Home school resource, setting up and properly managing your homeschooling and curriculum is vital.
Education News
Sentinel & Enterprise – FITCHBURG — The Fitchburg Art Museum will offer a free workshop for teachers entitled “Conjuring the Civil War: The Civil War Remembered”, from 3 to 5 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 25, at the museum, located on Merriam Parkway. Learn how to use photographs
For more information: used homeschool curriculum
KidsTheFun The brain is like a muscle — you use it or lose it. During summer vacation is your child “losing it”?
Picture two different athletes. Athlete A is on a schedule where she trains ten months and then takes two months off. Athlete B trains year round. When Athlete A goes back to training after her two months of being a couch potato, she’s going to feel sluggish, slow, and frustrated, while Athlete B is still in prime shape.
So, how do we, as parents, keep our children’s brains in tip-top shape? Exercise your children’s brains with these activities.
Writing Skills: Do your children have a favorite series of books, like The Magic Tree House or Harry Potter? They can write the next book in the series! Brainstorm the plot with your children. Provide them with a special notebook for writing the story — and let their imagination take them on a journey. A chapter each week will really add up!
Reading: Enroll your children in your local library’s summer reading program. These reading programs reward children for reading during the summer months, and are usually free to join. If your library doesn’t offer a summer reading program, contact your local bookstore. Or make your own reading contest. Simply draw a chart with rewards at different levels. Every time your children reach a new level on the chart, celebrate their accomplishments!
Math: The easiest and most delicious place to incorporate math is in the kitchen. Doubling recipes, figuring fractions, adding, subtracting — plus the experiments are yummy! It doesn’t get much better than that.
Logic Skills: Teach your children the classic card games like Uno, Go Fish, Old Maid, Crazy Eights. Older kids can learn the basics of Poker and Gin Rummy.
Music: Introduce your children to new styles of music on a regular basis — Classical, Reggae, Jazz, Blues, Opera, Soundtracks from Musicals, Classic Rock, Popular Music from the 60’s-90’s, Music from all over the World. Not only will it stimulate their minds, but it’s a lot of fun!
Art: Go to the library and find a great book about famous works of art. With your children, look through the book and ask them which pieces they like and why. Then, give them the opportunity to recreate the art they saw in the book, using whatever materials they’d like — chalk, paint, crayons, glue, etc. Your children will surely surprise you with their creativity.
Summer is a fun time of the year. Take these ideas and run with them. Not only will your children benefit from keeping their brains active and in tip-top shape, but you get the benefit of seeing their creative, brilliant minds at work. Have a great summer!
About The Author:
Visit http://www.ShowKidsTheFun.com and Free Online Preschool Themes (link
to http://www.showmomthemoney.com/homeschooling.asp ) for more fun ideas to spend time with your children.
Copyright ShowKidsTheFun – http://www.ShowKidsTheFun.com
For more information: homeschool worksheets
Saving Money on Preschool: Readiness Skills Needed for Kindergarten
by: Michelle Jones
As a mom of 4 who’s youngest child is about to start Kindergarten this Fall, I’d like to share with you some things I’ve learned about Preschool over the last ten years, along with a list of readiness skills every child can be learning at home – whether attending Preschool or not.
Preschools, especially those taught in a church environment, are a wonderful resource that help prepare children for regular school. Not to mention they also provide social interaction with children of the same age, and for a few hours each week, a much-needed break for Mom. Overall, we highly recommend them!
There’s just one catch – Preschool is expensive!
Though I truly enjoyed successfully homeschooling our first child for preschool in 1994, by the time our next child was ready for preschool (in 1998) I also had a toddler at home (our third child), and another shortly on the way. My husband and I decided it was definitely time for some help, and somehow we managed to put our second child through preschool, as well as the third. And the fourth – as I’ve already mentioned, will be graduating this year.
If you’d like to send your child to Preschool but would like to keep the costs down, try finding a school that offers just two days a week, that’s what we did. Of course homeschooling would cost even less, but we realize that’s not an option for everyone – especially working moms.
Whether you choose to home-preschool your child or send him/her to a local Preschool on a part-time basis, here’s a suggested list of academic, physical and social skills every preschooler should be learning. If your child will be attending Kindergarten in the fall it would be a good idea to continue working on these things over the summer. Kindergarten is a lot tougher than it was even a few years ago, so the more prepared your child is the better off he/she will be!
