Flashback: School Days

Flashback Friday buttonPrompt: Did your family have any back-to-school traditions when you were growing up? Were you generally eager or reluctant to start school? Was buying school supplies a big deal or did you order them through the school? Were there any school supplies you particularly loved?…

Some homeschooling families greet the coming school year with great fanfare, purchasing new materials and taking “first day” photos. Others do school year-round and never have a real “first day” of school.

And some, like my family, have a first day of school, but don’t make much of a fuss about it.

In fact, we made so little fuss that I can’t remember a single thing about any of my baker’s dozen first days of school (until college–but that’s a whole ‘nother story!)

That’s not to say that I don’t remember any of the circumstances surrounding “back-to-school.”

I remember going to the packed out back-to-school sales and perusing the completely unreasonable lists all those others schools had for their students. We didn’t get backpacks and lunchbags and fancy binders and pencil cases and the like. We got milk crates to store our school books in (since we’d usually destroyed our old crates, having carted them around the house and indeed the state during the previous school year)–but that was about the only thing that was distinct for each student. Otherwise, we stocked up huge piles of notebooks, notebook paper (in wide and college rules), handwriting tablets, yellow wooden pencils, and erasers.

In the olden days, Lincoln’s tax was $0.065 per dollar–and it rounded down from the half. So if you bought something that cost exactly one dollar, you’d be charged $1.06. But if you bought two things that cost exactly one dollar, you’d be charged $2.13. One year, there was something that cost exactly one dollar, and each of us kids went through the checkout with our one item. The checkout lady tried in vain to convince us to combine our purchase (instead of passing the leftover cash to the next kid in line.) We tried in vain to explain to her that we could save three whole cents by doing it our way. (We definitely knew how to pinch our pennies!)

And I remember Mom reminiscing about her own school days. Every so often, we kids would complain about how we’d been deprived of this supply or that–how we had to share our school supplies or whatever. And when we complained, Mom might tell her story:

When she was a little girl, the fourth of twelve children, she got just what was on the list and nothing else. The list decreed that each child had to have a set of eight crayons (red, violet, blue, green, yellow, orange, black, and brown.) And so Mom had a set of eight crayons. All the other children came to school with their sets of twenty-four. There was nothing she could do about it–her family was poor, they had what was required.

We, of course, never lacked for crayons. There was always an enormous bucket of partially used crayons around the house that we could use at any time. And if we needed nice, unbroken crayons, we could always borrow from Mom’s set–for every year, Mom bought herself a shiny new box of crayons, the biggest box that could be bought.

This was as close as I could get to a “back to school picture” in our entire family collection (and I would know–I’m the keeper of the family photographs).

Kids back to school photo

From left to right: Timothy (age 3) with his preschool workbook, John (age 4) with his art book, Grace (age 1) with someone else’s workbook, Daniel (age 6) with a Boxcar children mystery from the library, and Me (age 10) with some large tome also from the library (I’m guessing it’s either a history or a work of fiction–that’s a pretty big book!)

Visit Linda for more Flashback Friday posts.

10 thoughts on “Flashback: School Days”

  1. Your mom and I could be soulmates! I don’t color much any more, but I still keep a brand new box of crayons on hand, and none of them get too worn down before I buy another box. Since I am a school teacher, I have no trouble finding a home for my used crayons.

    In my classroom kids whose parents don’t buy them the cool stuff can still be assured they can get it. All they have to do is earn classroom rewards and then “buy” it from my supply store. Designer pencils, erasers and pencil sharpeners are favored items. Rarely does any one want glue, scissors or rulers. No one has to buy paper. I supply it.

    Reply
  2. Thanks for stopping by my post! Now that I’m re-reading the instructions…hello! I didn’t put anything in there about the supplies or traditions. I just know it came with a lot of melancholy.

    But there was always a school shopping day – that I remember! Loved the new clothes and picking out my book bag! I always have been a sucker for a good book bag!!

    Reply
  3. Hi Bekah ~~ I can just see you kids all lined up, each helping to save the penny. I like the idea of having the new box of crayons. My mom did and Mrs. Jim tries to.
    Thank you for the ‘family picture.’ I would have liked to , I might still if you want to check for it next week. Only one computer here, Mrs. Jim’s will work with our old scanner and she needed it last night.
    Have a good year at school, the kids and yourself. I am wondering if the Master’s will be in teaching?
    ..

    Reply
  4. The only first day of school I remember being a big deal was my first first day of school! I think I made a stick man out of popsicle sticks or something…don’t remember why though. Otherwise school just started. I don’t even remember ever going to the store for a “supply list” until I went to Parkview in Jr. High. We must have both been homeschooled or something…(and have similar values with reguards to money! Imagine that…)

    Reply
  5. I truly enjoyed your post, and your family’s homeschool philosophies! How long ago was this? Was homeschooling already that popular?

    To answer your question about my post:
    It was a four or five hour shift all the way through high school. In fact the same building used for my secondary ‘normal’ education was used in the afternoon for another program (pre-university secondary), and again in the evening by another school.

    Reply
  6. Jim-My Master’s will be in community nutrition, but I’ve enjoyed teaching labs at the University while I’ve been here and am looking forward to hopefully practice in nutrition education for the public–so I’m planning on sticking pretty close to education after all!

    Rita-What a wonderful system! That seems a lot more sensible to me than these all-day school things (I am a big fan of children having unstructured time.)

    My family’s homeschooling wasn’t quite so long ago as I make it sound–my parents were within the first few waves of homeschoolers in the ’80s. It wasn’t until the mid-90s that homeschooling seemed to be a norm/popularly acceptable alternative (at least in Nebraska).

    Reply
  7. I remember laying out my clothes for the first day of school. I was always just glad because the first day of school meant I was one day closer to graduation. I don’t really remember going shopping for school stuff. We saved our pickle money and shopped from the Sears catalog. We’d make our lists, check a total cost, recheck how much we had earned to date, refigure again, change our lists. I do remember that we always got that big box of pencils and I loved those pencils. I still have a hard time resisting pens, pencils and colors. We would be so anxious until that big box with our order from Sears arrived!

    Reply
  8. We’ve homeschooled for about 14 years now, and I never made a huge deal out of the first day of school. When I started reading blogs and realized that people made huge deals out of the first day of homeschool, I felt a little bad, but my kids seem to be ok. They don’t seem to be eternally scarred or anything! ;)

    Reply

Leave a Comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.