Don't judge yourself by others

One of the first things I noticed when I started to teach my daughter at home was the amount of information and other people sharing their own home school things on social media. Some of it I found helpful and gave me ideas but other times I felt guilty and judged my own style as being not good enough. I would see posts showing these amazing play stations set up and days out in the forests doing forest school and basically, I got Facebook envy!

It's tiring enough teaching your child, let alone adding to that the worry about what every other parent is doing and what they think you are doing.

Thankfully I have learnt that it doesn’t matter what everyone else around you are doing. You don’t have to be planning hundreds of play dates and group meets and visits to here there and everywhere to home educate your child. Do what suits them and what they need. I tried going to home ed meets and other groups available in our local area, but at this present time they do not suit my daughter. She is not socially ready as she has been used to a single close friend at school which took years to develop and maybe in the future, she will meet another close friend but, in a time, and place that she is ready.

Right now, she enjoys learning with me doing different activities at home and seeing family and interacting with those she is comfortable with.

Some days we do more than others but that’s ok too. Why do we feel there is this time limit and tick box system that we have to parent and teach by? I recently read a post where a Mum was really being hard on herself because she was trying her hardest to support her child, but they still couldn’t tie their shoelaces and other things. That’s ok. My daughter cannot tie hers yet amongst other things so for now she has shoes that she can do herself such as Velcro or zips. Focus on what your children can do and work with that and in future as they develop confidence and an interest in different things, those skills may come. Remember as adults there are things we may or may not still be able to do or even want to do. I can ride a bike but don’t so does that skill really matter as much as other things I do daily such as cooking?

Focus on what life skills and interests your child has and use that as your starting point for home educating. The only Maths we focus on is basic adding and subtraction, division, measuring and money as these can allow Isabelle to shop for herself and be more independent in future. My daughter loves reading so English revolves around lots of that and, we use story makers as Isabelle does not enjoy writing very much. She loves quizzes so we do a lot of YouTube quizzes on lots of different things and involve those in our learning. Isabelle loves pandas so we watch the zoo webcams online and learn more about animals. She loves games so I turn a lot of learning into games which I make, and these engage her, so she is more likely to focus and enjoy her day.

Don’t get me wrong, I still have days where I also beat myself up that I could do more or am I doing enough, but at these times I stop looking at what others are doing and look at my own child and what we have achieved together each week.