World: meet Homeschooling

You've heard it: ugh those homeschoolers!  Their kids will be badly socialized!  The parents CAN'T POSSIBLY teach them the skills they would learn in public school!  And.. at the heart of it.. WHAT ARE THOSE PARENTS THINKING??

So is this just stuff homeschooling families whine about, but really doesn't happen?  Is this just some over-inflated sense of being shunted aside by non-conformist families?  Sadly, no.



I consider us to be newbie homeschoolers (we are in our second year) but the truth is even breaking the 'big news' was tough for us.  I had a sneaking suspicion what sorts of comments we would be setting ourselves up for, so I choose to keep the information to myself at first.  Unfortunately, small town politics being what they are, one of the volunteers at our local school bumped into a family member at the only store in town and let the cat out of the bag.

Commence screaming phone call here- with accusations about our 'hasty' decision and what an enormous mistake we were making (the fact that the caller didn't know what led us to homeschool didn't seem to cross his mind).   Random semi-aquaintances have also felt the need to 'drop hints' about why public schooling didn't work out for us.  My favorite, and most quotable to me, was the elderly woman who told me repeatedly ad-nauseum that public school only works if the parents are INVOLVED.  Because, apparently, homeschooling parents can choose not to be?  If I had a nickle for every giggle I got out of that thought I'd be swimming in them right now.  I should really thank her. 

I've heard the 'socialization' question too many times to count, and my husband revealed that he had faced the identical question at the local store (yep, same store) from a semi-stranger.  I love his response- not nearly as nice as mine- where he asked sarcastically if they REALLY thought we kept our kids in a bubble.  I tend to smile, nod, and attempt some feeble retort- I don't think they honestly care what my answer is, anyway, nor are my words going to convince them that my children are doing just fine, thank you very much.  Where was their concern when my daughter played with her imaginary friends at recess in public school because she couldn't find anyone to play with?  Or when BOTH of my children sat alone at separate lunch tables?  That's not exactly peer interaction, either.

The truth is that homeschooling is far more mainstream than the general public has been led to believe.  The last report I read had our numbers in the millions of kids.  There are sitcoms on tv with homeschooled children.  My husband bought me a Dean Koontz novel recently that featured a homeschooling family who was completely normal (although quite wealthy).  However, the only reports available to the general public are anecdotal at best.  Occasionally, the homeschooling community will be represented by a highly religious family, many children strong.  When we pulled our daughter out of public school, even her young teacher was surprised at what the public school had to offer homeschooling families because, I'm sure, it never crossed her mind that there would BE any. 

At the end of the day,  I think this.. outdated idea that only 'weird' people (and I'm definitely not a good representative for normal here) homeschool is what brings the outcries from general people.  They forget (or don't know) that homeschoolers do extremely well on tests.  They forget that, for most of us, teaching our children to walk, talk, potty train, even hold a fork was natural and normal.. and that academics is just one more step in that same direction.  Public school, they feel, is the ONLY way kids can learn their basic math facts, learn to read, learn to write, and have quality time with their peers.  The populace forgets that we adults went through that SAME system, that we have decent educations, and that we can pass that on to the next generation of kids.  There is no magic formula for teaching used in public schools (they constantly change their pedagogies and methods.. do a websearch for 'math wars' or 'sight words vs. phonics' to see how confused even the educational establishment is about how to teach), and certainly the parents, those people who have been there since birth, know their own children best.  They forget having their name on the board, or even detention, for talking to classmates.  They forget hours of sitting at a desk, no note passing.  They forget bullying, ridiculing, and the dog-eat-dog dynamics of young people forced together for hours and hours a day (or they are convinced this is necessary for character development).  The general population doesn't see the fallacy in the system: that adults aren't divided by age, aren't told we can only take out books in one part of the library or can only ask certain kinds of questions.  Being bullied as an adult is called harrassment- and it is illegal.  Public school does not reflect real life- nor should it.

I don't want to mislead you here: I think public education was set up for an entirely different reason than quality education, and THAT is fundamentally why it fails so many of our young people.  But the general public trusts the ideal that public school IS the way to become educated, socialized, enlightened.  To those folks, refusing that gift to homeschool must seem like turning down a steak dinner to eat cow hooves.  They just can't see there is even a reason to question, can't see a different way.  The questions come not from jerks, naysayers, doubters.  They come, to me, from people who just don't see the man behind the curtain, nor do they suspect there even might be someone standing there at all.

As for my non-supporters (minus Granny and her 'involvement')- bumping into other homeschooling families has really been the difference between the screaming phone calls and gradual acceptance that this *might* work- it isn't because we proved anything to them.... it's just that we seem less strange or weird because WOW other people are doing it, too! 

It doesn't matter: when a neighbor, who has never weighed in on the homeschooling debate but sees my children on a regular basis, comments how calm and mature they are... that's all I need to know.  When my daughter offers a information in a scientific conversation that makes my mother's eyes go round, when my son deals calmly and understandingly with an obnoxious younger child.. these are the things that prove we are doing it right.  And THAT is all the approval I need.