Our family has had a complicated relationship with preschool. When our oldest was 3 we sent him to preschool at our parish school. We weren't quite sure what the compelling reasons were for sending him, we just thought it would be good for him. I was pregnant at the time and also had a 2 year old. He ended up doing really well, despite our worries over his behavioral problems at home, and he really enjoyed going to school those two mornings a week. We, however, didn't love the school, and had heard through the grapevine that the school was probably going to be closing in the near future. So at the end of that year, we decided we wouldn't be sending him back. We toured a few other schools, but I just really could not wrap my mind around any of them. So we didn't make a decision. And then we still didn't make a decision. Until finally we realized that the decision that we *had* made was actually that we would be keeping him at home the following year.
I had been going back and forth in my mind already about whether or not we would end up being a homeschool family, or send our kids to a traditional brick and mortar school. Truthfully, before kids, I swore up and down that I would *never* homeschool and I could see us thriving much better in a traditional setting. But somehow once we started actually considering the very real possibilities, I fell in love with the idea of what homeschooling *could* be. And so that year when our oldest was 4 I decided to try it. And by try it, I mean, moderately ease into doing some "preschool type stuff" at home with more intentionality, to see if I thought it was something we could actually pursue.
So I planned ahead. I bought a very cute and non-stressful looking Catholic preschool curriculum, and some materials and started off on a pretty strong foot. The wrench in the plan was....life. It was a very difficult year for our family. Having our oldest at home was such a blessing. It felt like it might be (and actually did probably turn out to be) the last year our child would be at home with no other commitments, and not in school 8 hours a day. I tried to cherish it, and make the most of it. But his behavioral problems at home ratcheted up to an all time high, and we weren't keeping up with our work the way that I had wanted to. In the end we ended up scrapping everything non-essential, and focused on working through a reading cirriculum. We made it about halfway through before I could tell that he had had enough and wasn't ready to progress.
That spring we had a big decision to make. Did I feel like I could go on to homeschool him for Kindergarten, or did we think it would be best to send him to school?
Obviously, we ended up opting to send him to our wonderful Catholic school, and it was unequivocally the right choice for him. He has thrived in that environment in a way that we only could have hoped.
But that year of keeping him at home taught me a lot. And one of the things it taught me was that it was *okay* for us to not send our kids to traditional preschool. I truly believe that there is nothing wrong with sending kids to preschool. It was a valuable experience for our oldest son that year he was three. But it was also a financial burden, and doing it just because "that's what people do" didn't ring true for me, and that's pretty much why we did it. It also taught me that, if you end up not sending your kid to preschool, that doesn't mean you have to overcompensate by somehow recreating the experience at home. I am not the kind of person who has the gifts or the patience to craft with my kids, and I am also a person who is easily overwhelmed. It just hasn't worked for me so far.
And now here I am, with my oldest in kindergarten, and another preschooler hanging out in my house. Our daughter is about to turn four, and I *do* have a desire to start teaching her more intentionally. Slowly (and mostly because she really wants to be able to do the things her older brother can do) we've started working on letter and number identification, and writing her name. I'm also trying to hammer home the *actual* words to the Hail Mary and the Our Father, in hopes that we can get our act together enough as a family to start a family rosary (or a family decade). And...that's it. And while I'm always on the lookout for ideas, and ways to connect her with the things I'd like her to learn, I am also taking it incredibly slowly with her, and I'm more confident this time around that that is okay.
She won't be in kindergarten for another two years. We are toying with the idea of sending her to the new preschool that just opened at our son's school, for maybe a few mornings a week. We do have another baby coming in June, and sending her might be a really good thing for everyone involved. But we also might not. But I've learned that as hard as it can be only having little kids at home, I really cherish the years when ALL that you NEED to do is just keep them with you, and love on them at home. Those years actually *do* end. I know, because now I have a child who spends most of his waking hours at school, without me, and boy is it bittersweet.
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