You will find that Kindergarten Readiness lists will vary but this is a great list that covers the basics.
Academic Skills
Physical Skills
Social Skills (These are always a work in progress!)
And a Note About Reading.
Depending on your local school system, children now begin reading in either Preschool or Kindergarten. It is very important that your child be familiar with the letters of the alphabet and if possible, even the sounds each one makes. Knowing the letters will make the transition to reading much easier.
Throughout the early school years, teachers will often remind you how important it is to read to your children every day. You can make it a special time by letting the child choose the book to be read, and ask them questions about the story as you go – this will also help them develop good comprehension skills, which are needed throughout life.
Enjoy these early years together, they grow up so fast!
Copyright 2004 by Michelle Jones
|
About The Author Michelle Jones, author of Dealing with Debt and publisher of Living a Better Life: The Money-Saving Tips Ezine, is a frugal mother of 4 who’s dedicated to helping families live a better life, not by spending more money, but less! If you’d like a free subscription to her monthly Ezine please visit www.BetterBudgeting.com for more information. |
For more information: homeschool
Author Interview: Mommy Come Home
The New Trend to Tradition:
Bringing Up Your Own
Interview with Sandra Gillmore conducted by Lisa Hendey
In her new book Mommy Come Home, author Sandra Gillmore strongly advocates the role of full-time motherhood. Some may disagree with the books premise that mother should eschew career and stay home with children (in lieu of day care or even dad or a relative providing in home care). I found the value of this book to be for readers who have chosen the stay at home route and are seeking support and encouragement in this decision. Sandra Gillmore shares a veterans experience and perspective and has so many wonderful tips and suggestions to share. Women choosing to voluntarily walk away from careers to pursue the vocation of motherhood are often met with resistance, financial concerns and a lack of support. A new mother may find herself isolated and uncertain as she attempts to ascertain her new identity in life. Mommy Come Home is a great tool for women facing or considering such transitions. Sandra Gillmore gives readers many pearls of wisdom to aid them in the journey of parenthood.
LH: Sandra Gillmore, author of Mommy Come Home, thanks for your time and for participating in this Book Spotlight feature. Could you please tell our readers a little bit about your background and your family?
As a single person, I worked in various office positions, and prayed for the Lord to send me a devoted Christian husband. God powerfully answered my prayers to the point that I wrote a song for Dave entitled, “You are the Answer to My Prayers.” Dave and I have been married for 20 years and we have been blessed with ten children, ages 19 down to 1 year in age. We both shared the vision for a large family and grew into the homeschool lifestyle. Over the years we’ve opened our home to exchange students, foreign refugees, college renters and the mentally ill. Currently our quiver is full of our own family members! Our children are very active in sports, music and scouts. I get involved with fundraisers and love to cheer them on in their activities. I enjoy singing for church which occasionally includes weddings and funerals.
LH: Sandra, what is the main message of Mommy Come Home and what prompted you to write the book?
Mommy, Come Home is my love letter to all moms! I’ve heard you stress-out on the soccer fields. I’ve seen you cry at church from the pressure. You told me I was lucky I could stay home. I’ve tried to console you through the rat race. I’ve prayed for you. But I never wanted to hurt your feelings. I never had the courage to tell you what was on my heart through the Holy Spirit’s leading. The message of Mommy, Come Home is that God is calling each mother to embrace her vocation to motherhood. This is your call that no one else can replace as God intended. (Not even grandma or daddy.) You have been given special gifts to share with your children in a most generous way. This world is not family-centered. The world wants to pull you away and make you too busy to effectively mother your children. Picture yourself ordering your favorite dessert in a restaurant only to have the waiter bring you one small bite! Wouldn’t you want more? ‘But it’s the highest quality of this dessert on the market, ‘the waiter tells you. Our children want and need more – not more stuff – more of our time. There is a way out of this madness. You have a choice.
LH: For families who have become reliant upon two incomes, can you offer some creative suggestions to help ease the financial transition when Mom decides to stay home full time with the children.
