Roadschooling

At the time we left for our roadtrip, we had six lessons remaining in our studies—Vikings and Transportation.

Normally, we would simply take a break from school while on vacation—obviously. But we had already taken…a lot…of time off from school this spring to tackle projects around the house, care for our spring babies, and travel. I found myself bumping up against a hard deadline. These unit studies needed to be completed within two weeks of our return because, right after Memorial Day, we would be starting two new units—with cousins joining us part time!

Since we would be spending so. much. time. in the car on our way to and from San Diego, I decided it might be the perfect opportunity to take school on the road with us.

I knew I would be doing most of the driving, but I was confident our two oldest children could handle reading the lessons aloud while we discussed the topics together as a family. So, I packed a separate bag complete with our teacher’s guides, student notebooks, and writing utensils and loaded it into the van.

Because we planned to maximize our travel days and spend very little time in our hotel rooms, we established on simple expectation: school would happen in the van. That left our limited hotel time free for rest, relaxation, and recharging.

It had been quite awhile since my husband had been able to join us for school, and we thoroughly enjoyed learning together about the end of the Viking Age and various forms of water transportation.

Reading on the road wasn’t always easy. Bumpy stretches of highway made it difficult to keep track of which line we were on, but taking turns reading aloud helped tremendously.

The student notebooks, however, were pretty much a no-go.

As it turns out, writing in a moving vehicle is an exercise in frustration and futility.

Instead, we read the questions aloud and researched and discussed the answers together. While I’m sure we all would have preferred to abandon school altogether, it ended up being quality time well spent—and it kept us on track.

In fact, we completed our final lessons on the drive home.

And that’s all we learned on our roadtrip out west.

Just kidding.

As much as I love our curriculum (shoutout to Gather ‘Round), it would be pretty sad if the only knowledge we gained on this trip came from ink on paper.

We learned Physical Geography.

We learned Coastal Ecology.

We learned Zoology.

We learned Botany.

We learned Marine Biology.

We learned History.

We learned Connection.

We learned Flexibility.

We learned Restoration.

We learned Wonder.

Taking our curriculum on the road with us was truly enjoyable, but Roadschooling is about so much more than filling our heads with knowledge.

It’s about filling our hearts with wonder and our minds with memories.

And while Roadschooling isn’t a full-time lifestyle for us—at least in this season of life—we’ll gladly take every opportunity we’re given to venture out and explore God’s vast creation—together.