| M i k e a n d H e a t h e r ' s c a l l t o H o m e s c h o o l |
| "Homeschooling - A Social Experiment?" by Jane Boswell Home Educator's Family Times (Volume 8, No. 4) "Children Educated at Home Don't Become Social Misfits" from a University of Michigan study '93 more to come.... |
| I realize there are still people in this country who are skeptical about home schooling. If you would like to educate yourself about home schooling you will find many interesting articles and information on the internet. You can do a search for yourself but to save you time and inconvenience I am hunting down good websites and will put links right here. I will include a title of the article or brief description of the information that you will find at the website when you get there. |
| Now, for my own personal reasons for homeschooling my children.... First of all, let me make one thing clear. I have nothing against our elementary school. I think it's the best in the district. The teachers and staff are all very nice, very good at what they do, and set a good example for the students. If I had to work outside the home and couldn't homeschool my kids for any reason, I am certainly in the right school district. Forest View is a great school. I guess I'll begin by saying that I don't believe everything I read. Nobody with a shred of intelligence would believe everything they read or hear. My motto: question everything (except God)! It takes more work to question things because then you have to go out looking for answers. You have to do research. Research isn't just for college students and scientists. It's for us everyday folks too. Have you ever noticed that the person with the loudest voice is usually the one that has the widest audience? Look at evolution: it's taught in the classroom as fact, it's in all the text books, teachers teach it as fact, people believe it. Well, people, don't believe everything you hear. Do the research. Evolution doesn't have a leg to stand on if you can get away from "the loudest voice" long enough to listen to the evidence. The only reason I bring that up is to point out that public school isn't the best option for every family, no matter what other people say. Public school advocates have a loud voice. They cry "what about socialization!" and "parents aren't educated enough to teach their own children!" and "public school provides the best education with the most opportunities!" Well, those are all non-issues now. They have all been beaten to death and proven false. Based on my research: 1.) I believe my children can and will get a better education at home (because of #2 and #3). 2.) Less stress at home compared with what's at school will enable them to learn easier. 3.) There is freedom to dig deeper into subjects that interest them. 4.) They will not have the dictates of peer pressure guiding their decisions. 5.) The safety of their loving home will give them the secure foundation that they will need in order to live in the "real world" someday. I intend to prepare them for life before throwing them in to fend for themselves. 6.) Homeschooling strengthens the family and does not weaken the relationships that are most important. 7.) The educational activities we do at home will be pro-spiritual, pro-Bible, pro-God, pro-truth. 8.) Since I know I can homeschool successfully, it would be wrong to deprive my kids of this alternative to conventional school, which by the way has only become available and popular (due to the loudest voice) in the last one-hundred years or so. Another reason I am drawn to home school my kids, and this was a biggie when I kept Jacinda and Lydia home, I will have time to deal with character development. I don't know how else to say that. It's so hard when they are in school all day. When they come home I know they are tired out, emotionally, physically, and mentally. I hated making them sit down to homework even. I wanted to just let them be themselves and unwind when they got home. Now we have time to do what is most important. At first, I was only going to homeschool Andrew. I felt that he needed it. Then I started reading again. Yes, I'd read it all before--after all, this isn't my first exposure to homeschooling--I used to home teach my older girls. Between 1996 and 1999, I attended seminars and workshops in Lansing, subscribed to homeschool magazines, read books, etc. Well, I got to thinking, why should I deprive Hannah of the homeschooling experience for even one more day? Just because she's doing well academically doesn't mean that homeschooling won't benefit her right now too. There is no logical reason to leave her in the school system. One concern was that she might lose friends. I guess if she loses some of her friends, then they probably weren't the kind of deep friendships that would have lasted long anyway--no great loss. We will join the local homeschool group (which I was one of the founding members of) and we will make new friends. Friends with similar values and goals. And my children will not only survive, they will thrive. |
| National Home Education Network Their mission statement: "The National Home Education Network exists to encourage and facilitate the vital grassroots work of state and local homeschooling organizations and individuals by providing information, fostering networking and promoting public relations on a national level. Because we believe there is strength in a diverse network of homeschoolers, we support the freedom of all individual families to choose home education and to direct such education." Home School Legal Defense Association This is the most comprehensive website I have found so far... and there probably isn't another website that could be more comprehensive. They provide legal information, information about their organization, research, resources, and many issues are addressed on their website. If you want to become educated about homeschooling, this is the place to go. How do homeschoolers measure up? Academic and demographic information from the largest national study of home schooled students. |
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| S o ... W h a t A b o u t S o c i a l i z a t i o n ? |
| If your child walks out in the street in front of a truck, you aren�t going to say, �I�d help you, but I don�t want the neighbors to think I�m overprotective!� The obvious instinct is to snatch the child from the imminent danger. When peer groups, pop culture, and modern philosophy pulls at your child, threatening to destroy their God-given potential, Christian parents need to rise up in the name of Jesus and declare, �You can�t have my child! God has entrusted this life into my hands, and I will do whatever I can to bring my child into the Kingdom of God.� By daring to shelter your children from negative influences, you will help to cultivate Godly character in his life. He will have a solid foundation on which to build his life and, someday, when you aren�t around and your child faces a difficult situation, they won�t depart from the training they have received. |
| I homeschooled my older two daughters for about four years. Lydia (17 now) tells me now that it did her a lot of good. I wasn't very disciplined in the academic area and did some things wrong, but I did a lot right. She is very secure and not heavily influenced by peer pressure. She told me that if I hadn't homeschooled her she would be in the wrong crowd with the wrong attitude. At the time, I felt that I was losing my children. They thought their teachers were smarter than their mother (Which may have been true, but you don't want your little kids to think it!) and treated me like I was not important. Teaching them at home was definitely Pro-Family! We grew closer, trusted each other better, and their attitudes made a complete turn-around. That's what I'm talking about! |
| T I D B I T S: The estimated number of homeschooled children (grades K-12) for the 2001-2002 school year was between 1.725 million and 2.185 million. more to come.... |
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| Here's a quote from a magazine called The Homeschool Digest, vol.9, no.1, author Israel Wayne: |