Exam Week

Mid-week of exams, I question everything and all my life decisions, and feel certain we are all failing at homeschool.

We soldier on through the exams, and somewhere by the end of the week, or over the weekend after, I let go of what I wished their exams looked like, and I let go of feeling bad for the courses that exams reminded me about that I either dropped on purpose, or by accident somewhere in the term.
I remind myself that EVEN the exam doesn’t reflect what my kids have learned. It is more of a check on my teaching than anything else.

During the break week following exams, I pray. I make some new decisions about how to move forward, either to hopefully improve the classes or to drop some or to rearrange the schedule, etc. I go back and look at afternoon occupations and see if I can incorporate them in class time. I ask myself, am I starting every lesson with some version of the question “what did we learn last time?” I think about my children’s strengths and ask myself if I am allowing them to use their strengths to learn. I consider how I can improve the quality of the discussion we have after narration each class time. I consider if I need to us materials from a lower grade level to help my child access the ideas more readily.

And then I move forward, because what else can I do? I profoundly believe that the principles behind a Charlotte Mason education are true. I know that raising children who can recite timeline facts or memorized paragraphs about history/literature is not my goal. I remind myself that my child will not retain everything from their lessons that I have retained because I have the advantage of age and many relationships already formed. I remind myself I am raising a person, not an encyclopedia. I pray for grace and help, and move forward with faith.

❤️