(See part 1 here)
Somewhere around reading The Well-Trained Mind for the first time I was having another first. Previously, I had always LOVED Makenna's teachers. They were easy to communicate with and I could almost daily see how much Makenna loved them and going to school.
During her third grade year that didn't completely change, but neither of us were feeling quite as much love. Makenna was finishing her work too quickly for the rest of the class and became a distraction. Despite her teachers assurances that Makenna would have other things she could do, nothing seemed to happen.
My husband and I talked about the possibility of skipping a grade and tried to figure out things we could do at home to help her. Homeschooling still never crossed my mind. I'm a little slow, I mentioned that last time, right? My recalculating? Well, the recalculations started with whether or not to skip a grade. We decided not to for a variety of reasons and then headed into her fourth grade year optimistic that a change of teacher might be just the ticket.
Unfortunately, Makenna's fourth grade year started a lot like her third grade year. Which brought about our next plan, the talented and gifted program offered by our school district. It didn't start until fifth grade, but we decided we'd wait it out and if she didn't test into it, we'd talk about "other options" then.
I don't know where, I can't remember a specific incident, but at sometime it occurred to me that I could homeschool. You know, if there were absolutely no other options. Even though I was very reticent, it was an option and so I started to research.
I checked out books from the library about a few different way to homeschool and I read a few blogs. I also went back as far as you could in Pioneer Woman's homeschooling section and read every single post. Yeah, my husband agrees with you, that was a little nuts. I loved every minute it though.
I read and read and thought and thought (and prayed a heck of a lot) until one day I realized homeschooling had moved from a last resort to an actual option. Something I might consider doing even if I had other options. Crazy.
About that time we found out Makenna got into the talented and gifted program. It's funny, but I was almost disappointed. I mean, I was happy for her (she was ecstatic), but I felt like it closed a door I was just starting to want to open.
Then it occurred to me that I could still homeschool, I have other kids, just because my journey had progressed so far due to Makenna didn't mean it had to only involve her. That was a big leap for me. A life changing leap.
Next week I'll tell about the rest of my leap into homeschooling story, you aren't going to want to miss it (or maybe you will...but I'll pretend you don't, you don't mind do you?).
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