Saturday, November 22, 2014

Day 2: School From A Parent's Perspective

Referring to my last blog post, Day 1: My First Impression of Homeschooling, I mentioned that I am the parent of two children.  My first was born in 1989 and my second in 2007.

With my first child, I was very young and had the tendency to place faith and hope into the world systems - especially the education system because I had a certain level of respect for the education that I received.  Also, I gave birth to my child when I was still in high school and shortly after graduating, I went to college. So, the system education experience was something that was still apart of my daily living and I saw it as having a great amount of value and being an integral part of a child's development.

Early on, I found that my child was extremely mentally and physically active and that she responded well when being directed to reading, math, art, and other educational-type activities so I integrated those things into her daily schedule.  As a result of this, at age 2 1/2, she was able to get an early acceptance at a private pre-school.  She thrived in this environment - she thoroughly enjoyed going to school and it was very cool to see her develop socially.  Throughout this, we continued with her education at home because it was something fun that we did together and it kept us both routine, scheduled, and focused.

When she was 5, she started kindergarten - it was a half-day program and I saw it as a way of integrating the children into the school experience.  So that first year, I didn't see much academic progress but I didn't anticipate seeing much either.

My daughter at age 5 - just before entering school for her first day of kindergarten.
For the following year, she began the first grade and I expected that I would start to see her being challenged academically.  Each day I saw the work that she brought home and it was the same as what she had brought home from her half-days of kindergarten.  When I asked her what she learned, she would smile, shrug, and and usually say, "Nothing."  After a couple of months of this, I called the school, expressed my concern about my child not learning anything new, and asked if they would consider challenging her.  I was told, "She is fine and she is right where she needs to be."  As I've mentioned, I still had this belief that the school knew better than I did, so I let it go.

Throughout the years, this pattern continued of me being concerned that she wasn't learning anything and with me doing nothing about it because I saw the school system as an authority - and after awhile, I accepted that my child was an 'average student' because she wasn't particularly driven to take advanced classes and seemed relatively satisfied with her school experience.

I do remember this one time when there was conflict in her classroom for an extensive period of time.  The school was struggling to direct the situation and they were reacting to what was happening with and between the children in her class so she would come home stressed and burnt-out.  She told me that she wanted to be homeschooled - but with my job, the other things going on, and me thinking that I wasn't qualified to teach her, I told her that it wasn't possible.

The school eventually fixed the problem and the point of homeschooling never came up again.  She went on to attend the same private college prep school that I attended.

See, I saw my daughter as much more intelligent than I ever was - she did not have the problems that I had with learning and she seemed to breeze through school up until high school level.  So, I thought that she would do really well at this school.  I mean, if I could make it through it, she would probably do pretty well there.  I also was satisfied that she chose this school because I knew that she would be challenged.

During her first year of high school it became clear that she hadn't been prepared for this level of education.  I remember a day when I picked her up from school, she was agitated at an experience that she had with one of her teachers where she asked her teacher a question and the teacher told her to look it up in her book.  She then explained to her teacher that she didn't know how to look something up in a book and her teacher suggested that she learn.

When she told me this, I recalled how I never once saw her bring home a book from school until high school - it was always copied worksheets.  She had never learned how to use a table of contents or the index of a text book.

To be continued.



Friday, November 14, 2014

Day 1: My First Impression of Homeschooling

As a teenager, I had my first look at homeschooling when I went with a friend of mine to her home where her young sister was homeschooling.  I remember seeing her sister doing schoolwork at the dining room table while the mother looked on from where she was doing tasks in the kitchen.

Seeing that it was during a time when most children her age were in school, I asked, "What is she doing at home? Is she sick?" And they answered, "No, she does her schoolwork at home - she is homeschooled."  At the time, I did not realize that such a thing was possible unless there was something mentally or physically wrong with a child.  I remember being curious about what might be wrong with the child and I secretly asked myself questions: Does she not get along with the other children?  Did she fail at school and now needs her mother to catch her up?  Are her parents trying to protect her from something?  Is she mentally disabled?  Is she in a wheelchair? Does she have some sort of disease?

