The 2006-2007 school year was the last year that my 2 oldest children attended public school. My son was in 5th grade and my daughter was in 2nd grade. It was during that school year that I began investigating the home schooling lifestyle. The thought of my oldest attending the local middle school for 6th grade and on terrified me. Smoking, drinking, sex, bullying seem to be intensified from the middle school years on.
As for my daughter, I was seeing some "ugly" behavior. She and her peers seemed to be more interested in what each other was wearing, which boy thought they were cute and talking to each other on the phone. School work seemed to be low on the list of priorities.
I wanted better childhood experiences for my children than what some people deemed "rights of passages". And I also wanted to get back to some core family values. In addition to learning a lot of first year, I felt that I was spending an equal amount of time undoing some inappropriate behavior learned while attending public school.
I found last week's poll results interesting. Last week's question asked "Why do you home school?" The majority of the votes were for "other". I would like to hear from people as to what "other" is for them.
Like so many homeschoolers, we began with negative reasons ("public school too scary") and ended up discovering many positives: all the academic advantages of private tutoring, the adaptability to drop everything and concentrate on something your child loves (striking while the iron is hot), freedom from peer pressure, greater family closeness, the benefits of a three generation family when my parents came to live with us (the children being home with them day by day), the chance to interact with all ages in a natural way. I could go on and on!
ReplyDeleteMarilyn