Teach my kids full time, all year long.  Do it all alone.  It’s been said that this is what I’ll be taking on by removing my kids from institutional schooling.  Teach the two of them on my own?  I fully believe that I can’t.

More importantly, I shouldn’t.

So I won’t.

Teachers also can’t.  Not with 26 kids to educate.  And the administration knows that they can’t, and shouldn’t.  There is a reading specialist who pops in, or who pulls kids out.  A room parent who coordinates things.  Volunteers who cut out laminated shapes and collate supplies.

There’s a P.E. specialist who gives the classroom teacher a much-needed break.  And maybe even a music teacher a couple of times a week to share the load, and even leave room for a planning period.

And when the behavioral going gets rough, there’s a principal and/or a counselor to address matters.

In the worst case, the parent can be called to come get the child.

In my new role as roadschooling mother, I’m going to serve as principal, counselor, teacher, curriculum developer, reading specialist, P.E. teacher, music teacher, food service worker, nurse, bus driver, custodian, playground assistant, and media specialist.  For no pay.

It’s madness, right?  Doing all that alone?

Well, what’s great in all this is that I have seen teaching staff in their “trenches of France.”  I’ve seen how fried some of them get by the time May rolls around.  I’ve been a teacher…witnessing how instructors marked time in the months of December and June, because the holiday spirit and the prospect of significant vacation time loomed so large in the kids’ minds.

I know what fried crispy looks like.

And I can’t do it alone, so I won’t.  I won’t cover every base, dot every “i” and cross every “t.”  I will find out what the boys want to learn, and go for it in the most organic way possible, one that we can manage.  New places will pique new interests, so I’ll have to keep on my toes.

Part of the plan is seeking out the wisdom and input of others in the settings we experience.  If there is someone else, child or adult, who can share interests and model aptitudes for us, I will welcome the contact.  And if there’s someone who is excellent at chilling out, at just being there, I will especially welcome the skill share.  Part of unschooling is deschooling, getting rid of the teacher voice in my head, and finding all the many quieter ways of learning and knowing things.

Catherine Zeta-Jones sang “I Can’t Do It Alone.”  I think about the cabaret I did a few years back, performing songs from the hit musical Chicago.  Now, as I look at our calendar and make arrangements, I’ve got that number playing in the back of my mind.  With gratitude, I’ll be enlisting some serious community help when we take our show on the road.

“Now ya see me going through it!

You may think there’s nothing to it!

But I simply cannot do it…aloooooone…!”