We have hugged our friends goodbye, thanked our teachers with gifts of thanks and appreciation and we are ready for summer to start!  As the school year comes to a close, I’m learning it's essential to take a moment to reflect on the past year's journey.

Reflection allows us to see things from a different perspective, appreciate our growth, and set the stage for a successful future.  In this journal entry, we'll explore the significance of reflection and provide a practical guide to help you make notes about what was important.  This will make it so much easier on your future self about what you want to remember for the upcoming back-to-school season.  Let's dive in!

Last week we wrapped up our hybrid homeschool school year and it feels good to be done and have a break.  All parents have a responsibility to their child’s education, but with the path we chose is a bit more hands on in some ways.  It’s been a bit exhausting, and it feels good to switch up to a different learning mode for the next few months.

By taking the time to reflect on the past school year, we can identify what worked well, what challenges we faced, and what lessons we learned along the way.  It allows us to celebrate our achievements, acknowledge areas for improvement, and ultimately grow as individuals.  I did a similar check-in with myself, at the end of the Christmas season.  To take a few moments to reflect and recap how this year went, and what I want to remember for fall.  Most importantly, I want to put things into perspective about what really mattered at the end of the year.

In talking it out with myself I came up with these main categories:

• Navigating friendships

• Plan our time better for exploring

• Implementing a better system for managing school work

• Celebrating what’s working

What to Love + Room to Grow

I’m starting with it's so amazing to see just how much the kids have grown in their learning and in their confidence.  Just them having these life experiences without us is pretty amazing.  And just I love to see that.  My heart was bursting the last couple weeks of school at drop off and pick up, seeing how they fit in to the group dynamics and the snippets of conversation I caught.  They are finding their own ways to navigate life and I want to keep being a strong support for them to know themselves better.

This has me thinking for the next year, what can we do to start out building friendships a little bit earlier?  We can't really believe it's the end of the year, and they want to set up play dates, and I don't know the parents super well (#introvert problems).  I know part of that is because at the beginning of the school year, there was still a range of responses to the pandemic which created awkwardness.  Now I get the vibe that people are becoming more receptive to socializing more like the “before times” now that the world is back to “normal” and people are way less weird about getting together.

When everything shut down, we were just getting to the age where we would start setting up playdates and making their own friends.  So, a reminder is that we all need practice learning how to interact with people and make decisions about if they would make a good friend.  As a parent, how do I help my kids recognize their values and seek out friendships that support them?  How do *I* navigate having conversations with other parents?

Being clear on the values I named while doing one of the exercises in the Illumination Kit helps keep us aligned with what matters and helps when putting our values in action.

Field Trip Fridays Anyone?

Next, I noticed I need a reminder that the year goes by really fast, and we didn't do all the things that we thought would be great to do with our homeschooling schedule. It makes me realize the importance of planning and scheduling for the upcoming year.  By organizing adventures and vacations in advance, we can avoid last-minute scrambling and create anticipation throughout the year.  The schedule for next year is published and we are already talking about what we want to do on some of our breaks.

Attending community events and experiencing the hidden gems aligns with our sense of fun enhances our homeschooling experience.  We did join some field trips that other parents had organized, but I'd really like to be the type of person who is setting some of those things up.  So as a reminder for fall, I really want to do that and to be more intentional about setting up those experiences that we're excited about and utilizing the freedom that our schedule has.  I have the list we started last year and will keep my eyes peeled for other fun and educational opportunities.

The Struggle Bus Stops Here

This was the first year homeschooling with two kids and I failed on a lot of fronts with that.  There were moments when I feel like I was letting the kids down.  I wasn't helping them know what their responsibilities were for the week and map out a plan because I got busy with my other passions. 

My biggest struggle is staying on top of the homework.  I have to admit to myself that I need a system and a routine to follow.  This pains me a bit because I really like to think that I am fun and spontaneous and somehow it will all easefully get done.  Instead, there was more friction and frustration that left us feeling unprepared for some of our in-person school days.  That could have been reduced with better planning on my part. 

Having a system will make me feel more confident that I'm doing what I'm supposed to do too.  We managed it all fine, but it wasn’t a way for us to thrive and enjoy our homeschool journey. 

Welcome to the Sh!t Show

For fall, we will need a better system for managing assignments and knowing where our materials are.  We will need to look at having a designated space to do the work to improve our focus.  Now that I have a better understanding of how my mind works, I now have an eye on a supply cart that could maybe help.  I’m a piler and the cart we were using just turned into a black hole.  I also want to have a better method for organizing our staff to go out the door to avoid last minute scrambles for binders, stuffies and lunches.  Knowing how that didn’t work for us is where I can focus for next year.

In addition to managing our physical stuff, I need to look at managing our time and energy.  Now having this understanding of when we generally actually get stuff done versus naively thinking each week that THIS will be the week we plan it out better will help set better expectations.  Naming this will prompt me to look ahead at the curriculum and know what they're studying next.  Then I can get a book about it, or come up with a craft, or something to reinforce what they're learning.  I know Pinterest has tons of resources to easily pull from. 

