When you picture homeschoolers, does your brain immediately conjure images of a particular religious persuasion and political bent? If it does, you might not have a complete picture of what homeschooling looks like.
Real Life Reasons Parents Choose to Homeschool Their Children:
- Education style/philosophy
Homeschooling opens up opportunities to provide a style of education that best suits a family. Not many public schools can provide a “classical” education, Montessori or a “Charlotte Mason” approach. Some parents choose homeschooling because they can provide something they feel their child would be missing in their local public school. And did you know, they aren’t all just sitting at home doing this every day, many are joining/starting co-ops or tutorials that meet regularly that fit their preferred style of education?
- Health
This may surprise you. There are lots of parents who choose to homeschool their children because they have compromised/weak immune systems and their health truly depends on not spending their days with a lot of other children. A lot of these parents started out sending their kids to school somewhere and their children’s health suffered. Some even mourn being able to send their kids to a loved school, but they had to make the choice to prioritize their child’s health.
- Their Children Learn Differently Than Typical Children
Traditional schooling has made huge strides in working with children who learn differently. There are special ed. teachers and IEP’s and that’s awesome. Unfortunately, many schools don’t have enough resources to make sure kids don’t fall through the cracks. Homeschooling gives parents the opportunity to teach in ways their kids can learn and to not make school a completely frustrating experience.
Is this new information to you? I hope it is for some of you. Do many parents choose to educate their children for religious reasons? Sure. And they have every right to do so. But if your picture has a stereotypical picture of homeschooling, you’re missing a huge piece of the puzzle. For most homeschooling families, the decision to school their children at home is not about what they want to keep their kids from, but rather, what their children can gain in a different learning environment.
Well said, Amy.
excellent!
Comment
This is a well written article! Love it! Other reasons than the traditional one is a great boost to why homeschooling is awesome!
People always ask me about the reasons we homeschool our children. I completely agree with you, Amy that homeschooling is often thought as a negative response toward the real life facts of education. People will be more curious when we say that we homeschool for the sake of the children and for so many positive reasons and benefits that we can get of it. Thank you very much for restating it here. Nice to meet you.