What do you do the first day of “not-back-to-school?”
I mean the first day all the neighborhood kids go back to school, and your kids are, like, THERE waiting for you to “play teacher?”
What we learned to do was to do nothing schoolish!
We’d take off for a Santa Cruz beach, waving our beach towels as we drove past our neighborhood school on our way to the Santa Cruz beaches… to “do oceanography,” of course.
But it took me a couple of years to get comfortable doing that, I must admit. I’d been a teacher, and the rule in school was to come across as strict and no-nonsense, for at least the first couple of weeks. Set a routine and show the class you meant business about keeping to it.
Going to the beach meant coming home with shells and bits of seaweed, and with any luck, a container of dead tide pool creatures to try to identify before the smell got to us.
Going to the beach means also EATING at the wharf and learning that, yes, fresh fish really does taste pretty good.
If you live in or near a big city, go visit an ethnic neighborhood and poke around. If you live in a rural area a river or lake beach will do. Just get out of the house while the weather is still decent – or study hurricanes, if that is your destiny this week.
Read a good book on “Deschooling” and really try to do it. Deschooling means getting schoolish activities that work for 30 kids in a classroom out of your routine and out of your mind right from the start. Learning to not duplicate failing school methods in your own home can save you headaches down the road.
How will you make your first day special? Post below or add to our Yahoo Group Thread.
Ann Zeise
A to Z Home’s Cool
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Ann Zeise
Ann Zeise