Mom Is Teaching

I read a great article yesterday called Why I Refuse to Send My Kids to School: Five Perfectly Sane Reasons and it got me thinking about all of the reasons why parents are choosing to homeschool their children. There are as many reasons as there are parents, some that you will agree with and some that you won’t. I’m sure that among your own reasons there are some that others will agree with and some that they will disagree with. Despite all of that there is one thign that we all can agree on, that all parents have the right to choose to homeschool their children. Just as any other parental right there are some that we all may agree with and some that we may not, and some that we are passionately opposed to. But having the freedom to choose is what keeps us all connected. And yes, there will be some parents who take it too far, who choose to homeschool as a way to abuse their children. But these parents are the exception, not the norm; besides we have all heard of the dangerous teachers out there in the world (just ask Teacher Smackdown) but we would never judge all teachers as abusers.

So, in the spirit of sharing and support here are my top 5 reasons why I choose to homeschool. You may not agree with them, you may not even like them, but together we can keep homeschooling an available option for all parents. If you are interested in sharing your own reasons I encourage you to write a post about it yourself. Christine over at Welcome to my brain is calling for bloggers to share their reasons in her post Why Homeschool? Check it out and see what other homeschooling bloggers have to say.

1. I want my sons to get a hands on learning experience. I don’t want them to sit around all day reading about the world around them, i want them out in it. Every day. Getting dirty, finding bugs, exploring rocks, feeling the wind on their skin. I feel that we learn better by doing, so i want them to have every opportunity to do, feel, hold, and absorb the world around them. To me, keeping them locked up all day behind a desk is like keeping them in a bubble.

2. I want them to be able to learn on their own timetable. I don’t want my sons to feel held back or pushed beyond their means. If they are grasping a subject quickly then I want them to be able to move on and not be stuck reviewing it until they become bored because the rest of the class, or the school’s schedule. And the same applies the other way. If they are having trouble getting something I want the freedom to be able to go as slow as they need without feeling pressure to keep up with everyone else.

3. The S word. that’s right, socialization. Now, unless there have been some major advances in how the school system works I’m going to assume things work pretty much the same way as they did when I was in school. Go to class with the same group of childre who are the same age as you and from the same background, spend all day behind a desk unable to communicate with the other children, getting a few moments here and there to work together. To me that’s not socialization, at least not the kind I want my sons to have. Instead they are free to communicate with whom they want, people of all ages and backgrounds, all day long. To steal a quote a great article I read How to Answer the Socialization Question Once and for All

“Oh, I think the word you are looking for is socializing. Socialization is actually defined as the process by which the norms and standards of our society are passed from one generation to the next. I’ve never really thought that a complete strangers six-year old child would be a good source of information on the correct standards of behavior in our family and in society as a whole. As for socializing, I remember from my school days that it was something you weren’t supposed to be doing during class!”

4. I’ll admit it, they are my kids and I don’t want to send them off. OK, feel free to let loose the “cut the apron strongs” comments now. Done yet? Good, then back to what I was saying. I’m not saying I want to keep them by me every minute of every day for the rest of the lives. I’m sure that some day they’ll be going on sleepovers, out on dates, and hopefully moving out into the big world. But for now they are my responsibility. They are my children and it is my job to raise them, to teach them, to help them build a secure foundation that will allow them to walk confidently on their own when they are ready. And i just do not feel that sending them out to the world at such a young age is going to do that.

5. I love the freedom that comes with homeschooling. There is no set schedule that we have to stick with. Maybe we want to sleep in until 10 AM, maybe we want to head to the hiking trail in the middle of a Wednesday and watch birds, or maybe we want to take off for a week in the spring to go pick up trash off a beach down in Texas. We have the freedom to make our own schedule, to live our own lives, and to create the kind of environment that benefits our children specifically. And we love it.

So there you are, my top 5 reasons why I choose homeschooling. There are many other reasons, things that ebb and flow depending on the day and how our moods are. But these are the top reasons that I hold. And they are good enough for us.

homeschool, homeschooling, reasons to homeschool