignitet “curtain wire” for hanging artwork. Think of how many thumbtack holes in the wall this will prevent!

Homeschooling Myth #3 – I can’t afford to homeschool

There are (at least) two reasons a person might believe that they can’t afford to homeschool – the cost of materials and the necessity of having two incomes.

First, let me address the latter reason.

My husband and I both work. He works “regular” business weekday hours at an office. I am a nurse, and I work nights. One of us is pretty much always available to be at home (or on the go) with the kids. Shift work is not just for nurses, either – there are many other jobs with second- and third-shift schedules, from retail to factories to lots of other, non-medical healthcare positions. There are many online jobs available these days, as well. If you’re creatively inclined, you could always open an etsy shop to showcase your wares. And there’s always domestic jobs like babysitting, house cleaning, being someone’s personal shopper, etc.

So, if you MUST work, there are options for continuing to work while homeschooling. Remember that one of the perks of homeschooling is that you can flex the schedule to meet your family’s needs. If your work schedule dictates that you need to teach your kids in the afternoons or evenings – as long as the kids aren’t tired, who says you can’t?

You might want to re-think your “need” to work as well. What can you live without? Cable? A land line? A second car? Fast food? Even for the things that you can’t cut out completely, you can usually negotiate a better deal. Like car insurance, for example. Shop around, find better rates, and then try going back to your insurer and asking them to drop your insurance rates if they want to retain your business. Maybe you won’t cut out the need to work completely, but if you try hard enough, I bet there’s a chance you could at least cut down to part-time.

Can you save on grocery costs through sales, budget-friendly meal planning and coupons? What about buying necessities in bulk? What about switching to store-brand food? And how about no-frills, bargain grocery stores like Aldi?

You can enlist your kids in your penny-pinching ways, too. Not only does it teach them to be a good steward of their money, you can turn it into a school lesson. I am planning to take Gabriel to the grocery store with me soon and let him figure out and compare unit prices for a variety of items.

Homeschooling itself can be a money-saver. There’s no need for expensive school wardrobes, endless school equipment and supplies fees, school lunch costs, daycare costs, etc.

As for the cost of curriculum and school supplies, if you don’t mind investing some time and elbow grease, you can homeschool for nearly free. I could write all about it, but there’s already some good articles and links to resources out there:

Truly Free K-12 Homeschooling

Easy Peasy – All in One Homeschool

Ambleside Online – Free Charlotte Mason Homeschooling

I understand that many families need two incomes – ours does. But if you can be creative and flexible, you can still homeschool your kids. It’s a sacrifice, but it’s worth it. Pray and ask God to give your family wisdom, direction and provision in this area and He will not disappoint.

Finally, when considering whether you can afford to homeschool, you have to ask yourself one question: what do you want to invest in?

Dream swing

I’ve seen this picture floating about for awhile now … it’s a trampoline that’s been upcycled into a swing/bed. Can you imagine? Oh, I think I’d never get off of it.

Tonight was so pleasant … it was still nice and warm after sunset, and Gabriel was in the hammock and Mikaela was in the porch swing with me. They were both drifting off to sleep, so I had to tell them to go inside and go to bed (it was bedtime). It felt heavenly outside, and I wish we could have just stayed outside.

We have a covered patio, and I’ve been looking into ways to put up some cheap bug screens/mosquito netting around it. Once I do, I would love to have some sort of a swing bed and/or multiple hammocks. I know we’d sleep out there frequently. I love mild central Texas evenings!

Pin of the Day: Playing with your food

There’s a plethora of ideas out there – especially online – for making kids’ meals into something more than just plain old food. This website has some unique ideas that I haven’t seen before – I especially like the meatball birds in the nest of spaghetti. Too cute! I will have to try some of these for my own kids.