Ebbing Tides

Back in the glory days of blogging, I used to love to scour people's blog rolls on a never-ending quest to find other fabulous blogs to enjoy. And I did. So many times it paid off in spades. (Why spades, I wonder. I'm guessing it's to do with cards and trumps and something, but honestly I would rather collect in any sort of actual currency even over trump cards. But I digress.)

One of the many, was the blog of Melissa Wiley, which I found in the sidebars of The Llama Butchers. Melissa was (is? Probably still is.) a friend IRL, I believe, of Steve-O. Which matters not a whit, but the brain stores the information and so it must out.

Melissa is an author, but that's not what her blog tended to be about. No, she was (and is) a homeschool mom of many. And one of the things that she wrote that has stuck with me through the years, was a commentary on how their homeschool had seasons of high and low tides. And in the high tides, all the work was done, education was attacked gleefully each day (I might have added the gleefully - these are children we're speaking of). There were lesson plans, and tests, and quizzes. And Formal Learning that was so rigorous that the letters really did need to be capitalized.

And then there were the low tides, where education still happened but in a looser, friendlier way. Books were read and discussed. Play was outdoors and it was enough that they found a cool bug or leaf or twig and spent time analyzing it and learning the deep secrets of nature or cartoons or whatever interest was theirs at the time, even though it didn't tie back directly to a standard of learning or one of the inevitable pop quizzes that people who don't homeschool (and who think it's weird) like to trot out upon hearing of our choice.

"What's the square root of 256?" they like to shout. And my not-quite-ten-year-old, who is still in the fourth grade, shoots me a quizzical look and stage whispers, "What's a square root, mom? Is that part of the capillary action that brings water from the ground into the trunk and leaves of trees?"

He's not advanced in math, but we do call him nature boy around here. If there is something to do with flora and fauna, chances are he has a random fact to share with you.

Elder boy, whose interests lie firmly in all things military -- weaponry, history thereof, wars and battles -- will likely be able to suggest several actions where 256 plays a role (number of soldiers lost, times the weapon was used, I don't know. But he does.)

It's a tricky thing to balance, and the words of Melissa Wiley have been echoing in my head this week as the golden light of fall beckons the kids outdoors with cries of, "Can't we play just a few more minutes?" And minutes turn to hours and before long, the day is lost without any of the textbooks cracked. No problems calculated. No essays written. 

But there is so much to talk about. The weight of the pile of leaves youngest buried himself in. The smells and textures. The worms and other bugs they found. The differences in shades of reds and yellows and golds and even greens. How the bark on this tree is split and the other is smooth. There's the defensive fortifications eldest has constructed from spare plywood and storage tub lids and his battle plan for the next time his friends come over for a war. There are plans for disassembling and modifying this Nerf weapon with parts from the other and how he needs a new spring to increase the speed of the bullets when fired and how changing up this, that, or the other brings about a better performing gun.

And there's me. On one hand, amazed and delighting in their explorations. On the other, dying because my carefully arranged plans call for a certain number of pages in each book to be accomplished each day so we can finish by a certain time. Me, the lover of Formal Education and the smell and feel of worksheets and online teaching videos who has children who love Informal Education with a furor that matches my own for the opposite.

So we walk the tightrope. And yesterday I could sense it and today it came full-force that shifting of the tide. We're slowing down in time with the shortening of the days. The tide is ebbing. So, I'll pivot and tell my type-A worry wart who's wringing her hands about the pages going undone that it's all right. We'll read the history of WWI -- the one that challenges even me with some of its conclusions (because really, are there people who disagree that what was done to the Armenians was genocide? Apparently, based on this book, there are. And while I think that's bunk, it provided for many teaching moments and side research and conversations that would never come from three pages a day to get through by May.) I'll dig out The Life of Fred and we can read about math, even if we aren't putting pencil to paper. Perhaps it's time to make another trip through the Wardrobe into Narnia as well, and look for Jesus in the face of Aslan and remember what it means that he's not a tame lion.

Low tide isn't my favorite time, but there's a part of me that recognizes how much we need it. So I'll try to embrace it and float along.