Home school post

My sister was suggesting I do a home school room "reveal"…

Want to know the truth? I used to have a kickin' home school room.  We have a huge basement, finished, with nice recessed lighting and built in bookshelves (my friends know it's not quite as fancy as all that!).  I think it is about 40'x12' or so…

We bought a huge standing chalk board which I really did enjoy using.  There was a large dry erase board on a side wall.  Strips of the alphabet in both cursive and print.  Cheerful posters to encourage the students.  And desks for each child.  Folding tables along the walls for projects.

Then came the winter.  My boys asked and I said ok.  Everything was lugged into the unfinished laundry room.  Everything.  Duct tape basketball courts and end zones were placed over the carpet.  My children disappeared into the basement to play.  It was pretty amazing up here on the main floor, child-free with joyful shouts and booms emitting from below.

The honest truth is that this happens Every. Single. Winter.  And I think I've finally learned my lesson: in the Northern Midwest, one needs (or is very very grateful to have) a (large if possible) indoor space to play during the winter.  Truth be told, no one wants to work in that school room either.  We ALL want to be on the main floor, in the natural light, glancing out the front window to see the mailman arrive or to hear the phone and dash to see who's calling.

One benefit to having such a large family is that we by necessity have a ridiculously large dining room table.  The benefit is that I can place the bulk of my schoolers around that table comfortably with their stacks of workbooks.  I just place buckets and baskets of pens, pencils and crayons in the middle of the table and easily step from one child to the next (because you know they ALL want to ask you how to get started or what to do, and speed is of the essence in saving your sanity and the children from frenzy.)

We all drift to the couches for oral reading, history and religion.   "Recess" is a dash down into that wonderful basement to play some form of football and a delicious break for the teacher as well.

So, my "reveal" has no pictures.  If I charge my phone I can let you see the basement and my dining table.  (Because I only upload pictures from my phone these days. I know, lazy blogger. Busy blogger.)  But that's how I do it.  Before dinner I pile all of the books into baskets and move the pens and crayons to a side table (still need to perfect that lack-of-a-place, thinking about the cupboards under the dining buffet, but I'd have to move some things around…)

It's working for now.  I like it.  If your school room is where you guys all love to work, definitely work there.  But if you actually sort of hate working there and you always drift elsewhere, don't just keep the room for aesthetic or theoretical reasons (I did for many years).  Consider if that space might be enjoyed more if used in another capacity.  (And now you know why there is a huge hole in our dry wall and a black eye on my oldest son.  We've actually forbidden tackle football games of any sort.)