Accountability

Hello and welcome to A Primitive Schoolhouse. With so many homeschooling blogs out there in the Internet world, you might be wondering why do we need another one?

We need another one, because I need it. I need to be held accountable for what I do in my classroom with my children. Don't get me wrong, I keep a lesson plan book and a grade book, test my children with the standardized "bubble" tests, and I make sure they fully grasp new lessons before I move on. But I don't really feel like I'm being held accountable. Not really.

When I taught school my peers held me accountable. We sat around and had weekly curriculum meetings where we discussed what we were doing in our classroom. We had the curriculum, but we also went above and beyond to make learning fun for our littles. We bounced ideas off each other and shared the freebies that we found online.

Fast forward five years and here I am in our fourth year of homeschooling. I purchase my curriculum and my girls do every last bit of it. I do no more and no less than what I have purchased over the previous year. BUT, I realized this morning that I have become completely reliant on my curriculum and I have ZERO creativity in my classroom.

Perhaps this lack of creativity has stemmed from teaching two different grade levels EVERY SINGLE DAY (can I get a witness?)! But then I think, "If I can provide a fun and engaging learning environment for 20 kids, why can't I do it with my two girls?" The past few years we have pushed through schoolwork in-order to have fun after school. I have to wonder, "How did this become my motivation for them?" Where did my creativity go?  So the answer to my quandary is starting this blog. I need to have a way to be held accountable for ensuring my girls get the BEST TEACHER they can instead of the check-the-box teacher.

In a few days we are taking a field trip to Washington DC. Opal and Mae are so stinkin' excited to see the Declaration of Independence, the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial to name a few things on our agenda. Now I can be the lackluster educator that I've transformed into and we can go and "see" the sights; or I can create a TOTALLY AWESOME journal to help my girls document all they will learn on our trip! A journal that spurs their interest in our nation's capital. A journal that will give them motivation to actually learn about what we are seeing vs. seeing and then brain dumping as soon as we move on to the next sight. Today I'm choosing the totally awesome journal! Today I choose to say goodbye to that boring homeschooling teacher I have become and say hello to the teacher I always dreamed I could be. I'll post the journal as soon as it's created...