Learning to Love to Learn at Shady Creek Academy

Hi, my name is Vicki Beddingfield and I'm an interior designer turned home school mamma and I'm truly loving every minute of this exciting new journey I'm on. My son, Zachary, is an amazing little eight year old who is growing up way too fast. What a joy it has been to have him at home with me during the last two years. I started homeschooling him when he would have been entering first grade at the private school he was attending. Because of his September birthday, he wasn't old enough to start first grade at his school or at public school, but he had just finished up Kindergarten and already seemed too advanced for where he was. I just couldn't see holding him back because he was born 12 days later than the cutoff date.

As I started researching my options I began getting more and more excited about the idea of homeschooling him. At first I thought "No way!! I can't do that!" But, through some great encouragement from loving friends, who also home school, I started asking the Lord if this could be his plan for us. I knew that if this was what he had planned for Zachary's education, then He would certainly equip me with the ability to do my part in His plan. After much prayer and discussions with my dear husband, we both knew that this was the right thing for us at this time.

What a blessing it has turned out to be!!

First, let me tell you some of the many things I LOVE about homeschooling....

I love knowing exactly what my son's strengths are and exactly what challenges he faces.
I love being able to customize his education based on those strengths and challenges.
I love rolling with the punches and letting his interests direct what we learn about at any moment of the day.
I love getting together with other home school families for co-ops and parties and field trips.
I love reading up on all the latest curriculum options and then mixing and matching things until I come up with what will work best for my unique little one.
I love learning right along side my son. (Learning is fascinating - especially through the eyes of an eager 8 yr old)
I love being able to "do school" while we travel with my husband when he has out of town trips for work.
I love that our "classroom" is life and the whole world around us and it is not filled with boring old text books.
I love snuggling on the sofa in our pajamas (me with a cup of coffee) while we read stacks and stacks of books with topics ranging from history, science and the arts to poetry, fiction and the Bible.
I love planning hands-on activities that incorporate all the different types of things we are currently learning about.
I love taking long walks through our woods - along the side of our Shady Creek - and observing the amazing wonders of the world that God has created for us.
I really, really love all the questions that my son comes up with during the day and being able to comfortably say "I don't know the answer to that, but it's a great question! Let's see if we can figure it out together!!" (Thank goodness for the Internet!!! :)

Let me finish by correcting one thing I said in the first sentence of this blog about "truly loving every minute of this new journey." In an effort to be completely honest with anyone out there reading this.... I can't say I'm loving EVERY minute! Let me be fair and tell you a couple of the things I don't love....

I don't love the unscheduled interruptions, like the occasional wrecked car that I'm dealing with this week, or the broken braces that became an immediate trip to the orthodontist, or the urgent calls from lingering design jobs that need a drop-everything-and-do-it-now response.
I don't love the frustration I feel after planning certain activities that, in my mind, are going to end up being beautiful works of art. You know, that lifelong keepsake kind of thing! I can envision the beautiful sketch in his nature journal of the first Robin in spring, the neatly copied final draft of that book report we've been working on all week, the model of the Viking longboat with the brightly decorated sail and intricately designed miniature shields...these are the things that are important to me - remember I'm the interior designer, the very visual minded person. Well, for now, let me just say that my son is just not me!
I don't love the feelings I get after over scheduling our time. In my mind, homeschooling should be relaxed and in depth, allowing time for digging into the subjects that we are studying and taking our time to really get it. Stress and panic over feeling like I just can't get it all done doesn't fit into my overall goal of learning to love to learn.

However, I am trying to learn to accept these bumps in the road for what they are --- simply life as it's going to be. Even more important than that, I'm trying to find the God moments in those bumps and learn the lessons that He wants to teach me during those not-so-fun distractions.

Well, I hope you've enjoyed getting a little peak into Shady Creek Academy. Come back again when you can and get a glimpse into what all we will be discovering. I'll be posting about our third grade year. Here is an outline of our plans for the school year:

Bible  - God's Story and Sword Fighting
Math - Singapore Primary Math 3A&3B, and Aleks On-line
Grammar - Daily Grammar Lessons, Grammar Songs, Diagramming Workbook, and Fix-It!
Writing - Institute for Excellence in Writing (IEW) Student Writing Intensive A (SWIA)
Spelling - The Phonetic Zoo Level A
History - American History (Discovery of the Americas to the War of 1812) my own mix of spines and readers
Science - Human Anatomy Co-op, Earth Sciences Co-op, and some Sonlight Science - Electricity, Magnets & Light
Art - Atelier and my own study of the Masters
Music - Classical Composers and want to start violin lessons in the spring
PE - karate, running, football in the fall, and baseball in the spring