Homeschooling Nightmares

Homeschooling Nightmares

I just liked the title of this article. Our homeschool journey nightmares consisted of busybody friends and relatives who couldn't comprehend what we were doing or didn't like what we were doing. Some treated our children like lepers but we managed quite well without their company or input. Early on, once the battle for our rights prevailed, the school officials just ignored us hoping we'd go away. We were adamant no one would deny us our constitutional rights or get in the way of our learning. I say our learning because, as a homeschooling parent, you're going to get one of the best educations you can imagine when you raise homeschoolers. You will learn alongside your children and be the wiser for it.

I know many of you are just starting out on your homeschooling journey and many of you are only partially through. Once you've raised homeschoolers into their late teen and early twenty years you'll be able to look back and reflect on that time well spent. I am convinced even if you do little or nothing to teach your children they will be far better off and better educated than if they had attended institutional training in a public school all those years. This discovery appears to be the impetus for the unschooling movement that many parents are now leaning toward.

While we were homeschooling, to us unschooling meant doing things to undo the schooling we parents had as children. We purposely tried to find ways of learning or teaching that did not resemble what was done in public school. If we were tested or graded in school we refused to test or grade at home. If we were made to raise our hand for permission to talk we refused to do the same at home. We deliberately didn't use the many trappings used in schools such as classrooms, desks, text books, study units and the like. There was no teacher and student just parents and children. Today though unschooling has taken on a whole new meaning. No longer does there seem to be a deliberate attempt at not replicating the public school. Now children are simply allowed to be the naturally growing, curious, inquisitive little creatures they are while living within their family unit and in their communities. Unschooling is no longer a way of teaching. It has become a lifestyle.

Connect with me on Facebook!