Since our youngest will be repeating material that older brother did two years ago, that will be a slight help but I will need help coming up with a better plan to work with each one individually.  And again, keeping in mind, it'll be two kids in two grades again.  Reminding myself that I will need to develop our schedules around that will really help us keep a little bit more in alignment.  

What’s Been Awesome

Something that worked to make drop-off smoother, especially on nervous mornings, was raising our vibration on the drive there.  Sometimes mornings start out with someone waking up on the wrong side of the bed, and having lots of feelings about going to school.  I’ve learned what works well for us is listening to an episode of Wow in the World.  It’s a kid-focused science podcast with a peppy theme song, off-beat characters and some wacky facts.  It helps shift their thoughts and generally gets them out of the mood they are in and in a better state to learn.  I love being wacky with them and gives us some inside jokes to talk about later too. 

Another thing I learned that it was helpful for me was to keep a book in the car for pickup and drop-off.  There are usually (ahem, cough) a few extra minutes where we get there early, or the kids want to talk to friends after school or we would sit and play Pokemon Go before heading in or going home.  Those are a few minutes where I could sit and read my book, instead of pulling up my phone, or getting irritated that we were still sitting there and I was ready to go home.  

So that was a practice that I built with a short book that I was really interested in reading, but helped me to digest it better in my small pockets of time that would normally be wasted.  It worked well as a transition moment to shift gears and be more present in the next shift in my day.  This was a practice that I want to keep up for the fall.

Put into Practice

Now it’s your turn.  To make the most of your reflection process, think through how you expected the year to go and how you felt it went.  This isn’t just about how it went for your child, this is about how it went for you as a grown up with a school age kid. 

Even if you don’t have kids, the start of summer can be a good time to reflect on the first half of the year.  What went well, where did you struggle, what do you anticipate next year to look like and where can you better prepare yourself for a successful fall?

The best ways for me to tame the swirl in my head is to either write it out in my journal or take myself on a walk & talk.  This is where I take a walk and talk things out with myself out loud (yes really). It doesn’t have to be a whole thing, but give yourself at least 15 minutes to get some thoughts out and have some space to let other things bubble up.

Ask yourself these prompts-

• What went well?

• Where is there friction in our schedule?

• What do I anticipate being an issue next year?

• How can I use the summer to prepare for fall?

You can go one step further and ask these questions to your children and get their input.  It’s a good way to instill a sense of continuous improvement and doing things that your future self will thank you for.

Get to Know Yourself

Take the time to reflect.  Then either summarize your thoughts into highlights or take your answers and put them somewhere that you will remember to reference at the end of summer.  For me, I have my notes from my walk & talk and I will take my action items and summarize them down to bullet points.  Then I will put it in our school cabinet so that when the supply lists come out and I load in the new books, I’ll have these reminders ready for future me to put into action. 

Put your responses somewhere you will find them for fall. Stuff it in the pocket of a fall jacket, clip into your planner or put in a place you will visit once you start gathering back-to-school supplies.

High Five From Your Future Self

Your future self will really appreciate these notes to look at when you start to shift gears toward new school year and goals of finishing the year strong.

Taking the few moments to reflect now, while everything is fresh now will make it incredibly valuable to your future self, knowing it came from lessons in the moment.  I can easily imagine myself totally forgetting the subtleties and emotions of what I’m feeling in these transition moments.  Having this to look back on instead of trying to think of what was important to me as this version of myself will be so helpful. 

This will make the next leg of your journey that much better because you will be fortified with the knowledge of what’s important from your lessons learned.  You will feel much more confident starting the year and choosing the direction of your future with the confidence of your past.  You can be more intentional about where your journey is going, and how you spend your time.  Your future self is already thanking you for the magic you are capturing now.

Rinse and Repeat

This is a practice I encourage you to do at the end of any other season, milestone or transition point in your life.  

• Your birthday

• Anniversary

• End of school year

• After vacation

• Completing a goal

• End of the month or season

I followed this practice at the end of the Christmas season, reminding myself of what was really important, what were my favorite memories, so that when it comes back around, I don't get swept up into the season.  I’ll be able to remember what was important, what I might want to try again this year and what felt like a waste of time, so that this next season can hold even more magic.

If you've taken that time to pause and absorb the lessons from your life experiences, then it can go into your personal guidebook for life.  Use your reflections to set meaningful goals and create a map that will guide you along the way.  By harnessing the power of reflection, you're equipped to make the most of the your life’s journey and create an amazing experience for yourself.  Embrace the process of reflection, and let it inspire your next adventure in living a life that lights you up!

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Stephanie Rose is a mom, wife, business owner and a forever student in finding ways to know herself better. She acts as guide for your own journey, sharing insights, tools and practices to help you remember your magic and live a life that lights you up. Sign up for her newsletter and check out her free resources.

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