Last week an online friend, Jo, posted in her Facebook group that there was going to be an online Montessori Summit with multiple speakers, specifically about homeschooling.   We were very Montessori-inspired when the kids were younger and so her post caught my eye. Her post, and the online course, came at just the right time for me as I was starting to consider what 2017 was going to look like for our home education journey and how I could shake it up and bring some more life to our year. I decided to investigate.

You need to understand that I’m quite wary about signing up for online training.  It really has to hit the spot and appear just when I need it to.  I was very lucky to do Jo’s My Organized Chaos course in it’s first iteration, and now thanks to that connection with Jo, the same can be said of the Trillium Montessori Homeschool Summit.  It looks like it will be hitting the right spot for me as well.

Spending money and being underwhelmed is one of my pet peeves, but I’m one video in to this course and champing at the bit to work my way through all of the others.  There are 14 video presentations across the entire course, most of which are close to an hour long.  I’m very happy that I will be getting great value for my money, even though I won’t necessarily need or implement ideas from all of the presentations.

Joining the summit reminded me that continuous learning and up-skilling is important for my professional development. Professional development — as in a full-time home educating mum, in this case.  I am, by nature, a constant researcher and reader but I tend to squish this in to the small corners of my life or note things to read later.  All of which means they aren’t given a high priority. So today I told my kids that they weren’t to disturb me until I came out of the study because I was doing some learning stuff.   In something of an ironic twist, the first video is all about the preparation of the adult and it reminded me over again that the best way for my kids to learn is to see me modelling learning.  (Amongst all the other things they learn by watching & then copying from us! Oh my!)

You don’t have to do paid courses if your budget can’t stretch to it.  There are plenty of great blogs out there that you can read and use for inspiration.  If you are a Montessorian or are inspired by Montessori practice, then you can always just read the Trillium blog and start from there.  The key is to take time out to focus on what you can improve on.  Your kids aren’t the only ones who should be learning and growing through your home education journey — you should too. It’s good for the mind. It’s good for modelling behaviour. It can re-instill confidence where it may have lapsed. It can give renewed focus to an area that may have fallen by the wayside.  If you’re home educating, the chances are that you understand the importance of continual education in an area that interests you.  And I bet you’re interested in how you can give your kiddos the best education you can.

So, do you regularly take time out to up-skill as a home educating parent?  If so, I’d love to hear what and how you do it.  If you don’t, why don’t you? I’d love to hear from you too.

Thanks for reading!