Hope Pixie sat her computer trying to focus on her math lesson but objects outside the window right next to her pulled her mind in a different direction. I watched her, waiting to see what she would do.
School had let out early here on post in Maryland for the promise of snow, though at the time it had not yet fallen and would bring us in the end little more than an inch. Children where on the play ground just feet from home.
She looked at her screen, and back out the window and then back to the computer and tried to go faster. Hitting the keys all the harder. Big white fluff balls started to fall outside as I watched and waited. The kids outside shrieked with glee and this pulled my daughter attention back out to the window. She stood up and watched. She was near bouncing up and down. She turned to look at me, and I looked down trying not smile.
“Snow Day?” She asked quietly, knowing I had noticed.
“Course” I said.
“SNOW DAY” She yelled and from around the courner her little brother ran to see the fun. No more homeschooling for the afternoon. Out they went, to play with friends and run in the falling snow. Lessons to be finished in PJs that night, warm and ready to refocus.
This is one of the reasons I love homeschooling. We can gift our children time to be children. Time to experience the world not behind a desk or stuck in 4 walls day in and day out. Not all schools got out, not all kids could afford to go out and not do homework just then.
What I learned though is that there are now groups of homeschoolers not even able to take this break, school at home programs like K12 would not allow a snow day, not even if all the schools where out for the day. Another thing for me to remember when next I toy with the idea of such a program. We need freedom to play in the snow, when ever it falls, when rarely it does!
My son is NOT the one on the roof! LOL