By eliminating, in large part, the extraneous expenses of working outside the home (such as more gas, wear and tear on your vehicles, or even the need for an additional vehicle, business attire, fast food, childcare) and adding an enormous tool called flexibility to your schedule, you will be set up for a new way of thinking and spending. The focus is on saving instead of earning. Simplicity is the key. Try asking yourself, ‘Is this a need or a want?’ whether it’s a new home, car or a toothbrush. (i.e.: do you really need the $5 variety or will the 88 cent version do the job?) Try drinking filtered water (from your own filter if possible.) Milk, juice and soda are quite costly and don’t offer much in the way of nutrition. Good quality vitamins can prevent a lot of expensive and time-consuming trips to the doctor. Consider shopping at various discount stores and make home-made cooking a top priority. Nothing has to be fancy. Instead of buying ingredients for a recipe, just buy whatever is on sale and then cook accordingly when you get home. If we need fresh produce, for example, I come home with whatever fruit is on sale for that week. This is a great way to keep more variety in your kitchen too.
For vacations, state and national parks are a treasure to behold. If you bring your own food you’ve already saved a bundle of money. Just pack the cooler(s) and you can make great day trips or camp, or even rent a housekeeping cabin. It’s incredibly less expensive than motels and amusement parks. And what could be more exciting than exploring ‘God’s playground?’ For other entertainment, don’t forget the library. Many libraries offer free concerts and other entertainment. Also, local museums and zoos almost always offer a family membership. This is usually a wonderful bargain for a family. Make use of this and you won’t fall prey to the lure of the expensive entertainment industry, which is usually full of negative messages that conflict with our Christian faith anyway.
Don’t be afraid to accept hand-me-downs, shop at thrift shops or garage sales for clothes or other items. There are some great discount stores around too if you make it a point to scout them out. I personally don’t enjoy shopping because it is so time-consuming. However, I make a point to shop during low-traffic times and that makes a huge difference. It’s the flexibility factor that will prevent you from feeling rushed all the time and missing out on bargains.
LH: Many “Stay at home” moms feel isolated and lonely. What proactive steps can they take to help themselves overcome these feelings?
Satan loves Christians to become isolated. Then he can trap you into thinking ‘no one understands me,’ etc. Don’t even give him a chance! REACH OUT! Whether you are new to a community or have just been pulled out of a huge social circle in order to stay home, you simply must find ways to be involved. For example, I have hosted lady’s Bible studies and support groups just by listing an ad in our church bulletin. Sometimes only one mom has called – but that was all I needed to make a new friend at the time. Then it would grow. You can join a group like I started, or find a local MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers,) La Leche League (breastfeeding support group,) or volunteer for something at church that may be just a few hours per month. Read your local newspaper; look on the internet for local church or community activities. Get involved in politics. You may be nervous at first but reaching out is essential and will bring you many blessings in new friendships. But remember that God and family come first. We don’t need to be supermoms and burn ourselves out. But we definitely need to be supported by and supportive to other moms and people in general.
LH: What role has your Christian faith played in your decisions to be home full time and to homeschool your children?
so that they (the older women) may train younger women to love their husbands and children, to be sensible, chaste, busy at homeTitus 2:3-5 (New American Bible)
I think the Lord says in His word that he prefers mothers to be busy at home. Other versions of the Word say ‘Keeper of the home’ or ‘good homemakers.’
The decision for me to stay home came when my husband and I became engaged. He felt very strongly that my role in the home was essential for a strong family to take hold. He felt that God would bless us if we honored him by this devotion to the mother’s role. We both loved the prospect of having a large family and I couldn’t see the point of bearing a child and giving birth only to leave the child entrusted to someone else’s care. It didn’t make sense. The entire pregnancy is a bonding experience for an important purpose. It is a beautiful beginning to a lifelong relationship with your child.
Although we do not currently homeschool all of our children, I do believe home schooling gives us the most generous opportunity to fully instill our values into our children’s hearts and minds. Homeschooling was still a relatively new idea when we started about 11 years ago. Dave had close friends he admired who homeschooled their children. I thought it all sounded very strange at first. Another family took our advice to home school (even though we didn’t do it yet!) and we were amazed at how intimately peaceful and joyful their home had become since starting.) Then we attended a large home school convention and it was very evident that these hundreds of families were bringing up their children to serve the Lord in a very powerfully practical way. It is more than just an educational movement. It is a way to bond with your children; to have the time and flexibility to demonstrate the faith on a daily basis. And for those naysayers who think the home is not ‘real world’, I say, ‘What is real within our families becomes real within our world.” Currently we have three high schoolers in the public school system who are thriving with prayer clubs and evangelizing when opportunity arises. We home school our four middle children and two of them also attend a church preschool three mornings a week for 3 hours a day. Our toddler is also home full-time.
