End of the Day

We have the most adorable little school room.
It's dill-pickle green, with blue and orange accents; counter tops around the two walls for lots of space to work; book shelves; two walk in closets; and a gold fish.
It is all I need and all I dreamed of.

Why is it then, that at the end of the school day today I found this on the kitchen counter:

And this on the kitchen table:

And this on the living room couch:

And this on the front room couch:

And this on the dining room table:


Yes, it probably points to the fact that my kids need a lesson in picking up after themselves.
And yes, it does provide further proof that schooling my children is like schooling a bunny rabbit. (Thanks Wendy for that analogy!).
And you could convince me that the school room is one of the most under-used rooms in the house.

But, as I reflected on the day, I realized that the problem was not children acting like bunnies jumping from room to room. It was me. I jumped from room to room. You see, while I ate breakfast we did our bible lesson at the kitchen table. Then, while I was making lunch one of them was reading on the living room couch. While I was tidying up the kitchen someone was doing math and language arts at the counter. And when I was doing piano lessons with one kid the other one was studying AWANA in the front room.

Ahah. Twas not the kids who couldn't stay in the school room. Twas I. They followed me. Come to think of it - I actually gave a spelling quiz while I was blow drying my hair! I love it. I love that learning happens in the chaos of life. I love that the kids want to be around me. I love that they follow me throughout the house. I love them. I love being with them.

Now, don't get me wrong, there are times in our days when we are very focused, when we all sit and I teach a lesson. But that's not the way we spend most of our home school day. It's just not realistic. It's not living. And it's just not fun.

There is a rhythm to our home - we read, we write, we play, we create, we experiment. We do it all in the parameters we like to call school. Most days we do it in the four walls we call home. Cooking, cleaning, church work, friendship are all intermingled with our school. Basically we are doing life together and learning as we go.

I have a hard time answering the question: "What is your schooling routine?" It's impossible to say. It has become so much a part of our way of life that I can't extract the school from the home life. And that my friends is why doing school in a school room all day doesn't work for us. We do school in the context of life - so it happens at the table, on the counter, in the living room, on the couch, in the bathroom.
It's our rhythm.
Some may think we beat to the rhythm of a different drum.

Our house is a well used house. We definitely use every square inch of this house (even the school room!). At the end of the day we do a 5 minute walk through and tidy up the square inches that we used that day and thank God for our home and our family. I love our dill-pickle green school room, I really do - but whatever you do, please don't lock me in that room.