Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

I just realized another great reason this week -- I'm so happy that my daughters are being integrated into the community, into real life, during our days together. They're always with me, so we go to babywearing or breastfeeding meetings together, and I appreciate that they are going to grow up having had the kind of exposure and education that our generation largely missed. It has value for them, not just for me. My 4yo and her poor abused baby doll tried to copy the babywearing leader's instructions as she demonstrated a back carry last month, LOL. At LLL last week, my 7yo put down her book and was listening avidly while we all talked about newbie breastfeeding tips with a pregnant mom.

It suddenly struck me that this is the way it was supposed to be -- girls learning about things like breastfeeding from a young age, watching their mothers and cousins and aunts help solve each others' problems and offer help and suggestions. A lot of women miss that basic foundation of knowledge, and have to re-learn it all from scratch when they have babies. Being able to weave my daughters into our community and mother culture from a young age is an amazing blessing!

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

That's beautiful! :)

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

I changed my answer to reflect where we are now. :rockon

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

This is going to sound funny, but another reason I'm glad we've homeschooled is that I've noticed that homeschoolers tend to be very accepting of others. We're part of a fairly large co-op and there's quite the variety of people there. Some who could care less how they dressed or what others thought of them, some who try to keep up with appearances and many others in-between.

Well, in ds's Chemistry class there's a kid who's, a little nerdy, I guess you could call him, but VERY smart. Ds has mentioned some of the funny-odd things he's done, but no one makes fun of him or tries to exclude him. During their last class, after this kid answered a difficult question, one of the other kids says something like, "you remind me of Albert Einstein". They all agreed and started mentioning all the good things about Einstein. The smart kid was quite proud to be compared to Einstein. Then one of the kids goes, "you know, Einstein used to shower with his socks on?" and the whole class, including the smart kid start cracking up.

In my experience with public schools, the smart-nerdy types were horribly mistreated. Something like the above mentioned scenario never would have happened. I'm glad my ds has had a better experience and naturally accepts others, despite their differences. I was also impressed how much a bunch of 5-6th graders knew about Einstein... :scratch I'd be surprised if half my 5th grade class even recognized the name...

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

:yes I totally agree! I like this aspect of hsing too.

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

I was just having a similar discussion with my brother (who like me, was mostly homeschooled) and my great-uncle who is a retired PS teacher (who incidentally, very much approves of HS now). Like how HS'ers tend to be more comfortable with people of all ages instead of just people in their grade or age range, how HS allows you teach the how and why of history and not just dates of major happenings.

I know it can be seen as a gross generalization, but I do think most of the homeschoolers we know have kids who are well-socialized. In comparison, we watch about a dozen neighborhood kids interact with each other and my kids and I see an enormous difference in acceptance, attitudes and bullying.

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

There are several resons (we school at home), the biggest is I love being around my children :yes
Andrew is 16 and sadly I know everyday life with him is not going to include me for that much longer ;)

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

:cool I loved reading all the responses.
I did NOT register Sam for public Kindy next year. He's gonna be home. Doing exactly *what* remains to be seen :giggle
The biggest reason is bc gifted kids are asynchronous & our PS system doesn't have a CLUE what to do with him. I'm not sure what would happen to him if I sent him to school, but I doubt it would be pretty. And I don't think I'd catch it fast enough - the kid is NOT a talker.

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

I just watched The Beautiful Truth with my son. Not only did he understand what uranium was, but he was aghast that someone would think it's o.k. to inject it into a human body. His words exactly, "why would they put radioactive material in someone's body?! Were they trying to blow him up?!" :hunh You're how old and you know this? :hunh

But also, about the movie, that awesome boy was a homeschooler. :heart I'll bet his mother is so proud of him. :candle :heart

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

I have a new one - hs is probably the only way your 14 year old will read Martin Luther and report back that she likes it and thinks his style is 'snarky'. :giggle

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

I am working on teaching our dd why we homeschool - we are "relaxed" bordering on unschoolers and she's been expressing some interest in school. . . well, she was. . . . not so much as I share my reasons for homeschooling.

I wanted to thank all of you. . .t his thread has helped that part of our journey as I needed to "flesh out my reasons for homeschooling".


It's also helped because I feel tempted to send them to school regularly. I am in "tired" mode at the moment/ burnout so to speak.

:ty3

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

The only reasons we might NOT homeschool (bear with me) are if we can't manage to swing it on one income, or if my kid expresses a strong need/desire to go to public school. (Right now, my husband is just starting the third year of running his own business, and it's not nearly profitable enough yet for us to live on. My income is the primary one at the moment, but he can't "quit" because he needs to establish his business. My oldest is 4, so we'll have to decide next summer how to handle it.)

Anyway, the point is, I've wanted to homeschool for so long that it's become the default choice to me, and while there are a few reasons we might not be able to, I don't feel like I need a reason "to" homeschool, if that makes sense. Homeschooling is the plan - public school is the backup if homeschooling is impossible for some reason.

Some of the things about homeschooling that appeal to me, though, are: flexible schedules, one-on-one study, less wasted time, studies tailored to children's interests, being able to teach what I believe and not the bland public school version (e.g., issues of American colonization/Indian wars).

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

I have decide to home school next year because;

1) I love my kids and I really want to experience learning with them.

2) we live in an urban school district. Even if I wanted to send them to a PS, this one is just not and option. We would need to move.

3) I want to give my kids the kind of education I want for them, not a one size fits all state sponsored one.

4) My dh has to work 2nd shift. He would almost never seen the kids if they went to school all day. having a close knit family is really important to us, so that just not acceptable for us.

probably alot more, but thats what I thought of for now.

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

1. The class size for kinder is huge.
2. Dh hated school.
3. I want to be the biggest influence on my children.

Re: What are some of your reasons to HS?
 

I volunteered in my elementary school when I was in high school, and I didn't like seeing how the kids treated each other, nor the teachers.

My DD has gone to public school b/c my XH does NOT like homeschooling, so that is a bit frustrating. DD has been bullied, and been the bully, and hasn't had good discipline in her schools.

My DH and I have decided that both DS1 and DS2 may be going to a private Christian school at first if we can't pull off homeschooling in the beginning.

Ultimately, though, we just don't like what the public schools have turned out like.