So happy we did Public School

(Heads up: this post has the word “school” in it many times I couldn’t figure out how to change that at this time so I apologize.) If you are a friend of mine, you might just want to skip this post, you likely heard me talk about this already and you could find something way more important to do anyways! (I hope someone laughed at that, my jokes are funny, my husband doesn’t think they are but I do!)

I am SO happy I put my kids in public school! Now that sounds confusing, me being a homeschool mom and all, hear me out!

Kindergarten

My first child went to public school kindergarten. We were blessed to have the best teacher in the world. If my kids could have her as a teacher K-12, we would likely do public school forever but clearly that’s not how school goes. My son was happy to attend kindergarten and I feel we were very blessed with a wonderful experience.

1st grade & school shut down

When first grade started my son moved to a charter school, he did well and was ok with going, but he didn’t love school. School shut downs in 2020 caused us and many other parents to try to figure out online school. Like many families , we struggled with the 7 hours of online school with his class, what 6 year old wants to sit at a computer for that long? By the end of the year, most students and parents had dropped out of even trying.

2nd grade homeschooling

When 2nd grade started, we were not doing the mask thing for 7 hours a day. This time is was my choice to homeschool my son, not just because of a world shutdown. Homeschool was sometimes a fight and I questioned if I was doing things right. I tried to recreate public school at home, getting through the busywork and following a strict schedule. Overall we did ok, but I worried about grade level, and it was not very “fun” to learn. I wondered regularly if my kids really should be put into the system.

Homeschool questioning

3rd grade rolled up and a few months in, the mask mandate was removed from the public school near our home. I was questioning my homeschool parenting skills daily. I now had a kindergartener and a 3rd grader.
Were my kids missing out on tons of school fun?
What about the crafts and the class parties?
Maybe they needed more structure and better lessons?
Were they “falling behind”?
How could they be at the top of the class, achieve high honor roll and become sterling scholars if they were homeschooled? I questioned constantly and my lack of confidence in homeschool reflected in lessons with my children.

I had to be failing

October rolled around and my questioning for homeschool turned to an obsession. I would see the other children walking to school with their cute little backpacks and think of all the experiences my children were missing out on. More often my kids were saying they wanted to go to public school. When we walked past the school, my kids would look longingly, wishing they were there. I had seen positive results of many homeschool families, I felt like motherhood and homeschool went hand in hand. I had read many books on the power of homeschool, but I was just not feelin it! I believed God wanted homeschooling for many families, but I still questioned if it was working for us.

A prayer

So, I prayed. I prayed deeply, worked on journaling and having many conversations with God. I asked him to help me see that homeschool was exactly what my kids needed! I figured my answer from God would be a strong definite answer that we indeed needed to homeschool and it was time to accept that, but, it wasn’t. I felt like God was telling me that we needed to public school! I prayed the most heartfelt prayer and asked God “Should I put my kids in public school?”
I was filled with beautiful peace and when I thought of moving forward to mainstream public school, I knew it was what we needed to do.

Public school!

We did it! I enrolled my kids in public school, middle of October. I felt at peace during all of the paperwork and even dropping them off in class. As I walked away from the school, I didn’t understand but I knew that my children were in the right place. Many miracles surrounded this event that continued to confirm that this was the right choice for my family. It didn’t make sense because I wanted to have that deep desire to homeschool. I figured homeschool was just not for us, I accepted it was ok, because I was at peace with the decision.

The slow changes…

The first few weeks of public school were alright, I know the teachers and school staff were trying their best. I was happy to know my children both tested above the standard grade level, I must have done a little right at homeschooling I guess. It was nothing grand having them in public school but I felt good with where they were. There was some good and some bad. They were on screens with many of the lessons during the day so there was a big desire to get onto the tablet or watch TV as soon as they got home (screen addiction). School lunches and class treats were far from what I wanted my children to be eating so I sent lunch, snacks and treats as replacements, but this was to be expected at a public school as most American lunches are highly processed.

