Embracing the Freedom of Homeschooling

EP225: Freedom thrives within structure and simplicity, not rigidity. This is a powerful truth that I've learned on my journey to embrace the freedom of homeschooling. 

In this episode of the Art of Homeschooling podcast, you'll hear my thoughts about the precious opportunity that homeschoolers have to truly see and respond to the children before us, customizing learning experiences without the constraints of external requirements that stifle creativity and individualized approaches.

After years of teaching in public schools, private institutions, and even working to establish Waldorf schools, I've discovered that homeschooling is truly a place of educational freedom. 

Learn how to embrace this freedom and simplify your homeschooling so you can teach and lead with intention and love. 

Find the Show Notes here  https://artofhomeschooling.com/episode225/

Join the Inspired at Home Community

Get the Waldorf Homeschool Starter Kit here

Chapters

• 1:09 What education is really about, according to Rudolf Steiner
• 2:35 How I experienced the educational system on my journey
• 6:09 How educational institutions stifle creativity and individual learning
• 8:09 Why you shouldn't try to replicate school at home
• 9:30 Freedom thrives within a strong but simple structure
• 12:34 Homeschooling is a radical, beautiful act of choosing freedom for your family

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:09

You're listening to the Art of Homeschooling podcast, where we help parents cultivate creativity and connection at home. I'm your host, jean Miller, and here on this podcast you'll find stories and inspiration to bring you the confidence you need to make homeschooling work for your family. Let's begin. Hey there, homeschooling friend. Today we're talking about embracing the freedom that homeschooling friend. Today we're talking about embracing the freedom that homeschooling brings.

Speaker 1: 0:47

My own journey to homeschooling includes teaching in public schools, private schools and even working to help open a Waldorf charter school. But through it all I discovered something very powerful, and that is homeschooling is truly the last place of real educational freedom. There's a quote I come back to again and again from Rudolf Steiner, the founder of the Waldorf Approach. He said receive the children in reverence, educate them in love and send them forth in freedom. And to me that's what homeschooling at its best is really all about. So today I want to share a bit of my own story of choosing to homeschool really choosing again and again after teaching in classrooms, and how I discovered that freedom begins with rhythm, not rigidity. Let's explore what it means to truly embrace that freedom and how a simple, clear planning system or structure, sort of a framework, can help you live that freedom day by day. Live that freedom day by day. Freedom it's such a simple word but it carries the hopes that we hold for our children inside of it. In homeschooling we have a rare and really precious opportunity to live out Steiner's words and focus on reverence, love and freedom. So we have the freedom within homeschooling, as the leader in our homeschools, and then we want to invite our children to discover that for themselves. My journey to discovering educational freedom goes like this I got my undergrad degree in English and I went to work for a book publisher in New York City.

Speaker 1: 2:47

Everyone kept asking me what I was going to do with my English degree. They'd say are you going to teach? But I was convinced I didn't want to be a teacher. But after a few years I decided to go to grad school and get my teaching degree. My first job was teaching high school juniors and seniors in a large public school outside of Atlanta. I was so discouraged in that first experience by those teenagers, their lack of spark and curiosity. I went to work as an assistant in a Montessori three to six-year-old classroom. I felt like I needed to go back to the beginning and I also tutored a seven-year-old boy one-on-one in reading. The Montessori approach was the only alternative I knew of at the time. There'd been no mention of Waldorf education in my grad school program.

Speaker 1: 3:48

After I got married and our kiddos came along, I read an ad in the old print version of Mothering Magazine from a mom in my area who wanted to start a Waldorf school. I'd heard of it by that point because we had some friends. So it was like through friends of friends who were homeschooling their kiddos loosely based on the Waldorf approach. So I got together with this mother in my area. She had two kids at the time. I had two kids and off we went trying to start a Waldorf school. This school never got off the ground, by the way, because our children kept getting older and when they became school age we parents had to figure out what to do. Our family chose Waldorf-inspired homeschooling at that point.

Speaker 1: 4:40

During those early years I taught part-time at a small private girls' school in the afternoons, four days a week. Interestingly, that experience is where I developed my project-based learning approach. I had so much freedom to create my own curriculum in that small school. So when our oldest reached school age we started homeschooling and I gave up my part-time teaching job to embrace homeschooling. Now, after our third child was born, a group of parents started working on opening a Waldorf charter school here. This was a huge undertaking to open a public Waldorf school sponsored by an educational organization. We worked hard for five years and then that fell through due to so, so many bureaucratic constraints. I remember that spring when all that fell apart, right as I was beginning to wrap up our homeschooling year I had three kids at the time and we were beginning to plan for the next year and that's when it hit me. I had worked in every possible educational setting public school classrooms, private schools, I had tutored one-on-one, I had worked to try to open two different Waldorf schools and I had homeschooled my own kids.

