A major goal in our homeschooling experience is to make sure our children can function as independent adults when they leave home. To ensure they can handle adult tasks without calling mommy and daddy, we have them handle difficult tasks now.
One major adult task that our kids handle are family vacations. We give the children a budget and talk about where we want to go and leave the rest to the children. Frankly I think they do a better job than we do.
To plan a vacation, the children usually decide how much we have to spend on hotel rooms, and how much the activities we want to participate in will cost. They take in consideration the food budget (and are careful to get hotels with continental breakfast included). They use the Internet to search for vacation spots and make phone calls. When the time comes, they use our credit cards to make bookings (with our supervision, of course)!
Not all vacations come out completely rosy. Last year, when it was my son’s turn to plan a ski vacation, we were not aware that he really didn’t want to ski. When we got to our destination, we realized that he had actually planned a hiking vacation. In addition, since he wanted to bring the dogs with us, we found the hotel not up to our normal standards, as the better hotels would not accept dogs. We did however, have lots of money left over, and learned to monitor a little more closely. But we still had fun and everyone learned from the experience.
The last time my daughter planned a vacation, she chose a cabin figuring mom would get over her fear of the woods and have fun. My husband, the kids and the dogs had a great time. I however spent the nights watching the ceiling for spiders. But she knew what she was doing. (I’ve got to teach that child about the benefits of four-star!)
Right now, my son is planning a field trip. He mentioned yesterday that he wanted to visit the local Christian radio station for our next field trip. I just looked at him and said “make it happen”. Right now he is searching the Internet for their phone number.
So when you are homeschooling, remember to enable your kids to do tasks you would normally do for them. Allow them to make mistakes and even deviate from the plan a bit. They will learn from the experiences while they are young, and you will never worry about them when they are older! (Or perhaps you will worry less)
Read about Homeschool success stories on Families.com
*Have a question about homeschooling? Just ask.
*Want to know more about homeschooling? Start here!