Landing in the homeschooling community
I really believe that 2022 was a year where lots of things just worked out for me, they just happened organically, without force. I guess the momentum was already there and the general direction was cast, but at the beginning of the year, I didn’t really know where I was headed.
After moving quite suddenly to the beautiful Sunshine Coast in 2021, I found myself out of a full time classroom and stepping into relief teaching. I thought I wouldn’t enjoy it; not knowing the kids, not having a relationship with them. But I actually really enjoyed the new scene each day. Sure it was tricky to get my head around a new class, 25 odd new names, figuring out where the classroom was located (because school maps are hard to read right?!) and then trying to understand someone else’s planning, but it was refreshing and while it was short lived, it really gave me a confidence boost in my teaching.
It also gave me a moment to reflect on just how much of a workload I had working full time in a school. I mean I knew it when I was there, but being on the inside sometimes doesn’t allow you to see the bigger picture.
Somewhere along the way I met a lovely lady who had opened a tutoring business and she sparked my curiosity as to what I could do that wasn’t full time teaching. There was a whole world out there! And I had discovered that teaching could look like lots of different things, not just stuck inside a classroom.
Seeing the decline of trust and confidence in the school system in the general population and within myself, it was perfectly timed that I connected with a Homeschool Learning Hub close to where I live. As the educators came together, we understood the need of this community and this place offered that. Learning that did not look like a school. 2022 started with a new job, a new thinking, a new outlook.
It was quite powerful to be a part of the community, where so many families, some new to homeschooling, others seasoned patrons, came together to support and celebrate this journey that many of us found ourselves on.
During this time I read lots of books about homeschooling, free play, parenting and books about business! It was quite a year of growth for myself as I went through a sort of ‘deschooling’ to find new ways to teach. This was a really enjoyable time as I continued to find that the more I read about this style of learning, the homeschooling, the unschooling, the child-led approaches, I found myself leaning in to it all. I saying things like ‘Yeah this is what I thought teaching would be’ and ‘Yeah kids ARE supposed to enjoy learning’. I was leaning into the feeling of growth. Being able to implement my learnings at the Learning Hub was very gratifying.
One day I had a moment where I was like ‘I could do this’, meaning by myself. I had already registered my business and ‘fell’ into this group learning in the homeschooling community and I thought ‘Yeah, this is what I want to do’. So I did it. I started one day a week, I had three kids! I mean it WAS a group! Or is three still only a few? I also didn’t realise that continuing to market myself throughout the term after it had already commenced could actually lead to more enrolments, but hey, you (I) live and learn!
Then the following term I had some marketing experience under my belt and I began to see an increase in my exposure. I had a change of location, but I was humbled when clients said ‘No worries!’ and re-enrolled.
It was coming up towards the end of the year and I was still just one day a week doing my own thing, and working at the Learning Hub. I felt in my heart that it was time to really step into my own business and give the time, space and energy it deserved to really make something of it. Taking the leap wasn’t as scary as I thought it would be, because I knew there were many families searching for alternate styles of learning. Even though I was just one of many in the big pond of homeschooling educators, I trusted that where ‘focus goes, energy flows’.
As it would be, the Learning Hub was no more at this point and I was once again humbled that the relationships that I had built working there turned into families following me over to my own group learning settings. This transition was quite fluid and while it is a shame that the Learning Hub is no longer providing a space for homeschooling children, I give credit to this space and the people in it, for supporting my confidence and the belief in myself that allowed me to jump, and land safely, into this community.
I continue to read books and do research into the homeschooling world and how learning can look different each day of the week. Please feel free to recommend any books you think I’d enjoy! I have just started reading ‘The Danish Way of Parenting’ - I’m about 8 pages in and can already tell it’s going to be a good one!
I love telling people that my ‘job’ involves lots of games, a relaxed learning approach for the morning and the children have dedicated play time in the afternoons, even involving a creek! The breathing in (the head heavy work in the morning) and breathing out (the creative playing in the afternoons) of the Steiner philosophy really speaks to me and this is how I structure the days.
The lovely lady who owns her own tutoring business and I still talk and refer customers to each other. She is another wonderful human who showed me that there’s power in supporting other businesses like your own.
These days I come home with stories about my day and when I am done recounting the tales, I notice that they are tales of laughter and enjoyment, of delight and celebration. And then I realise that those emotions are also how I feel about my job.