Are you new to schooling at home? Are you worrying about whether or not you made the right choice because family, friends, your children’s former teachers, and even complete strangers are telling you that you are crazy for even attempting this, that you are not qualified to teach your own kids, questioning your curriculum choices, and asking you about how your plan to socialize your kids? Are the giving you a lecture about kids needing to be around kids their own age or telling you that you won’t last one semester? You are not alone in this feeling. You are not the only one feeling pressure from family, friends, school staff and even complete strangers whom for some reason think they know more about your children than their own parents do!
I cannot explain why this happens. Of course, we all wish that people were a little more open minded about trying new things. We wish people would remember that it wasn’t all that long ago that most people home schooled or were in little country classrooms with multiple grades/ages all being taught by one teacher (not all that different than many home school families except for location). We wish people didn’t see some very one-sided news report on TV or online and assume that everyone who decides to home school their kids (regardless of which method or curriculum you choose) are like the usually very extreme cases documented in those shows/articles.
The crazy part is that not only are you not alone when it comes to dealing with people like this in the non-home schooling world, but you may run into closed minded people even within the home schooling world. Just like anything else, you have people who think that home schooling should only be done a specific way and that all the new programs and curriculums out there are bad. The thing to remember is that you are the parent and you know your children better than anyone else ever will! Even when considering those people who take it to one extreme or another, there is really is no wrong way to home school. If you are truly committed to educating your children at home, regardless of the method or curriculum you choose, then you can’t go wrong.
Home schooling is not easy and it is not right for everyone, but if all your options with public/private/charter schools have been exhausted then why not at least consider the idea of home schooling? Yes, it is a lot of work, but trust me when I tell you that the first time you see your children’s eye light up when they finally grasped a new math concept they may have been struggling with, the first time you go to any sort of event or place that you normally can’t go to because they would be at school, when you see the excitement in their eyes and hear it in their voices as they share what they learn or did that day with the same skeptical family and friends, you will know you did the right thing!
Honestly, what is the worst thing that could happen? You realize that is just not an option for you and you look into another public/private school option? It is not the end of the world to try and realize it is just not the best choice for you. At least you know you are doing EVERYTHING you possibly can to find the best educational environment for your child!
