Midsummer Vacation

Three people responded to my recent post about the current challenges with my restless and unhappy kiddos. All were teachers. All said I could blame it on midsummer, when kids begin to miss the routine of school.

Miss school?

They only went 2 times a week for nine months, their very first real experience of school. How can it have become so ingrained in them already?

But I think my friends are correct.

Because of course, during the inertia, malaise, and discontent of the last few days (which has, thankfully, at least partially abated), one of the kiddos asked me, "When are we going back to school?"

I guess we all got pretty used to our school routine. I know I miss the 6 hours a week I'm alone in the house doing whatever needs doing (or not doing anything that needs doing). In fact, they think of school, particularly their teachers, quite often and have been making lists of experiences they want to record in their "What I Did This Summer" books we're making specifically to share with their teachers. They have no concept of summer, really, and keep hoping to go back and see everyone soon. And as much as I can overlay schedule and routine on our summer days--field trips, playdates, "Pajama Friday"--it still isn't school.

I know that soon, probably sooner than I wish, my kids will think of summer as a wonderful break from school which they will likely come to detest (not preschool, I think, but my teacher-friend says it is observable in her first graders, which seems earlier than when I was a kid--but then I loved school. Just makes me sad, especially because it is where kids spend the majority of their time). I know others want to get rid of summer break (to solve low test scores, childcare problems, summer "slippage," and to compete internationally), and I would be all for it, if schools in this country were in general worth being at year-round (and I don't, for the record, lay the fault at the feet of teachers, for the most part, but a combination of them, government, school administration, and even parental expectations. In a pessimistic mood, I favor homeschooling; when I'm optimistic, I'm going to be an involved parent who changes the world one school at a time!). But the American school epxerience isn't structured like European or Asian schools; American students get less creative time and freeplay (especially recess), with all the emphasis on tests and scores, which, ironically, is probably the real reason our kids score so low and so desperately need a summer break.

So for now, I'm thrilled that all my kids can think of during these not-quite-dog-days of summer (it's not quite 75 here today) is school. And I hope their love of school lasts a long time . . . even despite school itself.