This year I made the decision to join Generations Homeschool group here in Raleigh. I liked the group we were a member of this past year but I really wanted to find a group that holds classes each week so that James could experience group learning. Generations has a co-op called Legacy that offers that structure so he is registered and ready to go! However, I am a little overwhelmed by it all right now. I registered for both Generations and Legacy on the same day and in a matter of hours, I was asked what I wanted to teach. Part of the requirements of registering your child/children for Legacy is that one parent must commit to teach one class during the semester. They asked me for my preferences. I had no idea. It's such an open-ended question so I put down what I like to talk about: politics/current events, nutrition and sign language/deaf culture. After that, I get a call from one of the mom's who is in charge and she is asking me if I want to team teach (hell yes!) a reading class for kids James' age called Five in a Row Volume II. "What is that?", I am thinking. Of all the reading I have done and the conferences I have attended and people I have talked to, I have never heard of Five in a Row so, of course, I google it. It looks great. I check out the reviews others have written about it. So now I am team teaching with a woman I have only emailed with so far and who is using this curriculum at home with her children. I feel so behind before I even start. I haven't really decided on a reading curriculum I want to use for this year. I have picked out all the other curricula I want to use for math, science and handwriting but I have been quite undecided about a reading program. And now I will be teaching something that I have never heard of. When this sort of thing happens, I initally panic and then I decide to either go with the flow or find my own way. Right now, my plan is to go to The Gathering Place homeschool bookstore in Raleigh, walk up to the person who is working there and ask them to hold my hand while walking to the reading section and help me! I am not afraid to say, "I don't know!". It usually gets me great answers and many options. You know, part of my panicking is that I haven't been the new kid on the block in a long time. But I suspect every year will start out this way. It'll be as if we starting all over every Fall. It'll still be me and James and a co-op but the curriculum will be different and we'll be learning all new stuff again...building onto what we have previously learned.
One thing I have recently come to realize about homeschoolers is that they are a group of steadfast individuals. Even when they get together as a group like a co-op, they are not a collective. What I mean by that is that even though they gather regularly because they homeschool and can share in that, they still maintain their individualism. It's unique to me. Even as a sign language interpreter who has spent a career with many unique individuals I find the value placed on the individualism of homeschoolers is great. I like that. Don't get me wrong. I only speak of it because I sense it so strongly among them. Or us I should say. :)
