Each time I teach a writing class in my area, I turn to the new class and say, “Don’t do the ‘c’ word.” Of course, they don’t know what I mean and start thinking through their lexicon of iffy words for one beginning with the letter “c.”
When they come up empty, I tell them what I mean. Many of their older siblings have taken this same class, and it will be very natural to compare themselves with those older writers. In addition, I add, it will be tempting to compare themselves with others in this class during discussions or when they receive their graded homework.
“C” stands for “compare,” and it is a fruitless exercise, I warn. Then I whip out a handy visual aid to cement this in their thinking. At the end of this article, I’ll share the visual aid with you.
Students aren’t the only ones who compare themselves with others. As a homeschool mom, I dived into that ocean as well. You know what I mean: reading levels and SAT scores of other children, classes or co-ops I was involved in, the latest scientific exploits of some other homeschooled genius, the bragging rights of how many things I was doing in addition to homeschool, my teaching methods versus those of the best teachers I had in school, and so forth.
Tara Bentley, a veteran homeschool mom who has just graduated her last child, used to compare herself with the health-food, home-arts moms but one day realized, “It’s ok to attend a homeschool picnic and bring McDonald’s take-out while sitting next to someone eating a sandwich made with homemade bread, with vegetables from their garden, in a lunch bag that they quilted themselves, drinking milk from their own goatherd.”
I laughed out loud when I heard Tara say this. I had splashed around in that pool for a long time, and the comparisons weren’t comfortable.
One bleak night I confessed to my homeschool group just how inadequate I felt. I wished I could be a better teacher and reach my children’s hearts. I figured I was probably doing things wrong. The room got very quiet, and I thought I had shocked everyone by being too honest.
After the stunned silence, one mom said to me, “If you feel that way about your homeschooling, then we are all in the basement.”
It turns out that while I had been comparing myself to an invisible standard of excellence and perfection, this mom had been comparing her homeschool experience with mine. Funny thing, though; she was a very accomplished woman. She had started a small business and even read classics at night to her sons. Even so, she had felt compelled to compare herself with me.
I learned that comparing is a nasty business. There could be only one of two outcomes: I felt prideful or I felt deflated. Neither was helpful. Both had negative consequences.
So, what was the cure? More to the point, if I didn’t compare myself with someone else, how would I know what kind of job I was doing?
First, I threw out the idea of perfection. It was not attainable, if it existed at all.
Second, instead of measuring myself against other moms, their homeschool accomplishments, their amazingly brainy children, or some ridiculous image of the perfect homeschool mom I had cooked up, I asked myself these questions:
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Are my children being cared for in a safe environment?
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Are they learning?
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Am I seeing progress in myself and in my children in areas that matter to me?
I tried not to aim for perfection but for progress. This gave me permission to relax, have some fun with my children, and be creative with our homeschool.
Third, I looked for moms whose work and teaching styles I respected, and I tried to emulate the good things I found there. How did they keep grades? How did they teach homeschool without driving all over town for classes? What was their advice on balancing being a wife, mother, homeschool teacher, and church member? This was not comparing; this was learning from a role model. My life was enriched through these women, and by learning from them, I found my own stride.
Here’s the visual aid I mentioned earlier, the one I use in my writing classes: I pull out a yard stick and show the students how far along I think I am concerning my knowledge and skills in writing. Then I ask them to identify where they think they are on the yard stick. Finally, I tell them, “By the end of this class, your goal is to be farther along this yard stick than you are now. If you’re going to compare, compare yourself then with where you are now.”
My three children are adults now; my youngest one graduated over a decade ago. Having adult children gives me a whole new set of homeschool comparison criteria: their jobs and lives, their children, what I’m doing with my life versus what other retired homeschool moms are doing, and so forth.
It’s tempting. It really is. Someone throw me a life jacket!
Sharon Watson is the author of Apologia’s Jump In, which appears in Cathy Duffy’s 101 Top Picks for Homeschool Curriculum. Her popular course The Power in Your Hands: Writing Nonfiction in High School was reviewed by TOS’s Review Crew in early 2013. When she isn’t avoiding cleaning her desk, Sharon enjoys attending hot air balloon events with her husband or playing with their two delightful granddaughters. Connect with Sharon on her website, Writing with Sharon Watson, Facebook, and Pinterest.
by Sharon Watson, copyright © 2014 by Sharon Watson
