"Finishing School"

Victoria asked me two weeks ago about the "finishing school" I mentioned, so I thought that I would make that the topic of this week's post.

What I attend weekly is not, sadly, an institution. In essence, three girls, including myself, have gotten together and decided to study things. Useful, fun things. Many things that we either were not taught in school, or did not study as in-depth as we would have liked. Currently, our schedule includes French, music (theory and practice together), writing, a bible study, cooking/baking, astronomy, and Ancient History. We also fit knitting and jewellery-making in, as time allows. Later in the year, we will be studying Consumer Math, gardening, herbs, nutrition, several other time periods in history, and various other things which I have forgotten. :)

Every Friday, we meet from eight to four. We have a fairly casual schedule; generally, we do certain subjects before lunch, and certain after, but the length of time and the order of study varies greatly from week to week. Some things we learn together and teach each other, like astronomy. Others, such as French, are taught by one person who is already quite knowledgeable in the subject. We considered rotating houses, but decided it would be best, for everyone, to just meet at my house each week.

Our main focus is to have a time each week where we all feel that we can relax, and renew our energy, while enjoying each other, and learning things that we think will be interesting or useful in life.

Because we are picking our own courses of study, we can more easily avoid false or poor teaching, and concentrate on getting the most from our studies. The more structured atmosphere means that we have accountability, and usually actually do whatever homework is assigned for the week, whereas if we were studying on our own, all the studies would almost certainly end up being procrastinated over and over until they disappeared entirely.

When we were still in the planning stages, I called it our finishing school, just to have something to call it. The name sort of stuck. This is our time between high school and whatever comes next, whether that's marriage, college, etc. We want to be 'finished' young ladies, in preparation for the rest of life. And so we cook, and knit, and play various instruments, and yes, study astronomy. :)

It's been quite an adventure so far; I look forward to seeing what happens next!

Blessings,
Rachel