Homeschooling isn’t Weird Anymore, Embrace It
We initially decided to homeschool our kids due to logistics. I was retiring from the military, and the timing was going to be inconvenient for enrolling our daughter into a private school. She was attending a private school in the small town we lived in for Pre-K. We weren't staying in the small town but weren't sure where we would end up. Before our daughter was born, we had already discussed that public school was not an option.
I had been preaching about the inadequacies and rot of the public education system before it was cool. I knew it was a joke when I was still in it in Minnesota.
I went to what was considered one of the best high schools in the state back in the late 1990s. I can count on one hand how many teachers I had that was worth a damn (for fun, let's see...Chemistry, Algebra, Statistics, US Government, Shakespearean studies...yeah, that's it). Many of my teachers would rarely show up to class, often teaching via VCR (for my younger readers, that was a magical machine that you put a tape in, and it would play a movie on a television). Still, I had other teachers who were just plain mentally and emotionally unhinged.
I had a Mythology and Creative Writing teacher who, on numerous occasions, had full-on emotional and psychotic outbursts where she would burst into tears, scream, and throw herself to the ground. Another English Literature teacher would regularly go on rants about how people in the military get brainwashed into wanting to kill women and children. I can provide countless other examples from my time in the public school system, leading to our decision not to put our children in the same.
Fast forward, and we find ourselves trying to figure out how we are going to deal with Kindergarten for our oldest. We were sitting around our old dining room table in our base housing kitchen, trying to figure it out when the idea of homeschooling came to us.
All we knew about it at the time was our misconceptions from when we were younger and knew individuals who had been homeschooled. Thoughts like only weird off-the-grid families who make fruit leather (whatever the hell that is) homeschool their kids.
How wrong we were. Turns out, homeschooling has evolved quite a bit in a short period of time.
We spent weeks diving deep into the homeschool world, researching curriculum and programs, laws and groups, and other alternative schooling options. We decided to go with Liberty University Online Academy, which is more of a hybrid concept. We get a curriculum from the school we teach to, and professors at the university grade the homework and tests. We pay tuition each year, so where we live currently, our children are considered to be enrolled in a private school, not homeschooled. However, that isn't the same in other parts of the country.
Our decision to educate our children the way we do was met with lots of animosity, including from my own family. My mother was so upset by our decision that we were worried she might try to take us to court to get custody of our kids. Her main concern was that our daughter would “miss out" on having friends, and her second concern was her belief that my husband is too much of an idiot to teach to a curriculum.
Of course, she was wrong on all accounts, and her concerns about socialization were misguided.
How many children do you know, ranging from 3 to 18 years of age, who have zero interests, can't communicate effectively, are incapable of moderating their emotions, and are just plain dumb? You might not want to admit it openly, and you might even have kids that fit that description - ask yourself, were they educated in a public school? I would wager they were, and many of the bad habits they now are saddled with are thanks to the equally awful children they are or were exposed to daily at public school. Their budding stupidity is thanks to a curriculum focused on equity, the falsity of social justice, and the downright laziness of educators focused more on tenure and union protections than educating your children.
This is why I firmly believe there needs to be stronger protections and incentives for families who homeschool. It is and should be my right to educate my children how I see fit, and a parent's right to know what their child is being taught should also be guaranteed.
When you decide to bring another human into this world, you have a societal responsibility to ensure that those human beings are educated in the best way possible to provide not just their survival and ability to thrive but also their ability to contribute effectively to their community. I would argue that in today's day, when children are being told they can change their gender, that they should focus on race, that if something hurts their feelings or is uncomfortable, they should be given safe spaces, and all the other nonsense getting fed into their minds that if a family can homeschool, they absolutely should homeschool.
Fast-forward to third grade and our daughter is still homeschooled. She knows how to multiply and divide, write book reports and essays, write in cursive, understand the scientific method and apply it to various scientific disciplines, engage with civics and the history of democracy from the ancient world to today, and yes, she can also explain the basic tenets of Christianity and apply them to daily life.
Our son is in Kindergarten and homeschooled and knows how to add, read, write, and explain basic tenets of Christianity and apply them to daily life.
Do they have friends their age? Not many, but I don't mind because most kids their age are assholes, and I don't want them hanging out with them anyway.
Our kids are lovely, can carry a conversation with an adult, can entertain themselves (without technology as neither have tablets or anything like that), eat all their food, don't have temper tantrums, and are happy, healthy, and intelligent.
I would rather my kids have a few good friends and be smart, critical thinkers, innovative and creative, and kind than have lots of superficial acquaintances because they happen to be in the same class in the same assembly line style education system exposed to not just stupidity but downright bad actors trying to trick them into believing lies meant to enslave them in a world of liberal dependence.
To read more on my thoughts on homeschooling, please check out this article I posted that I wrote for one of my PhD courses titled: AN ANALYSIS OF HOMESCHOOLING AS A PARENTAL RIGHT
