Make A Memory with Back To (Home) School Traditions
How do you greet each new homeschool year?
Do you dress up?
Decorate?
Do you have a special breakfast?
Do you participate in a fun activity?
Whatever you do, be sure to make a memory.
Over at HCN’s sister website and YouTube channel, It’s Only Homeschooling, I share some of my family’s favorite ways to kick-start the new year!
Surrender
The decision to homeschool is never taken lightly. Like many other families, we too had our fears, worries, and doubts. Initially, even our son had to be convinced to give homeschooling a go! School outside the home was all he had ever known.
Before homeschooling, our son attended a private pre-K and a private kindergarten. I had even enrolled him in our local elementary school before being quickly convicted by the Holy Spirit that this was not the call the Lord had on our son’s life or ours. (To learn more about our family’s journey to homeschooling, check out my blog post here.)
Make A Memory
At Bennett Academy, we love humor and fun.
When we first began our homeschooling journey six years ago, my husband and I decided to do it with a bit of flare. At that time, our son was obsessed with Mary Poppins Returns. We watched the movie countless times and the soundtrack was always blaring in our home and our car.
Terrified but walking in obedience, we decided as a family to surrender our will and our lives to God. While we knew we did not know it all, we also knew we didn’t need to. When you’re starting at the bottom, there is nowhere to go but up.
What better theme for launching a new homeschool? A Bennett Academy annual tradition was born.
Traditions
From baptisms to graduations, traditions unite us. They connect us and mark moments, cementing events in our brains in the form of beautiful memories. They help us communicate what matters. They strengthen bonds. They renew our faith, in self, in one another, and ultimately in a power greater than ourselves to lean on, guide us, and carry us through when the days seem long and the years short.
Traditions matter.
Since our first year as a homeschooling family, we have continued some of our family’s favorite customs to help us celebrate the beginning of a new school year. While some rituals remain the same, a few have changed.
Here are just a few:
- We choose a new theme each year (usually something our son has been interested in lately)
- Hubby and I will decorate the door to our classroom and our classroom the night before once our son goes to bed
- We give a little basket of surprises for the first day (usually school supplies he can use throughout the year, new sensory fidgets to help with Sensory Processing Disorder and a new t-shirt)
- I wake up early on our first day to pick up a special breakfast of donuts from our local bakery
- I dress up in a funny costume to match the year’s theme (usually something I can wear multiple times throughout the year such as a t-shirt or the comfy Kirby sleeping onesie that I could live in)
- We make the first day all about FUN! We play games and ease into the new year
Two years ago, our family transitioned to a university-model school. As hybrid homeschoolers, our son attends classes on campus two days per week and completes the remainder of his work at home with us on the other three days of the week. Technically this means we now have two first days for school, our fun and easy tradition at home a few days before his official first day at the university-model school.
Make It Your Own
Celebrating the beginning of a new year does not have to come with a lot of expensive fanfare or elaborate Pinterest-worthy planning. In our homeschool, we value connection over curriculum and relationship over the traditional “r’s” of reading, writing, and arithmetic. Amusing anecdotes aside, nurturing our bond with our son and helping him grow in his relationship with the Lord is paramount.
More than anything, our children want our time. Our most valuable asset. Play a board game with them. Go for a walk in nature. Set up a silly scavenger hunt around the house with clues and have them find their school supplies, math facts, or memory verses. Build a fort out of blankets and couch cushions then crawl inside to read books together. Eat ice cream for breakfast.
Whatever you do, make a memory.
What To Expect From The Homeschool Counseling Network
HCN functions as a liaison between homeschooling families and professional helpers.
Our network consists of professionals in the areas of academic advising (career advising, transcripts, college transition, etc.), counseling (counseling, marriage and family, mental health, psychology, psychiatry, social work, etc), testing (assessment, interest inventory, testing, etc.), therapy (occupational therapy, physical therapy, and speech-language pathology), and tutoring (coaching, education).
To learn more about our Mission and Vision, click here.
To learn more about how The Homeschool Counseling Network plans to serve the homeschooling community, visit our About Page.
For professionals who are interested in joining The Homeschool Counseling Network, click here.
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Blessings,
Kimberly Bennett, LPC (TX LPC #80138)
Founder/CEO, It’s Only Homeschooling
Founder/CEO, The Homeschool Counseling Network
This website is not a professional counseling website and nothing here should be construed as professional counseling advice. Although Kimberly Bennett, LPC is a Licensed Professional Counselor, she is not your counselor, and no counselor-client relationship is established unless she has signed an agreement with you. All information provided through this website is for informational and educational purposes only.
