I’m tired of this cold weather and I’m thankful I live in an area of the country where winter comes for like one week of the year. The weatherman has predicted we will be back into the 70-80s by the end of the week and I cannot wait!

Tuesday we managed to not go outside but yesterday I couldn’t keep them inside. They were begging to go out. Going outside, however, was the LAST thing this Mama wanted to do. So I bundled them up and let them play on the deck while I watched them from the comfort of a heated house!

I snapped this picture with my phone just before they went out, and I love it:

The weather really isn’t the topic of this post. A mid-year homeschool assessment is.

It’s January so time to start thinking about next school year, right?! Well, I am because I love to plan ahead and have an idea of where we should go next.

Little Bug will turn five in May which means she officially starts Kindergarten this Fall!

My latest “homeschool revelation” (I guess you could call it?) is that there is no rush for Little Bug to learn to read.

Now before you start thinking that I am planning to leave academics alone and trust my kids will just pick it up along the way as we do life, that is not what I am saying at all. While I do believe some learning does happen best that way, my Type-A personality could never un-school without having nervous breakdowns that my girls aren’t learning anything.

I’ve just come to realize that maybe pushing kids to read in preschool and Kindergarten maybe isn’t best for some kids. And my Little Bug might be one of those kids.

I’m thinking about this from an educator’s perspective and from a mom perspective. And I know there are just some kids sitting in Kinder that just are not ready to learn to read! They still need to “be a baby”. To learn through simple play instead of being forced to learn to recognize letters and the sounds they make.

My aunt is a Kindergarten teacher and has been for over two decades now. While she was visiting during the holidays she told me there is a study out there that shows children who learn to read by age 3 are no better off by the time they are in 3rd grade than those that learn to read after age five. (If I have time to research and find a link to this study, I will, but since I am writing this and planning to publish it the next day, I doubt that is going to happen. So if anyone wants to post the link in the comments, that would be much appreciated. Thanks.)

When she said that to me, it resonated with me that there is no rush to get Little Bug reading.

If she is five and learns to read, awesome. If she is six, fine, even if she is seven or eight. No problem. There is no doubt in my mind that when it is time, Little Bug will take off and I will probably have to barely teach her as she will just pick it up and suddenly be reading words I had no idea she could read.

This has nothing to do with ability and instead has everything to do with timing.

There is a time for everything and, for some, learning to read at three (or even younger) is the perfect timing. But for others, learning to read closer to six, seven or eight is the perfect time.

But public schools all over America are saying kids need to read at an earlier and earlier age and that just worries me. I remember I learned to read in 1st grade. In the 1980s that’s when kids learned to read. In first grade. Then it was pushed back to Kindergarten. And now we have free VPK so kids can learn to read even earlier.

Do you know what homeschooling affords us?

I have the ability to teach Little Bug at her pace and I absolutely LOVE having that freedom that we wouldn’t have if I was sending her to public school this August.

When she is ready to start learning to read, we will start learning. Whether it be August of this year or March of next year! It doesn’t matter if we start in August or March. We start when she is ready.

So how do I know Little Bug’s not ready? Well, I’m going off her maturity level and, at this time, I don’t see her being able or interested in sitting down for a daily phonics lesson! The whole time she would be crawling up the table dreaming of making a fort and fighting the bad guys with the Ninja Turtles. Or she’d be waiting for the minute I said we were done so she could get down and go play dress up with her sister. Or she’d want to open her craft supply box and create to her heart’s content.

I just know in my gut, because I’m her mother, that she’s not ready.

Come to think of it, I’ve parented my girls this way from birth. I weaned them from the swaddle and the bottles when I knew they were ready for it. I let them cry-it-out to learn to stay asleep in order to get proper rest when I knew they were ready for it. I potty-trained Little Bug when I knew she was ready for it. And I’m waiting for that she’s-ready-for-it moment with Sweet Pea to potty-train her.

It’s all about being in tune to the specific needs of my children and moving them through the milestones of growing up when they are ready.

Learning to read is no different. Since I am homeschooling, I can teach them when I know the time is perfect for them!

So what am I planning for next year? I have a few ideas of where I’m going with both girls that I will share soon.

- Elaine