Admittedly, I am NOT a “stepford” homeschooling mom. We try to get the most out of every lesson, but I do not have one of those geeky “stepford” students. It’s a common misconception that children who have school at home are always happy to jump into lessons simply because they are at home and can do the lesson in their pajamas if they want. Truth is, even homeschooled kids get sick of school. They get complacent, whiny and bitchy. I don’t care how much fun you make a lesson or how much one-on-one attention they get, at some point a kid is just going to want you to leave them alone and let them play some video games or watch television without it becoming a freaking learning experience.

I have no doubt that Maggie gets sick of the sound of my voice. More than once at the dinner table I have been asked, “Mom can we NOT do school right now?!?!?!?” It’s very hard to turn the “teacher” button off and very close to impossible to separate the mom hat from the teacher hat.

Maggie loves history, science and Spanish. But, even those get old. She’d rather watch TV, play video games or go outside and harass her pets. Believe me, there are days when it would be easier to catch gnats with baseball netting than it is to get Maggie to settle in and get to work. Instead of fighting, begging, bribing and cajoling I created passports.

She currently has 2 passports. One is for video games and the other for the television. Each day she has to earn her passports in order to play or watch tv. In addition, she can’t use her passports until her lessons are finished or she is on a break. I printed out the title of the passport and how it is earned. I used clear packing tape to “laminate” it on to a smaller manila envelope and I decorated it with fun stickers that coordinate with the purpose of the passport.

Everyone in the household understands what the purpose is and Maggie is often asked, “Do you have your passport for that?” and she proudly presents it upon request to prove that she earned her fun time. It has worked brilliantly for months now.

Home schooling is really a constant learning curve for both the student and “teacher” – I don’t have a set system that I have to force 30+ kids into, instead I have to be creative and mold the system around one student. When it’s molded correctly the results are obvious and almost immediate. Fortunately, I have the advantage of really knowing my student so I know what is going to provide strong incentive and what isn’t.