LH: Congratulations of the publication of this, your first book! What a tremendous accomplishment! Are you currently working on any new writing or creative projects?
Thank you so much. It has been truly exciting to watch the Lord open doors on what otherwise would seem impossible or just plain ridiculous. I have felt called to write a book about special needs families. We have not been blessed with a special needs child, but I have a friend who is legally blind and the mother of nine children. Her family includes two sets of twins, one autistic child, one nearly deaf child, and four vision-impaired children. The book will be about her and some other families that share their experiences and faith-growth through their special needs situations.
LH: What resources can you recommend for new moms?
I highly recommend ‘Family Foundations,’ a publication of the Couple to Couple League. (http://www.ccli.org/) So many moms are told that the number one priority after giving birth should be birth-control. I do believe in child-spacing but so often mothers are discouraged from having more than two children these days, the ‘accepted norm.’ If we truly open our hearts to another child, we have more reason to want to stay home because more souls are depending on us. We also are being more open to our husband, accepting both the potential for life and the pleasure of the marriage act. This method of ‘natural family planning’ automatically builds mutual respect and self-giving in the marriage, which is so much-needed today.
Catholic Familyland (http://www.familyland.org/Home.htm)- an awesome family vacation/retreat experience, an apostolate devoted to teaching the true faith by way of books, tapes and videos from top authorities such as Cardinal Arinze, Pope John Paul II, Scott Hahn, Mother Teresa, etc. In addition, they have their own TV network which is on a satellite with many other Christian stations and costs only $11.99 per month. We love this place. I can’t say enough good about it.
Focus on the Family (www.family.org) is a wonderful resource for all sorts of parenting tips. And don’t forget the Bible. It’s full of proverbs and other parental advice for the finding.
LH: Thank you again Sandra for your time and for sharing your book. Are there any closing thoughts you’d like to offer?
The revival doesn’t begin only at church. It begins in the home. Home is not an escape from the world. It’s a foundation to build the values of our faith. Then we must share that faith with the world. One family at a time. Thank you, Lisa for this opportunity to share from my heart to other moms. I pray the book will be used as an instrument of hope and healing to every family’s mother that reads it.
For more information or to order Mommy Come Home visit http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1594675627/digitalcropper-20
Copyright 2004 Lisa M. Hendey
The New Trend to Tradition:
Bringing Up Your Own
Interview with Sandra Gillmore conducted by Lisa Hendey
In her new book Mommy Come Home, author Sandra Gillmore strongly advocates the role of full-time motherhood. Some may disagree with the books premise that mother should eschew career and stay home with children (in lieu of day care or even dad or a relative providing in home care). I found the value of this book to be for readers who have chosen the stay at home route and are seeking support and encouragement in this decision. Sandra Gillmore shares a veterans experience and perspective and has so many wonderful tips and suggestions to share. Women choosing to voluntarily walk away from careers to pursue the vocation of motherhood are often met with resistance, financial concerns and a lack of support. A new mother may find herself isolated and uncertain as she attempts to ascertain her new identity in life. Mommy Come Home is a great tool for women facing or considering such transitions. Sandra Gillmore gives readers many pearls of wisdom to aid them in the journey of parenthood.
LH: Sandra Gillmore, author of Mommy Come Home, thanks for your time and for participating in this Book Spotlight feature. Could you please tell our readers a little bit about your background and your family?
As a single person, I worked in various office positions, and prayed for the Lord to send me a devoted Christian husband. God powerfully answered my prayers to the point that I wrote a song for Dave entitled, “You are the Answer to My Prayers.” Dave and I have been married for 20 years and we have been blessed with ten children, ages 19 down to 1 year in age. We both shared the vision for a large family and grew into the homeschool lifestyle. Over the years we’ve opened our home to exchange students, foreign refugees, college renters and the mentally ill. Currently our quiver is full of our own family members! Our children are very active in sports, music and scouts. I get involved with fundraisers and love to cheer them on in their activities. I enjoy singing for church which occasionally includes weddings and funerals.
