Avivah Werner

Sukkos roundup and getting back to routine

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sukka 1Another beautiful yom tov has come and gone!

It’s been two years since all of our children have been home for Sukkos.    I loved sitting around the table with everyone and particularly cherish our family time spent singing together.  I love, love, love this!

On Sukkos we celebrated dd13’s birthday, which means she’s now 14.  She was five when I started this blog.  How time flies, hmm?

Last week we also participated in a Sukkos lunch/chagiga for the English speaking families here in Karmiel.  We’ve had several of these type of events together with the goal of developing a sense of community: one person hosts and everyone brings a dish to share.  This time about ten families participated.  The food was wonderful, the company was wonderful, and the music and singing was wonderful!  Karmiel attracts really, really nice people.

On Simchas Torah, our older boys (ds21 surprised us by staying home instead of going back to yeshiva) danced up a storm.  Yirmiyahu (2) charmed the womens’ section by smiling, waving and blowing kisses each time he passed by in the arms or on the shoulders of yet another dancing brother.   Ds15 performed a feat that will leave people talking for a long time to come and caused my heart to go faint made me very nervous.  He told me afterward that when I was signalling him with my eyes to stop that my eyes were almost popping out.  Maybe that’s an exaggeration but maybe not.  🙂  He danced with someone much heavier than him on his shoulders – that sounds much less dramatic than it was.   All’s well that ends well.

Dh was honored with Chassan Bereishis on Simchas Torah and since here in Israel we only have one day yom tov, that meant that Friday we got busy baking for the kiddush on Shabbos!  My girls did a great job doing a lot of baking in a very short span of time while ds21 took down the sukka and got everything put away with ds12 (and a couple of younger boys to help, too)!  We hosted the kiddush with a friend whose husband was honored with Chassan Torah.  It was really nice.

Today was our first day back to our normal schedule.  As much as I loved the holidays, there’s something very grounding about getting back to a routine!  I started a new chore chart for this year but there wasn’t much time to get everyone used to it before the holidays.  So the excessive complaints this morning were predictable – as if they’ve never been asked to do these jobs before!  For me, I’m busy tackling Mount Washmore.  🙂

I’ve been thinking lots about our homeschooling focus for the coming year and determining what I want to adjust for each of the five kids who are homeschooling this year.  You might think that after so many years of homeschooling that I run on automatic but for me, running on automatic for an extended period isn’t a good thing.  It feels dry and uninspired.  It’s been very helpful and energizing for me to think through what I want to accomplish this year, what are my specific goals for each person and why.  The big picture always stays the same for me but the details of how to get to that goal often shift.

I was just contacted today by a writer for the Hebrew language Mishpacha magazine about doing an interview with them about homeschooling.  I always have a million and one thoughts on education and child raising, so we’ll see in what direction it goes!  I’d love suggestions from you about what kind of questions you’d want answered if you were reading this article.

I’m now looking forward to hunkering down in the long stretch between now and the spring and moving towards our homeschooling goals!

Avivah

Comments

7 responses to “Sukkos roundup and getting back to routine”

  1. Kaila Avatar
    Kaila

    As someone who grew up in Israel, I think the biggest issue Israelis have with homeschooling (and especially chareidi Israelis which is the clientele for the Mishpacha) is the social aspect (do they have friends), and doing things differently than everyone else.
    Also, how would you explain where you get materials for teaching?- I’m sure they won’t want to put anything about the internet in there.

    I’d love to read it! please let us know when it’s published!

    Reply
  2. Naomi Avatar
    Naomi

    I think for the average charedi Israeli Mishpacha reader, homeschooling is an idea that they have never heard of or considered in their entire life. So make sure that the whole concept is clearly explained.
    It would help them understand if you refer to the fact that traditionally Jewish girls were always homeschooled, and that the idea of a Bais Yaakov school only came about as an emergency response to the fact that public school had become mandatory for girls throughout Europe, leading to a situation where Jewish girls’ education was being taken over by non-Jews.
    At the time, there was fierce Rabbinic opposition to the idea of Jewish schools for girls, as the tradition was that Jewish girls should be taught primarily by their mothers. So really, you can say that you are not innovating anything or trying to be better than others, but rather returning things to the way they are meant to be. I think that’s an angle that people will relate to.
    Explaining why it’s better for boys will be harder, as boys schools have been around since the time of the Mishnah – though in those times they were controversial and be-dieved. It was understood until then that boys should also ideally be homeschooled. But that was a rather long time ago – even by Jewish standards 🙂
    Beyond that, this audience will want to know how you get your kids into good yeshivot and seminars – which is the be-all-and-end-all of all charedi education -since this is the ultimate decider of who they will marry (or so the wisdom goes).
    I’m extremely curious to read the article. Behatzlacha rabba!

    Reply
  3. Ja'el Batyah Avatar
    Ja’el Batyah

    Wow you have an amazing opportunity!!
    Is there a way to address the problem of: ” I can’t stand my kids at home I can’t wait for the chofesh to be over.. .etc I hear this from a lot of families and it is not one that should come out of the mouths of G-d fearing people.

    This to me is a terrible attitude that needs to be addresses for schoolers and non-schoolers. I wish parents would learn to love their kids and ot work out a routine with them s othat easing into chofesh mode is not fraught with resentment and stress

    Reply
  4. R Avatar
    R

    I was just discussing with my kids…now is the time when our homeschooling gets really “serious” …from now until Purim time 🙂 Enjoy getting back into routine! So happy that you guys had a nice chag. On a side note, I can’t believe you have been blogging for 8 years already, wow, time flies! thanks for opening your home to all of us and thank you for sharing your wisdom with us!!

    Reply
    1. Avivah Avatar
      Avivah

      R, you’re the longest reading blog reader of mine that I’m aware of! You were the mother of a very young and much smaller family way back then – a lot has happened in eight years! 🙂

      Reply
  5. Sara Avatar
    Sara

    My two big homeschooling questions are:

    1) how do you succeed to give enough one on one time to the big kids during study time, when you have a noisy and active toddler at home?

    2) is it really possible for boys to get the same level of limudei kodesh at home as they would get in school? When I look at how much torah, navi, mishnah, halacha, gemara my boys are getting (in elementary school) and these are topics that cannot really be studied independently, I wonder how it can work when homeschooling (once again, even seems harder with multiple kids of different ages that should be learning different topics / at different levels). I know that your sons do great in yeshiva after your homeschooling them, but it just seems to prove to me that they are really smart kids :~). Can homeschooling limudei kodesh be effective enough so that even average students dont lose out on the wealth of material they would normally get in school?

    I am really curious as to what you will say in general in the interview. Since I only get the English version of the Mishpacha, please PLEASE summarize in your blog.

    Thanks!

    Reply
    1. Avivah Avatar
      Avivah

      I appreciate all of the questions and feedback, thank you!

      I won’t be the only person interviewed for this article, so I’m thinking about what my most important points to contribute on this topic will be. If time allows, I’ll try to respond to some of these questions here.

      Sara, my kids are bright but I don’t attribute their academic success post homeschooling to that. It’s much more about other qualities that were directly developed during their homeschooling years.

      Reply

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