As we’re heading into Advent, the temptation is high to make much of this season. Planning activities, finding books to read, decorating, filling every spare moment possible with the “meaning behind the season.” However, this is the exact opposite of what we should be doing: resting and waiting. Instead of rushing to add more into an already overloaded schedule, what about truly resting and taking this break?
When should we just rest, taking a break from school, the planning, the frantic pace that homeschoolers can find themselves in?
Answer: whenever you want to. This is the joy of homeschooling! We are not mired to any one set schedule or plan or ideal but are able to focus solely on our family needs. If you find yourself, like many of us, overwhelmed by trying to have everything done, all boxes checked and complete, please know that it doesn’t need to happen. You are able to rest. To breathe. To allow your family time to just be together, playing in the snow, going for walks, making crafts and meals, laughing together over board games.
These pauses in our daily routines to connect with each other can do so much more than an extra unit study could ever do. They allow parents and children to have fun, to play, to find quiet moments in which the important and impromptu conversations happen. Take a day, a week, even a month to recharge your batteries and your children’s, and come back with renewed energy. Will your children remember that day you squeezed in one more chance to drill home a concept in science with a new activity? Possibly. But would they remember the day you threw caution to the wind, grabbed your sleds and a thermos of hot chocolate, and spent hours speeding down sledding hills?
I guarantee it.
Jill Kawchak lives at the edge of the Rocky Mountains in Alberta with her husband, daughter, and a very slobbery yellow lab. She writes, she homeschools . . . and makes a mean tortilla soup. Most days you can find her on the trails in the foothills, trying to keep her daughter from breaking bones as she scrambles up rocks. A follower of Jesus, she tries, fails, and tries again to seek Him first.