LH: Sandra, what is the main message of Mommy Come Home and what prompted you to write the book?
Mommy, Come Home is my love letter to all moms! I’ve heard you stress-out on the soccer fields. I’ve seen you cry at church from the pressure. You told me I was lucky I could stay home. I’ve tried to console you through the rat race. I’ve prayed for you. But I never wanted to hurt your feelings. I never had the courage to tell you what was on my heart through the Holy Spirit’s leading. The message of Mommy, Come Home is that God is calling each mother to embrace her vocation to motherhood. This is your call that no one else can replace as God intended. (Not even grandma or daddy.) You have been given special gifts to share with your children in a most generous way. This world is not family-centered. The world wants to pull you away and make you too busy to effectively mother your children. Picture yourself ordering your favorite dessert in a restaurant only to have the waiter bring you one small bite! Wouldn’t you want more? ‘But it’s the highest quality of this dessert on the market, ‘the waiter tells you. Our children want and need more – not more stuff – more of our time. There is a way out of this madness. You have a choice.
LH: For families who have become reliant upon two incomes, can you offer some creative suggestions to help ease the financial transition when Mom decides to stay home full time with the children.
By eliminating, in large part, the extraneous expenses of working outside the home (such as more gas, wear and tear on your vehicles, or even the need for an additional vehicle, business attire, fast food, childcare) and adding an enormous tool called flexibility to your schedule, you will be set up for a new way of thinking and spending. The focus is on saving instead of earning. Simplicity is the key. Try asking yourself, ‘Is this a need or a want?’ whether it’s a new home, car or a toothbrush. (i.e.: do you really need the $5 variety or will the 88 cent version do the job?) Try drinking filtered water (from your own filter if possible.) Milk, juice and soda are quite costly and don’t offer much in the way of nutrition. Good quality vitamins can prevent a lot of expensive and time-consuming trips to the doctor. Consider shopping at various discount stores and make home-made cooking a top priority. Nothing has to be fancy. Instead of buying ingredients for a recipe, just buy whatever is on sale and then cook accordingly when you get home. If we need fresh produce, for example, I come home with whatever fruit is on sale for that week. This is a great way to keep more variety in your kitchen too.
For vacations, state and national parks are a treasure to behold. If you bring your own food you’ve already saved a bundle of money. Just pack the cooler(s) and you can make great day trips or camp, or even rent a housekeeping cabin. It’s incredibly less expensive than motels and amusement parks. And what could be more exciting than exploring ‘God’s playground?’ For other entertainment, don’t forget the library. Many libraries offer free concerts and other entertainment. Also, local museums and zoos almost always offer a family membership. This is usually a wonderful bargain for a family. Make use of this and you won’t fall prey to the lure of the expensive entertainment industry, which is usually full of negative messages that conflict with our Christian faith anyway.
Don’t be afraid to accept hand-me-downs, shop at thrift shops or garage sales for clothes or other items. There are some great discount stores around too if you make it a point to scout them out. I personally don’t enjoy shopping because it is so time-consuming. However, I make a point to shop during low-traffic times and that makes a huge difference. It’s the flexibility factor that will prevent you from feeling rushed all the time and missing out on bargains.
LH: Many “Stay at home” moms feel isolated and lonely. What proactive steps can they take to help themselves overcome these feelings?
Satan loves Christians to become isolated. Then he can trap you into thinking ‘no one understands me,’ etc. Don’t even give him a chance! REACH OUT! Whether you are new to a community or have just been pulled out of a huge social circle in order to stay home, you simply must find ways to be involved. For example, I have hosted lady’s Bible studies and support groups just by listing an ad in our church bulletin. Sometimes only one mom has called – but that was all I needed to make a new friend at the time. Then it would grow. You can join a group like I started, or find a local MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers,) La Leche League (breastfeeding support group,) or volunteer for something at church that may be just a few hours per month. Read your local newspaper; look on the internet for local church or community activities. Get involved in politics. You may be nervous at first but reaching out is essential and will bring you many blessings in new friendships. But remember that God and family come first. We don’t need to be supermoms and burn ourselves out. But we definitely need to be supported by and supportive to other moms and people in general.
