The Bookstack

This is the stack of books for My Second Son last year - his seventh grade stack. It's a LOT to get through in the course of one year. In my early years as a home educating mom, I thought that the boys would want to work ahead and finish their books early.  That's certainly how I would've done it! No. That's not how the men roll around this house. It's one day at a time, no extra book-sweat please, and out for the day. Unlike other homeschooling prodigies, no one around here ever started their own cottage industry, built solar panels just for kicks, or raised a flock of tame badgers as a personal  study in wildlife conservation. To quote my teenagers: "Dang It!" I really did want those things to happen; did long to be there when the drive to go above and beyond in their self-education switched on for the first time...Ah, well. They always perform well on standardized tests, and that has its own sort of value. I guess. But let the record show that I did aim higher than this!

All to get around to saying that My Second Son is  on his last book of the bookstack for eighth grade! This son does his work well without being hounded (angels singing hallelujah along with any other home-educating mom who will totally get this). He doesn't like to be nagged, so he does his job, lessons, with as little prompting as possible. This is A Wonder to me, since the other two are Initiative Challenged when it comes to school books.  In a sweet way. OK, it was not really sweet. At all.

Dear Middle Son is on the path to going out to public high school for his ninth grade year, so the one book in the bookstack is very meaningful.  I'm almost finished with his home education!!!!  Joy, sadness, anxiety, appreciation...more joy!  I'll only have one little boy left at home next year for schooling! And that will be weird. But good. Very good.