Why Homeschool? 

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         We made the decision to homeschool in September 1990, and as natural as it seems to me now, I remember the decision was not an easy one to make. There were many events that led us to homeschooling that I plan to write about some day when I'm not so busy rearing children. 

          For now, here is the short answer. 

          We knew no one who was homeschooling or who had been homeschooled. We had a bright, friendly, happy, loving, creative, wonderful child. I believe he was like the majority of five years olds. When it was time to send him to school, I made a list of all the methods of schooling and the pros and cons of each. What we were looking for was a form of education that would provide him with the ability to do anything in life that he might desire. Homeschooling won. 

          Since that time we have found research that supports our decision; but, at the time, all we had to go on was a gut feeling. We knew that no one cared about our child's success more than we did, and that no one knew our child better than we did. We believed that made us the best qualified to teach our child. 

          I have a great respect for most paid teachers. Much of their training deals with how to educate many children who have different learning styles, abilities, and disabilities all at the same time. They do their best under these very difficult conditions. 

          I, on the other hand, only had to teach one child. That meant one-on-one, student-paced instruction, tailored to fit my child. 

          Our decision was made easier when I found that, at the end of kindergarten a student was expected to know the alphabet, colors, shapes, numbers 1-20, how to follow instructions, stand in line, follow a routine, and sit quietly, all to prepare him for first grade. Eric already knew all these things and more. He was reading and could easily have entered first grade, had we been prepared for the social implications of his being the youngest child in the class.  Therefore, if we did nothing for a year, he could still start first grade next year on schedule, if he or we so desired. 
 
         We continued to teach through playing. We used no formal curriculum. We moved to a new town that year and found other homeschooling families. The summer between kindergarten and first grade, I went to a homeschool convention to look for a curriculum. I went from booth to booth, looking through their text books, until I found material we had not covered already. I would have to purchase third and fourth grade books for my first grader. 

          Life is not a race; so I put the books back, thinking that I would check again in a couple of years. 

          It has been eight years and we still learn through play; and he is still a bright friendly, happy, loving, creative, wonderful child: a fact in which I, as his mother and teacher, take great pride. 

         If a method of education can be measured by the success of those for whom it was intended, then our method has been proved very successful. 

          My job as the primary teacher has gotten harder because now we have a two-year-old, and my time is divided between the two children. Still, a two-to-one student-teacher ratio is better than that of the best private schools. 

          Home schooling has become a way of life for us, and we cannot even imagine a different way. I didn't realize how entrenched we had become until the day I met a neighbor with a baby who was only a few days older than my daughter. 

          She said, "I guess our children will go to kindergarten together." 

          "No. We home school." I replied. 

          The decision we had agonized over for our first child had been made without any more thought than most people give to sending their children to school. Instead of, "When they're five years old, they go off to kindergarten," it had become for us, "When they're born, they start home schooling."

Engela E. homeschoolkids@geocities.com