52 Weeks of Happier Homeschooling Week 10: Make a Difference
If you’re like me, this election season has left you feeling a little bruised and eager to put some good energy back into the world around you. Your homeschool is an obvious place to start. Here are some ideas for adding political advocacy to your curriculum—wherever you fall on the political spectrum.
Connect with your representatives. Last week, I added a recurring event to my calendar: As our first and last activity every homeschool week, we’re going to write letters to our local, state, or federal representatives. (Check your local and state government websites to find contact info for those representatives; find contact details for your federal representatives and the White House here.) My plan is that we’ll write a mix of advocacy and thank-you letters to the people representing us—I want to be sure that we’re celebrating the good stuff as hard as we’re pushing back against the bad stuff.
Get involved with local politics. A lot of us have fallen into the habit of paying attention to politics only in the big Presidential election years, but there are many opportunities to make a big difference in local politics happening all the time. This website has a great list of ideas to help you get involved with politics in your community. (Disclaimer: I think this is a good list, but I haven’t read everything on the site so no endorsement is implied.) Local politics let you experience activism in action—kids may not be able to vote yet, but they can collect signatures for petitions with their parents, make posters and flyers for causes they care about, and raise money and support for campaigns they believe in.
Make your community a safer place for people who need it. Volunteer with a group like the International Rescue Committee to help support refugees. Collect shelf stable food for donation to your local food bank. Learn more about Islam (Minnesota Public Radio has a handy list of books to better understand Islam) so that you can respond meaningfully to misinformation and Islamophobia. Donate clothes and supplies to women’s and children’s shelters. These kinds of projects can be the most rewarding kind of advocacy because you often get to see the effects of your efforts firsthand.
