Commercial Urges in Homeschool Education

Posted in DemEd in Real LifeParentingTeaching on Feb 04, 2010 - 10:38 PM

I want to buy everything.

It's a good thing I don't have enough money to do just that, or our house would be filled to the roof with chemistry kits, pretend food, costumes, and pretty much every other educational (traditional or otherwise) item available for purchase. Some people love to buy shoes or clothes--my thing is books, stickers, lacing boards and the like.

Cognitively, I know that most of these things are a waste of money; the small Melissa & Doug beading set I just bought, for example (it was on sale!), could have easily been made with some plain cord and pony beads. Yes, my daughter loves it and has made several necklaces, but she would have loved choosing her own bag of beads just as much.

I'm continuing to read The Unschooling Handbook (and enjoying it for the most part), which strongly cautions against buying a bunch of junk that you don't need to supplement your child's education. Use all of the things that you normally use in daily life, the author advises. And I completely agree; today we learned quite a bit with some uncooked spaghetti noodles, the bathtub, some food coloring, paper and paint, library books, a board game, straws, our dinner, the cats, some yarn, a pair of scissors, glitter, a hole punch, paper clips, toothbrushes, a CD player, some hair scrunchies, and a few toys. And I have to admit, all of these things (save for the toys, which were all animals) would be in our home child or no child, homeschooling or not homeschooling.

That said, I've never had the urge to buy anything like I want to do with these activity sets, art kits, and science labs! Right now I really, really want a telescope, a couple of lab kits we saw at the hobby store, and two Klutz activity kits. I think it's simply time to start admitting that I want these things for myself just as much as I want them for my daughter, if not moreso! She would obviously be involved with whatever I purchase, of course; but she definitely has more of an interest in animals and manipulative art right now than, say, how to make your own invisible ink.

So how do I reconcile my wants with our needs, as well as the budget? Simply buying one special item a month would probably be okay. Looking up the ingredients in various kits and finding less expensive ways to do experiments and projects at home would also be helpful. And I could always ask for that telescope come Mother's Day...

Tags for this entry:
parent involvement, homeschooling and unschooling, school supplies,

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