We strongly considered homeschooling as Phoebe approached kindergarten age. We live in a great school district, but were concerned by the school "system", and I felt personally that my daughter would be one of the ones who does "fine". That she'd do well enough to sort of be slipped by. She might not be brilliant (although she might be, who knows), but she definitely wouldn't be a "problem". To me that was actually concerning... that there might be gaps in her educational strengths as a result. Plus, I LIKE her, and I want to be AROUND her, ya know? I miss her when she's gone.

So we pulled her out of pre-K as an experiment in our homeschooling. We found that it was hard to get her to focus on "lessons" in the home, and that meeting curriculum was a battle. We started "unschooling". We took tons of outings, and encompassed learning in everything we did (finding shapes, letters, colours, sortings, patterns, explored jobs that people did wherever we were etc etc etc), and that worked great. We had a great time! My 2.5 year old was learning these things too and we were all enjoying time together immensely.

But I was expecting Chloe. I couldn't see making sure that I met all her educational needs myself with the two younger ones around (and Chloe being a newborn)... so I explored charter schools, and preset curricula and homeschool groups for lesson sharing. It looked fabulous, in theory. We had plenty of social opportunities, and group lessons via dance classes and swim lessons and the like. However, what those showed us was how driven to impress external "teachers" Phoebe was... and how she thrived in the group settings, and what a truly social creature she was.

I wasn't worried about her lacking social stimulus, don't get me wrong, but she absolutely glowed in these settings.

So finally, we just asked HER what she wanted to do. I had an online charter school all set up, and my ducks in a row to do homeschooling and group lessons etc etc... and she wanted to go to public school.

I found myself unprepared for that in a way, but my goal is to meet my child's needs, not my own. So we registered her and off she went. But I found the journey to where we are now so valuable, and I know that should the public schools not meet her needs, we're prepared to recognize that and do what we need to do - be that enhance her learning more at home, or pull her out entirely. I feel good knowing that I"m comfy with all options.