LH: What role has your Christian faith played in your decisions to be home full time and to homeschool your children?
so that they (the older women) may train younger women to love their husbands and children, to be sensible, chaste, busy at homeTitus 2:3-5 (New American Bible)
I think the Lord says in His word that he prefers mothers to be busy at home. Other versions of the Word say ‘Keeper of the home’ or ‘good homemakers.’
The decision for me to stay home came when my husband and I became engaged. He felt very strongly that my role in the home was essential for a strong family to take hold. He felt that God would bless us if we honored him by this devotion to the mother’s role. We both loved the prospect of having a large family and I couldn’t see the point of bearing a child and giving birth only to leave the child entrusted to someone else’s care. It didn’t make sense. The entire pregnancy is a bonding experience for an important purpose. It is a beautiful beginning to a lifelong relationship with your child.
Although we do not currently homeschool all of our children, I do believe home schooling gives us the most generous opportunity to fully instill our values into our children’s hearts and minds. Homeschooling was still a relatively new idea when we started about 11 years ago. Dave had close friends he admired who homeschooled their children. I thought it all sounded very strange at first. Another family took our advice to home school (even though we didn’t do it yet!) and we were amazed at how intimately peaceful and joyful their home had become since starting.) Then we attended a large home school convention and it was very evident that these hundreds of families were bringing up their children to serve the Lord in a very powerfully practical way. It is more than just an educational movement. It is a way to bond with your children; to have the time and flexibility to demonstrate the faith on a daily basis. And for those naysayers who think the home is not ‘real world’, I say, ‘What is real within our families becomes real within our world.” Currently we have three high schoolers in the public school system who are thriving with prayer clubs and evangelizing when opportunity arises. We home school our four middle children and two of them also attend a church preschool three mornings a week for 3 hours a day. Our toddler is also home full-time.
LH: Congratulations of the publication of this, your first book! What a tremendous accomplishment! Are you currently working on any new writing or creative projects?
Thank you so much. It has been truly exciting to watch the Lord open doors on what otherwise would seem impossible or just plain ridiculous. I have felt called to write a book about special needs families. We have not been blessed with a special needs child, but I have a friend who is legally blind and the mother of nine children. Her family includes two sets of twins, one autistic child, one nearly deaf child, and four vision-impaired children. The book will be about her and some other families that share their experiences and faith-growth through their special needs situations.
LH: What resources can you recommend for new moms?
I highly recommend ‘Family Foundations,’ a publication of the Couple to Couple League. (http://www.ccli.org/) So many moms are told that the number one priority after giving birth should be birth-control. I do believe in child-spacing but so often mothers are discouraged from having more than two children these days, the ‘accepted norm.’ If we truly open our hearts to another child, we have more reason to want to stay home because more souls are depending on us. We also are being more open to our husband, accepting both the potential for life and the pleasure of the marriage act. This method of ‘natural family planning’ automatically builds mutual respect and self-giving in the marriage, which is so much-needed today.
Catholic Familyland (http://www.familyland.org/Home.htm)- an awesome family vacation/retreat experience, an apostolate devoted to teaching the true faith by way of books, tapes and videos from top authorities such as Cardinal Arinze, Pope John Paul II, Scott Hahn, Mother Teresa, etc. In addition, they have their own TV network which is on a satellite with many other Christian stations and costs only $11.99 per month. We love this place. I can’t say enough good about it.
Focus on the Family (www.family.org) is a wonderful resource for all sorts of parenting tips. And don’t forget the Bible. It’s full of proverbs and other parental advice for the finding.
LH: Thank you again Sandra for your time and for sharing your book. Are there any closing thoughts you’d like to offer?
The revival doesn’t begin only at church. It begins in the home. Home is not an escape from the world. It’s a foundation to build the values of our faith. Then we must share that faith with the world. One family at a time. Thank you, Lisa for this opportunity to share from my heart to other moms. I pray the book will be used as an instrument of hope and healing to every family’s mother that reads it.