During the short time that I was in my friend's home that day, I could not find anything wrong about the child.  However, what I did see was a relaxed young person who was mature, articulate and an active participant in the conversations that were taking place.

When my friend noticed that her sister was getting distracted, she said that it was time for us to go, we said our good-bye's and left promptly.

I remember continuing to be curious about homeschooling because it seemed weird or foreign to me so I would ask my friend random questions like, "Why does she do her schoolwork at home?" and,"Why can't she be with other kids?"

My friend answered simply that her sister didn't want to go to school, that she didn't really like the kids that she had gone to school with and that she got more work done at home than in school.  Also, her mom was a stay-home-mother so it wasn't a problem for the family to do this.  My friend told me that she, herself, was also homeschooled up to high school level.   I found this interesting because of how my friend was - she was more mature than any of us at this age, she didn't have the emotional ups-and-downs, she was relaxed, she didn't seem to be influenced much about what others were saying or might be thinking in regards to her or her decisions, she was committed, and all-in-all a really nice, easy-going and down-to-earth person.

So this was my first impression of homeschooling.  At the time, the general belief that I had connected to this way of educating was that homeschooling was one of those rare things that others do - that it was a radical and sort of 'on the fringe of society' thing.  Also, I grew up in a period of time and within a family where being a stay-at-home mom was looked down on - where I saw that being a housewife was a horrible life choice and that it was wrong to not be out in the world and contributing to society by working.

I admit, I did not see the point of homeschooling.  I saw the school system as respectable, experts, and absolutely necessary for almost every child.  So, I had this belief that all children that are able should be in school and that all parents should be using that time as an opportunity to work and contribute.

When my first child entered first grade of the public school system, my perspective changed where I began to question what was going on at school and why my child wasn't learning anything new because she wasn't bringing home any work that I saw as challenging or further developing any skills that we had already opened up at home.

In the next blog, I will be expanding on that experience of not being satisfied with my child's education and sharing what changed my perspective on the school system and why, despite my awareness that public school may not be best for my child, I chose to continue to allow them to fulfill the educator role for her.  I will also be sharing how this history assisted me with making the decision to take responsibility for my second child's education with homeschooling.

My second child, Hunter, whose school is home, the world, and the things that interest him or are important to him.  In the background, you can see where does his structured curriculum like Reading and Math - on a TV table and sitting on a comfy couch with a blanket, his favorite toy Mario, and his Nintendo 3DS.

Introduction

Homeschooling is becoming a more and more accepted way in the United States for parents to take responsibility for their children's education.

Each parent has their own reasons for why they have decided to homeschool - it could be religious beliefs, not wanting another to raise their children, bad experiences with the school system, impracticality of school day hours, not agreeing with public school curriculum, not trusting the school system, not wanting any institution to have control of the parents or their children, they are doing it for fun, they want to be a part of their child's learning process, or they simply want to provide a one-on-one education for their children.

Most parents homeschool in a way that differs from the next parent.  In our state, the state of Maine, the law requires that students learn specific subjects each year. However, how we do it, when we do it, and what materials we decide to use to teach the child these subjects is entirely up to us.

Many of our homeschool days are simply being together, being silly, and having fun.
Homeschooling is growing and because there are so many parents that are homeschooling, we have this community of individuals for support, cross-referencing, information, and sharing solutions with each other.  So,  even though we're educating in a way that works for us as individuals, there are many opportunities for us to come together as a group where personal history, beliefs, and economic status are irrelevant as our primary focus is on our children and providing the best possible education for them.  

Homeschooled kids in our area coming together for a field trip.  We also have a regular group of us that meet up every Wednesday.
This is cool considering that a few years ago only a few were homeschooling and the general perspective on homeschooling was that it was 'wrong' or that it denied children in some way or another - and now, as we are becoming aware of just how much our school systems are diminishing, there is an overall agreement in our society that homeschooling is a perfectly acceptable solution.

In this Homeschoolers Journey To Life blog, I will be discussing these points mentioned here in expanded detail, going into the myths and realities that I have found in regards to homeschooling, sharing research and relevant information, and also using this blog as self-support for myself as I stand and investigate what comes up in this journey and look at ways of educating and parenting that can be integrated into my day-to-day living that expresses my utmost potential.