Speaker 1: 6:09

I had this big realization that in any educational institution, even in Waldorf settings, external requirements and regulations can stifle creativity and really specifically individualized learning. In a homeschool setting we can truly reach the child in front of us right, not following any systems version of what education should look like. So when I was finally able to embrace this freedom of homeschooling, I felt so much more creative as a teacher and a guide for my children. Homeschooling offers us the freedom to shape our children's education and tailor the learning to their in approach, curriculum, pace of learning, giving us the flexibility and personalization that schools often lack. Now, I'm not saying that schools never work. I truly believe in educational choice and that we each get to decide at any given moment what will work best for our children and our families. But I do think it's important for us to acknowledge that homeschooling is a valid educational choice and something that can work really well for children. But here's the thing freedom can also feel really overwhelming without a clear, simple path forward. I get that, I felt that too, and here's the antidote. That antidote is the power of simplicity. So, rather than the myth of doing it all, embracing simplicity is what's going to help us move forward.

Speaker 1: 8:09

Many homeschoolers, especially those drawn to Waldorf, feel like they have to replicate a full classroom experience at home, and that can quickly lead to burnout, second-guessing ourselves or feeling like we're never enough, like we don't know enough and aren't doing enough. We even feel this way when we try to follow a purchased curriculum as it's written. But true educational freedom isn't about doing everything. It's about choosing intentionally and doing what matters most, because the truth is we can't do it all all at once. And I'll let you in on a little secret classroom teachers aren't doing everything either. That's a trap. We homeschoolers often fall into comparing what we're actually doing at home to what we think the classroom teachers are doing at school. Believe me, classroom teachers have to pick and choose lessons and activities just as we do, while also managing behaviors.

Speaker 1: 9:13

To me, the freedom that homeschooling really gives us is the opportunity to look at the children before us and bring them what they need. As Steiner said, we get to customize the curriculum to meet our children's and our family's needs. Simplicity is truly the answer. It starts with embracing our leadership role, observing our children and being willing to be decisive about what lessons and skills to focus on. Next, here is a mini mindset shift. For you, freedom thrives within a strong but simple structure, not a rigid schedule, but a living rhythm that you create. This is the idea that, between form and freedom, you will find your sweet spot. Now it does take the right tools. We wanna have the right tools in place to be able to embrace that freedom.

Speaker 1: 10:14

I spend a lot of my time these days mentoring homeschooling parents. I'm mentoring one-on-one inside the Inspired at Home community and at the summer Tepper teacher training, and I talk all the time about simplicity, how to scale back until it works, how to make some decisions ourselves about the flow of our year and lessons before consulting a curriculum, how to embrace the freedom of our choice to homeschool. So let me just remind you here that it took me years to embrace that freedom as a homeschooler, but once I did my kiddos and I really started to thrive. This is what led me to create the Waldorf Homeschool Starter Kit, because I wanna help homeschooling parents like you get to a place of freedom sooner than I did. Over time I learned that effective and joyful homeschooling does not mean following someone else's plan, but it also doesn't mean chaos. It means having a clear living structure that holds space for creativity and connection. That's exactly what the starter kit is designed to give you.

Speaker 1: 11:29

The starter kit is not a curriculum. It's a way to stay rooted in your values, simplify your planning and bring your unique homeschool vision to life without the overwhelm. It includes the Homeschool Simplicity Handbook, a set of beautiful planning templates and a video on how to bring it all together. You can find more details at artofhomeschoolingcom slash starter kit and I'll be sure to put a link in the show notes for this episode. If you're wondering how do I make all of this practical in my daily life, that's where the Waldorf Homeschool Starter Kit can be such a supportive companion. This starter kit is like a compass when the winds of self-doubt or comparison blow in. You'll have a clear direction, because when we simplify our days with intention, we create more space more space for love, for learning and, most of all, for freedom.

Speaker 1: 12:34

Here are just a few thoughts I want to leave you with. Homeschooling is a radical, beautiful act of choosing freedom for your family. You can trust yourself, you can simplify without relying on textbooks, workbooks and checklists. After all, we don't want learning to be abstract. We want to bring it to life with the lively arts and hands-on learning. Lively arts and hands-on learning. Just remember this mini mindset shift that I mentioned earlier on. Freedom thrives within a strong, simple structure, not a rigid schedule, but a living rhythm that you create.

Speaker 1: 13:16

As I reflect back on my own journey from classrooms to homeschooling, on my own journey from classrooms to homeschooling, I'm reminded that this education toward freedom is the gift of homeschooling, not a perfect curriculum, not a checklist. And homeschooling isn't about doing more. It's about being present, choosing love and honoring the sacredness of childhood. We can choose to embrace the freedom of homeschooling right now, in the heart of our homes. Thank you so much for joining me today and for choosing this homeschooling path, where love, creativity and freedom can truly thrive. You can find the show notes for this episode at artofhomeschoolingcom slash, episode 225. Until next time, remember you're not alone and you're doing important, beautiful work in this world. That's all for today, my friend, but here's what I want you to remember Rather than perfection, let's focus on connection. Thanks so much for listening and I'll see you on the next episode of the Art of Homeschooling podcast.