For more information or to order Mommy Come Home visit http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1594675627/digitalcropper-20
Copyright 2004 Lisa M. Hendey
For more information: home program school
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Here’s the dilemma: You need to run several crucial errands, but you dread taking your preschooler and toddler along. Here’s another one: You’re working at home on a deadline, but your preschooler wants to play and your toddler will not take a nap. What about this: The sitter just called in sick, and you have a doctor’s appointment in an hour. Or even this: You and your spouse have not gone out alone since you had the baby over a year ago!
If you only had a reliable sitter for just an hour or two!
Smart moms — and dads! — have found the answer to the babysitting dilemma in a babysitting co-op. A co-op provides a sitter at just the crucial time they need to work at home, run an errand or go out at night.
A babysitting co-op consists of a number of families in a community who decide to share free babysitting among themselves. The co-op can be used for errands, doctor’s appointments or just some quiet time in a coffee shop. Parents who work at home can use their co-op for a few precious hours of total concentration on work. It allows parents to get something done or enjoy some free time without the hassle of finding a sitter and the expense of paying for one. The parents feel more comfortable knowing their children are watched by an adult they know and by someone with whom the children feel comfortable as well.
“Moms all over have discovered that best friends make the best babysitters,” says Gary Myers, author of The Smart Mom’s Baby-sitting Co-op Handbook (ISBN 0-9678748-0-7). The book is based on the University Place Babysitting Co-op near Seattle, Washington, established in the early 1980s, and comes with a companion kit that can be downloaded from http://www.BabysittingCoop.com for free.
A co-op requires little work to start or manage. In fact, any mom can invite a few friends over and start a co-op in one hour, according to Myers. For families new to an area, placing a few flyers in the community will attract those interested. Additional promotion and work are usually not necessary. Myers recommends keeping things simple in the co-op by establishing a rotating secretary position to coordinate the sits.
“The secretary keeps track of points and calls the mom with the biggest point deficit first to give her the chance to babysit and earn back points,” explains Myers.
This eliminates the need for chips that some co-ops use and prevents those in need of a sitter from having to make several frustrating calls. To keep co-op duties balanced, Myers recommends allotting extra points to the person serving as secretary and having the secretary position rotate monthly among members. With a membership of about 10 families, each member would have to serve as secretary only about one month a year.
“Our co-op provides affordable, reliable and available babysitters, as well as a way to connect with others in the community,” says Cheri Benz of Maroa, Ill., who started her co-op in conjunction with her playgroup. “My daughter enjoys playing with the other kids whenever I do a sit, which actually relieves me from having to be her exclusive playmate and entertainment.”
Best of all, work-at-home parents agree that a co-op allows them to plan their day better. Knowing they will have reliable sitters at a certain time lets them schedule those important calls when the house will be quiet or lets them focus on a crucial project without interruption.
However, even single parents or those who work traditional weekday hours can benefit from participating in babysitting co-ops. As a matter of fact, Babysitter Exchange at http://www.babysitterexchange.com was founded by parents such as these as an online service for parents who already know each other to create groups that schedule and trade babysitting time. Co-op groups come from the neighborhood, children’s preschool, local church, soccer team or any other established community group.
As with most co-ops, Babysitter Exchange uses a credit system. Unlike other co-ops, it eleminates the need for a secretary because it manages all the administration of the groups, such as member profiles, credit accounting, and email communications, via the Internet. For parents who do not have time to serve as secretary or to attend meetings, an online resource for babysitting has been very helpful, almost as helpful as the co-op itself.
“As a parent, whether working outside the home or not, you don’t get a ‘break.’ There isn’t any ‘off time’ at all,” says Danielle Lee, a working mother in Mission Viejo, California. “Having a support system is somewhat therapeutic for all.”
A babysitting co-op provides that support system crucial to any parent. Don’t wait until the next time you need a sitter, try solving your babysitting dilemma with a babysitting co-op today!
Carren W. Joye is the author of “A Stay-at-Home Mom’s Complete Guide to Playgroups” (ISBN 0-595-14684-8) and “Homeschooling More Than One Child: A Practical Guide for Families” (ISBN 0-595-34259-0). A homeschooling mom of four children, she has founded four successful playgroups and one homeschool support group. Visit http://www.onlineplaygroup.com for more information about playgroups.
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