Reasons Why We Homeschool

1. Socialization in most public schools is of extremely poor quality. Parents have no idea who their child is going to meet, interact with, be influenced by, or if the other children are who they want their child associating with. Worse, bullying is on the rise, and educators seem to be uneducated on not only what bullying is, but how to deal with it when it happens.

2. Educational standards are slipping, and quickly. More and more children leave school with no skills, including the very basics of reading and writing.

3. Pressure to perform, and also to conform, fails to intrigue me, except for the passing fancy I have of it and why so many parents are fine with it being aimed at their children. Then I remind myself, there is no logic behind it, except it's easier to control people who conform. I want my child to grow up to be a leader, not a follower. Nothing wrong with followers, it's just the day and age that's bad for followers. At the rate things are going, it might be harder on those who end up being leaders.

4. I enjoy being with my son, day in and day out. He doesn't seem to mind my company, either. I know what he's learning, what methods are being used, I never have to worry about the dreaded PTA meetings, nor the parent-teacher conferences, where all of a sudden, your child, who you've been told all grading period is near saintly, now has problems that you've never been told about. and I also know what he's eating, without ever having to pack a lunch.

5. Flexibility is wonderful. I can teach at a bowling alley, lecture while he's laying down to go to bed, help him write better while talking on the phone, use his favorite TV shows to reinforce something we covered before, and combine subjects into lessons however I think he'll learn best.

6. Risk of several things is eliminated, and even though they may have been low-risk if he attended 'regular' school, there's no chance of him being bullied, ending up in a poor quality school system (FWCS, where we live, is rated a 4 out of 10!), being a victim of violence, or failing. That's right, he has no risk of being held back a grade. I teach him at what level he is capable of learning, not by his age. He also doesn't risk becoming ill from other students, and I don't mean the flu or colds, I mean contagious diseases that run long-term health risks, such as e-coli. He also doesn't run the risk of being kidnapped while on his way to or from the bus stop.

7. Lack of his time being wasted while a teacher catches other children up with the rest of the class. He's not forced to learn at the average rate of the other students in his class.

8. He's also freed of permission slips for field trips, lunch money lost (or stolen), homework left at home, and so on.

9. His curriculum is actually increased, not decreased. He's learning how to cook, parasitology, beginning chemistry, beginning physics, and not only geography, but also topography.

10. His teacher, me, studied Liberal Arts, and I'm comfortable teaching many different subjects, even though I'm a bit rusty on the calculus.