I was also homeschooled and turned out fine. Was it perfect? No. Would going to either the public or private school in my town have improved anything? Also, no. I wasn't thrilled about the idea of homeschooling my own kids because I wasn't sure it would be good for me. It is not without its problems, but again I don't think they are problems that school would solve (both for the kids as students and myself as teacher).
At 27 I was a married, home-owning, fully self-employed, debt free college graduate. In a meeting with parents of my piano students, one of them made a derogatory comment about homeschoolers being unprepared for "the real world." My husband (also a former homeschooler who was also a veteran and finishing a very demanding PhD in 5 years) and I had an enjoyable time casually mentioning all we had accomplished since graduating from high school.
But I also think it's difficult to have productive discussions because the one word ("homeschool") covers many kinds of "homes" and "schools." Homeschooling looks SO vastly different from family to family. There are so many resources for homeschoolers in our area of North Carolina that I am essentially just overall administrator of education. My kids have so many classes outside the home or with homeschool groups that our life looks very little like mine did growing up!
I appreciate the guiltless aspect to this. My oldest begged me to homeschool her, but I knew it wouldn't be good for either of us. Also, my youngest was a huge Garfield reader and is currently in college majoring in English with a creative writing focus. Maybe Garfield is the perfect starting point for all readers.
there's far too much guilt and shame put on parents around education. Yes, we should all take the matter seriously and use prudence and prayer, but the conscience-binding and shaming is ridiculous.
I really appreciate your writing and voice. I am only now (30 odd years later) working through some of the harms I experienced in my growing up years – which were (incidentally?) Homeschooled. Curious to consider, those ills would have been true regardless of education style because they had more to do with my home then my education. (To note, I think homeschooling made things worse, but…again, that’s not exactly homeschooling’s fault.)
Your comments around learning to learn organically is something that I see in myself and my history as well. there’s ambivalence there because so many unhealthy things help help us to grow, and God uses it all to shape and form who we are. So I’m grateful for these things even while I’m mourn some of the experiences that I wish I didn’t have.
Also: Garfield v. Calvin and Hobbs. Oh…oh…oh…so deeply funny 😆
I went to to public school and I am mostly fine. Very few people were homeschooled in the 60s and 70s. It was either christian school or public school. My father worked for the post office and there was no way he could afford to send four kids to christian school no matter how much they scrimped and saved, even though there was a lot of pressure from our church.
By the time my kids were in school, the homeschooling movement was going quite strong in Michigan. Both of my brothers homeschooled their kids K-12. Their goal was to keep them away from the wicked ways of the world and public schools. We sent our kids to public schools after they were identified as
having special needs. They needed speech therapy, occupational therapy, reading instruction, etc. They were later all diagnosed with some sort of autism (with differing categories - now it's all autism spectrum disorder). At any rate, private was out of the question. In our area, private schools seldom offered anything for special education students. The one that had special education services charged the whole cost to the families in addition to regular tuition. And although some families home-schooled their special needs children, I was not up to that task. I didn't have any skills in speech therapy or occupational therapy or social skills training. The public schools offered that at no cost (other than paying my taxes).
The school district my kids attended was very small. And that was a big blessing. No one got lost in our district. Yes, there were atheists and liberals teaching there. But there were also Christian teachers. Our kids did well in school, with various therapies. They also had a very good youth group and youth pastor. They all graduated from college. They are adults now. They are fine.
*Our kids went to school in the 90s and early 2000s, so things are probably different now.
I was also homeschooled and turned out fine. Was it perfect? No. Would going to either the public or private school in my town have improved anything? Also, no. I wasn't thrilled about the idea of homeschooling my own kids because I wasn't sure it would be good for me. It is not without its problems, but again I don't think they are problems that school would solve (both for the kids as students and myself as teacher).
At 27 I was a married, home-owning, fully self-employed, debt free college graduate. In a meeting with parents of my piano students, one of them made a derogatory comment about homeschoolers being unprepared for "the real world." My husband (also a former homeschooler who was also a veteran and finishing a very demanding PhD in 5 years) and I had an enjoyable time casually mentioning all we had accomplished since graduating from high school.
But I also think it's difficult to have productive discussions because the one word ("homeschool") covers many kinds of "homes" and "schools." Homeschooling looks SO vastly different from family to family. There are so many resources for homeschoolers in our area of North Carolina that I am essentially just overall administrator of education. My kids have so many classes outside the home or with homeschool groups that our life looks very little like mine did growing up!
I appreciate the guiltless aspect to this. My oldest begged me to homeschool her, but I knew it wouldn't be good for either of us. Also, my youngest was a huge Garfield reader and is currently in college majoring in English with a creative writing focus. Maybe Garfield is the perfect starting point for all readers.
there's far too much guilt and shame put on parents around education. Yes, we should all take the matter seriously and use prudence and prayer, but the conscience-binding and shaming is ridiculous.
I really appreciate your writing and voice. I am only now (30 odd years later) working through some of the harms I experienced in my growing up years – which were (incidentally?) Homeschooled. Curious to consider, those ills would have been true regardless of education style because they had more to do with my home then my education. (To note, I think homeschooling made things worse, but…again, that’s not exactly homeschooling’s fault.)
Your comments around learning to learn organically is something that I see in myself and my history as well. there’s ambivalence there because so many unhealthy things help help us to grow, and God uses it all to shape and form who we are. So I’m grateful for these things even while I’m mourn some of the experiences that I wish I didn’t have.
Also: Garfield v. Calvin and Hobbs. Oh…oh…oh…so deeply funny 😆
Debatable…
fair
I went to to public school and I am mostly fine. Very few people were homeschooled in the 60s and 70s. It was either christian school or public school. My father worked for the post office and there was no way he could afford to send four kids to christian school no matter how much they scrimped and saved, even though there was a lot of pressure from our church.
By the time my kids were in school, the homeschooling movement was going quite strong in Michigan. Both of my brothers homeschooled their kids K-12. Their goal was to keep them away from the wicked ways of the world and public schools. We sent our kids to public schools after they were identified as
having special needs. They needed speech therapy, occupational therapy, reading instruction, etc. They were later all diagnosed with some sort of autism (with differing categories - now it's all autism spectrum disorder). At any rate, private was out of the question. In our area, private schools seldom offered anything for special education students. The one that had special education services charged the whole cost to the families in addition to regular tuition. And although some families home-schooled their special needs children, I was not up to that task. I didn't have any skills in speech therapy or occupational therapy or social skills training. The public schools offered that at no cost (other than paying my taxes).
The school district my kids attended was very small. And that was a big blessing. No one got lost in our district. Yes, there were atheists and liberals teaching there. But there were also Christian teachers. Our kids did well in school, with various therapies. They also had a very good youth group and youth pastor. They all graduated from college. They are adults now. They are fine.
*Our kids went to school in the 90s and early 2000s, so things are probably different now.