TEACHING AT CO-OP VS. TEACHING AT HOME

Not the same. It is so much harder to teach a classroom of children than it is to teach my own.

But teaching at co-op has been so good for me. I’ve learned to look further down the road to graduation. I’ve learned to be a stricter teacher and disciplinarian. And I’ve learned more about children and education in general.

It’s so easy to think that my kids are like kids everywhere or that kids everywhere are pretty much the same. Not true. Not true at all.

At co-op I have to try and meet children where they are. And they come from homes where the rules are different and the expectations are different.

What I take for granted in my kids, I realize now, is the result of the work that my husband and I have put into raising them. And my children’s weaknesses are also a result of that same training.

Because of co-op, I can see a little more clearly what we’re doing right and what we’re doing wrong.

What we’re doing right?

My kids know how to think. We don’t spend as much time as I’d like discussing deep concepts, but we do talk a lot–everybody at my house is always talking–and we’re all so loud. My husband and I love debating and arguing and having deep meaningful conversations, and my kids are beginning to get involved in some of those conversations. Our current favorite topic is the economy and the demise of America as we know it.

After spending a couple of years at co-op, I see that many, many homeschooled students are excellent thinkers. Most of the highschool students that I teach are amazing in their ability to research, filter through information, and write up their opinion(s) about the topic. But not all of them are capable of doing this on the same level. There are a few whom I have encountered over the years that have unclear, muddled thinking. They don’t know how to narrow down ideas to the crux of the matter. (This is why I like The Lost Tools of Writing so much. It’s not muddled.)

What we’re doing wrong?

~sigh~ There’s so much I don’t know where to begin. I’m working on discipline, scheduling, habit training, and the list goes on. My kids are good kids, but I didn’t learn about Charlotte Mason’s methods until I was an adult, and I am the one that needs habit training. I am working on all of those above issues for me, and as I get better in these areas, my children improve in these same areas as well. They catch my habits.

So more than anything, co-op is helping me to be more organized and together by requiring me to be more organized and together. The end result is that my kids are becoming more organized and together.

The biggest drawback to attending co-op is the fear it causes in me. I fear that my kids will not get as good an education because the teachers are not teaching my children the way I would. (This is huge!)

In some instances, I know it’s right. But in others, I know that I have seen the co-op teachers doing a better job in some subjects than what I would have done. And my children are benefiting.

Our co-op is worth the risk. The ladies who run it are amazing and are gifted at what they’re doing. I’m really looking forward to what is happening at our co-op.