Roller Coaster of Learning, Say What!

Up and down, up and down.  As we continue on our journey of homeschooling, I am starting to see a trend.  I am curious if any of the rest of you notice the same in your school house.  One day, the boys will seem to strap into the seat of learning and begin lurching up the hill with great effort.  It is almost a creep to get to the top.  The anticipation of them making it to the top overwhelms me.  I think it will never come.  Then the next day, they pass over the summit and fly down the same hill with speed and ease.  What's that about?!

Why does it take 8 hours to do something one day and a mere 4 hours to do it the next day?  Ahhhggg!!  Up and down, up and down.  I must be missing something to think that things will stabilize and just go on like a steady train chugging along the tracks.  That wouldn't be so bad.  Only coming upon a hill every once in a while would be somewhat normal, I would think.  'Tis not the case, I am afraid.  It guess that the boys will be somewhat bound by the time that they take to accomplish their tasks.  When we decided to home school, I imagined long hours of lying on the swing reading books.  I dreamed of all of the field trips that we would take.  I longed for hands on cool science experiments and messy arts and crafts.  While I still hope to get to do these things, I see that it will all depend upon how fast they can get up that hill on our roller coaster.

Maybe the further we go, the better it will be.  They will fall into a routine.  Their writing will become quicker with age.  They will learn to type faster.  They will be more motivated to finish in a timely manner.  They will be more focused.  But when that happens, will they be tired of such things?  Will they be to grown to enjoy lazy days of reading?  Will the time have passed for exploding volcanoes and play-doh dinosaurs?

It is just our first year...and the first part of that.  I know that things will change.  I will keep my goals in the front of my mind.  Maybe there are things that we will need to sacrifice so that the goals can be accomplished.  I may need to think outside of the box.  Modifying myself is a great deal easier than foisting larger than life expectations on them.  We shall see.