Tripping and Stumbling into Nature Study
Many parents start off homeschooling unsure and scared of what they are about to begin. I, on the other hand, started off assuming homeschooling would be easy. After all, I used to be a teacher. One student versus twenty students seemed much easier, but pride goes before the fall. Real life taught me that homeschooling is harder than it looks. Trials change us and make us think deeply about matters we might otherwise have skipped over. By realizing that I didn’t know as much as I thought I did, I found myself sensing that what I was doing wasn’t a good fit for me, nor for my children. What was the problem? I didn’t know I needed to think about education differently. I was thinking more like a teacher and not like a homeschool mom.
The first time I realized this was when I had a hard time squeezing in science. I saved it for the end of the day after we had finished everything else. I tried doing science experiments with my five-year-old, but his two younger siblings knocked things over. They cried and interrupted the lessons. I felt like a failure. I couldn’t do science with my son, yet I had taught science lessons to twenty students. I hadn’t expected this problem. His brother and sister were in the way. I was not homeschooling the younger ones yet, or so I thought.
That’s when I came across my first taste of Charlotte Mason. I found a nature study that was based on picture books. Using picture books from the library to teach science was a new concept to me. I was used to a boxed science curriculum with texts that the publishing company had made. As a teacher, I had posters that outlined the scientific process. There were also all the tools for the experiments that needed to stay together. Even though there are so many different ideas about how to teach reading and math, the idea of there being another way to teach science had never occurred to me. Since I love reading to my children, I thought a nature study booklist seemed like a great fit. Thus, I began incorporating living books into our snack time with all three kids. That was how we did “science.” Everyone sat on a chair. Their hands were busy picking up food. Their mouths were chewing. It worked!
I was thrilled when I realized a Charlotte Mason approach to nature study can be easily implemented with young children. We learned through picture books. We took walks and noticed things outside that we were learning about. We explored in the garden. We did nature crafts. We read poems and sang songs about nature. My two oldest children drew pictures of what they learned each week. The best part was that it was enjoyable and not stressful. I also wasn’t saving it for the end of the day. Everyone had something to learn. Yes, and I mean the younger siblings – the three-year-old and one-year-old. They were no longer in the way. They were included. Never in my life had I heard of doing science this way. I stumbled and tripped into nature study, which was the best “mistake” I ever made.
Earlier I said that trials change us. Learning about nature study opened up a whole new world of homeschooling that I had never known before. I was shocked by how different a public-school philosophy was versus a homeschool philosophy, especially a Charlotte Mason point of view. Before this, I assumed there were differences between the two, but not a gaping chasm. It was as if a whole treasure trove had been given to me. There were books that I had never heard of as a teacher, and those unknown books soon became our favorites.
If doing a boxed science curriculum had worked out, then I would not have read as many wonderful books to my children. By sensing something wasn’t right with our homeschool days, I had to pause and figure out the problem. I had not discovered the richness of homeschooling. I was still in school-teacher mode. I needed to learn how to think like a homeschool mom.
What I have learned is that there’s a difference between a teacher and a homeschool mom. If I could go back in time, I wish I could have loved my students more. Now that I’m a mom, I know how strong that love is between a mother and child, and I know a teacher can never have that same love for my child. I love my children more than anyone, and I want to see them grow and learn more than anyone. That was enough to make me rethink what I was doing each day, reject a schoolteacher’s mindset, and learn to be a homeschool mom. In the end, I found that a Charlotte Mason education works for us – nature study, living books, conversations about books, and so much more.
I learned a lot in my first year of homeschooling. It was overwhelming at times. What will I learn in the next ten years or so? That’s exciting to think about because homeschoolers never stop learning, do we?
Carly McGinty 2023