by Mary James

Fall is definitely my favorite time of year. I love soft flannel shirts and the wonderful smell of crisp morning air. There is another scent I associate with fall — the smell of new books! Most of us are starting a new school year and are surrounded by new educational material. Of course, we began to indulge ourselves in this aromatherapy back in May and June during the height of book fair season. We began to amass our supplies for the new year and delighted in each new purchase. We spent the months of July and August diligently working on our lesson plans for the upcoming school session. Yes, it was a lot of hard work, but we entertained ourselves with images of our children gathered around our feet in true Charlotte Mason style... eyes wide open as we read aloud from some great classic (Dickens or Austen, no doubt), begging "Please, dearest Mother, read more!"

In the James household, we usually begin the new school year the first week of September. Prior to starting school, I spend about a month decluttering and reorganizing our school room. Since I have several very young students, I like to decorate the walls with colorful posters and learning aids. I spend time packing away all the work from the previous year and organizing folders for filing the schoolwork of the current year. I gather manipulatives and learning games and store them in an easy to access yet out of the way place. (Mothers of preschoolers will understand that contradiction...) I stock up on notebook paper, spiral notebooks, pencils, glue and markers when the local stores have their back-to-school sales. The highlight of the last week before school is when each child goes to the store to pick out their own school box to hold their supplies for the new year. By this time, the children have caught the enthusiasm and start each day with, "Is it time for school yet?!" Even my high schooler has trouble being believed when he grumbles about school work — there is an edge of excitement to his moaning and complaining, and he has even been known to pick up his school books and thumb through them!

The first day of school is usually a good day in our house. God has always smiled on us in that regard, for we always seem to start on time after a hearty breakfast and we manage to stay on track all day and finish right on schedule. Dad comes home to smiling faces, eager to inform him, "today was a school day!" At supper that night we begin our household tradition of answering Dad's question, "What did YOU do in school today?" Of course, everyone is bubbling over with details of their day — new books, new supplies, new subjects. There is usually one child who has just experienced his very first day of school and he feels such pride at having joined the ranks of the educated. Since this is a perfect day, we are having this conversation over a delicious dinner, because I was clever enough to cook ahead or do a crockpot meal. Ahhh... we love this homeschool lifestyle!

Our enthusiasm holds for at least four or five weeks, but shorter days seem to bring shorter tempers. School work is beginning to be a drudgery for the children and the lesson plans I so carefully created in July just aren't holding up to reality. Six weeks into school I'm already a week behind! Where did we get off track? Well, there was that week of allergy attacks... and the visit from an out-of-town relative... not to mention that the baby's nap schedule is NOT what I expected it to be. There have also been several episodes of frustration and resistance — Algebra is a nightmare, cursive handwriting is a major headache, and the kindergartener is much more interested in losing manipulatives than in learning his alphabet. By the time the Thanksgiving holiday rolls around, we are mostly thankful that school is out for a while! In our house, we usually stop school at Thanksgiving and do not return until after New Year's Day. We spend this time really enjoying the holidays, doing lots of arts and crafts and baking, and playing outside in the cooler weather. I spend this time reevaluating my school schedule and trying to fix the problems we are experiencing in our book work. We return to school after the long break without the intense excitement of September, but with a level of energy that we were lacking in early November. Having removed our rose-colored glasses, we hold steady until early March, when we begin to dream of Spring Break and another respite from school work. By this time, my lesson plans are so far off track I'm ready to scrap them altogether! I convince myself that the sensible thing to do is to hold on until the summer break and do a better job next year... And so the cycle goes...