As the weeks went on, I noticed changes in my children. My kids were were stressed, mornings had no time to waste as we rushed off to school. Evenings were busy as we prepared for the next school day. I noticed my kids were learning many things from other students that I felt were not appropriate for children to know. I saw a drastic decline in my kids ability and desire to do math and writing, to the point that my older child would cry and say he hated math.

My older son started to wear a big coat daily, even on hot days so he could hide his head inside the coat during lunch and class. This was a sign he was uncomfortable with who he was and how he felt at school. At home both of my children had distanced themselves from our mother-child usually very close relationship, along with less talking and opening up about how they felt. I saw my children loosing their desire to learn and their creativity abilities seemed to be partly shut off. They wanted to come home as fast as they could, chill and beg for screens. My boys had always been best of friend brothers, nearly never fighting. When they started public school they were fighting nearly daily, or simply uninterested in each other. It was a lot of very quick shifts in a very short timeframe, but I knew that this is what God had directed me to do as a mother.

A short time at home

Christmas break rolled around and I was excited to have my children home with me again. The first few days were stressful and grumpy. We were trying figure out how to spent the full day together for more then the weekend. By the end of the second week my boys started getting along again, they were showing more creativity and wanted to learn. There was a peace about them that I had forgotten they had before our public school adventure.

More questions

The day after New Years was time for my kids to return to school. My older son came home after the first day back stressed, overwhelmed and the peace I had seen him experience was no longer there. My younger child came home and told me about a student who was saying inappropriate comments to him, things that kids should not know. I prayed what I should do about this, and I felt like God had placed both options in front of me. I had now seen the results of my children in homeschool and the results of my children in public school. God was going to let us choose what direction we would go. I told my kids they could homeschool again if they wanted or they could continue public school, but they needed to stick to the choice they made. I gave them three days, asked them to pray about it and figure out what they really wanted.

Time to decide

When the third day came along I sent my kids off to school and told them that this was either just another day at school or the last day in public school. When I came to pick them up at the end of the day I asked my kindergartner what he wanted to do, he skipped away ready to be home and not turn back. I asked my 3rd grader what he wanted to do, he leaned against the wall, head down and says to me “I feel like I don’t belong here”. We left public school confident and ready to homeschool again. This time we did not question, we did not look back and we knew it was right.

Seeing both sides

Had I not put my kids in public school, I likely would have continued to question and wonder if homeschool was right for our family. I would have bounced back and forth to wishing I had and glad I didn’t but never finding solid ground on what we should do. I really would like to have that deep trust in God that when I feel like something is absolutely right, to know for it for a fact and not second guess myself or God.
I was not at that point when I questioned homeschool, and I am thankful God could see that. I didn’t want to look back and think “what if” or “should I have”. It made no sense when I felt like God was telling me to put them in public school. I figured God should just tell me exactly what I should do, but he knew I wouldn’t be ready for that. I was able to see both sides of things in a true light and make a choice between two options.

Self reflection

I was a mainstream child, the typical placed in public school kid. Some kids hate school some kids love it. I was the kid that loved school. I loved the busywork, the crafts, the classroom setting, listening to a teacher- it was so fun to go to school. (I hated to social part, but that is another story.) When it came to school, I strongly enjoyed it, it was not until I had experienced putting my kids in school that I saw I was trying to recreate school for my kids the same way I had when I was a child. But school is not the same as it was back in the 90s. Kids are on screens for hours at a time, the food is highly processed(even toxic), students are exposed to more negativity/darkness because of social media, the rates of depression and anxiety are higher than ever before. School from when I was a kid is a different world from now. The world now is where I want to hold onto my kids and give them safe space to learn.

Public school works for some people, some kids thrive off of the social, educational and designed system. This is great for them, but I am beyond happy I put my kids in public school so I could see that the one size fits all, boxed design of public school was not for us. Prayer works, trust God- he can see the big picture.