Easy Button for Homeschoolers

"Nothing worth doing is easy."

I'm working on a sekrit project, which I'll eventually (in 2010) reveal, but as I was taking the first steps towards completion of it, I had to remind myself frequently of the above statement. Nothing worth doing is easy. Nothing worth doing is easy.

It's applicable to homeschooling, as well. Let's assume that if a person decides to homeschool their children, they also feel it is worth doing. Let's further assume that they feel it's worth doing well.

That's not going to be easy.

What's difficult about it will vary for different people. For some, it's giving up a large amount of their "me time." For others, it will be focusing on multiple subjects at multiple levels for multiple children - every day. The guarantee, however, is this: it won't be easy.

Some homeschoolers, though, seem to think that Staples sells a Homeschoolers Version of their Easy Button. Don't get me wrong; there may be days, subjects, weeks, whole months that will seem easy. The journey is long, however; it will not always be smooth sailing. So many of the posts that can be found on message boards and mailing lists, however, are essentially a well-cloaked version of "I need the Easy Button for this!"

There's nothing wrong with lamenting the lack of Easy Button, but trouble can start if someone attempts to fashion one. Putting a high school age student and a third grader together for history? There's at least one person who will tell you that sure, that can work! Teach the same exact science material to all four of your children (and, no, none of them are the product of multiple births)? I guarantee a respondent will tell you that they've done just that. In most cases, though, you're sacrificing a component of at least one child's education.

Similarly, the time advantage of homeschooling will begin to wane at some point. This will be either because your child doesn't have homework, or because your child is doing more than he or she would in a traditional school - a second foreign language, religious studies, extra science, two math programs, or in-depth arts study, perhaps. Yes, that makes it harder. More of your time has to be devoted to supervising, guiding, and teaching, even if the actual face-to-face teaching time has decreased.

We wish it were easy. I certainly do. It would be nice to press the Easy Button for some aspect of homeschooling - just one! But I can't.

No, it's not easy.

But nothing worth doing is.