By Mimi Rothschild
I’ve been meaning to post about this Georgetown Times article for some time now. This particularly unbiased piece showcases how four moms are choosing to give up their career dreams and more to stay at home with the kids.
By joining up with the Georgetown Area Home Educators, this group of women is standing firm in their call to bring Kingdom Education to their children.
Hagmayer doesn’t understand why people disagree with home-schooling, saying it is not a new practice. Before the federal and local governments decided to regulate education, everyone home-schooled their children, she said.
“We’re not inventing anything new, Hagmayer said. “We’re just going back to the basics.”
What a surprisingly true statement. Many public school administrators have this backwards idea that homeschool parents are doing rejecting the longstanding institution of the public school. In actuality, the public school is an institution in its infancy. Homeschooling is a tradition that has been passed down from generations since the beginning of time, really. To think that homeschool parents are entering uncharted waters by pulling their kids out of the public school is quite naive.
I’d also like to call attention to the article’s mention of the women giving up their career dreams. We live in a me-oriented culture. Self-actualization is the name of the game. After all, do we moms want to look back on our lives and regret that we didn’t go for that career in the thick of the rat-race? This mentality not only flies in the face of everything we know from God’s Word, but it also opposes our natural inclinations. Life is a time to invest in other people. Christianity is built on the concept of you-orientation.
A good example is marriage. Why are so many marriages ending in divorce? The simple answer is that our society reflects a me-culture, but marriage is a you-culture institution. Marriage can’t work in me-culture because marriage is one big sacrifice!
These moms are choosing to follow a different path, and in the end, they’ll be more fulfilled. Investing in a child is the most fulfilling act in all of human behavior. Why do we bang our heads against walls trying to get rid of this gift!
By Mimi Rothschild
Yesterday we learned about how wealthy families are taking advantage of homeschooling as an optimal solution. Today, I came across an article from the Sassy Lawyer in the Manila Standard describing how homeschooling might be ok if there are no other options.
She starts out somewhat negative:
“Still, in a scenario where quality education is inaccessible or unaffordable, or both, I’d take a good hard look at homeschooling. And, in a worst-case scenario, I’d probably overcome my feeling of incompetence to teach my own children math and the sciences. In a worst case scenario.”
Ouch! She makes it sound like she’d have to be dragged kicking and screaming into the homeschooling world. In her defense, many of her negative feelings about homeschooling seem to stem from personal insecurities about her own ability to teach. These are feelings that all parents have when they begin homeschooling. She warms up a little to the idea of homeschooling by the end of the article:
“To sum up, homeschooling is a worthy option especially in view of the many failures of schools and the educational system. But the right of parents to choose to homeschool their children may not always be in the best interests of the child. As with most things, the advantages and disadvantages will have to be weighed on a case-to-case basis.”
Thank-you, Sassy Lawyer, for the illuminating analysis! In all seriousness, she makes many good points. I would encourage her readers to check out yesterday’s post on the Bloomberg story about Manhattanite homeschoolers.
By Mimi Rothschild
How would you educate if money was not an issue? Would you send your children to the most prestigious school in your city?
According to a recent Bloomberg article, many of Manhattan’s movers and shakers are no longer relying on outsourcing the education of their children. Whether they hire expensive private tutors for homeschooling or allow their children to educate themselves in an “unschooling” format, these upper-crust families are realizing that their children are too important to leave their education in anyone’s hands but their own.
“The growth of home schooling in Manhattan is part of a national trend. From 1999 to 2003, the number of kids being taught at home soared 29 percent to 1.1 million, according to the most recent survey by the U.S. Education Department. The city requires parents to create a teaching plan and to have students’ academic progress evaluated under state regulations.”
I think this is a fascinating development. For one thing, it blows the popular perception of homeschoolers being a bunch of rural hillbillies trying to escape from society. These are some of the most influential people in the city. They are choosing to homeschool, not for religious escapist reasons, but because they strongly feel it is the best academic environment for their children. Although they can afford to send their children to $30,000 private schools, they are forsaking this luxury.
“Leon Potgieter, who runs the 300-employee New York City office of Stamford, Connecticut-based consulting firm Towers Perrin, said he and his wife, Barbara, can afford any school for 9-year-old twins Luke and Sarah and 6-year-old Hannah. They chose home schooling because they decided that Barbara, 41, a physicist and computer scientist, could do a better job. Potgieter, 44, teaches the history lessons when he gets home from work.”
Again, these are not the uneducated right-wingers at which the mainstream media would point the finger. These are well-educated, urbane parents. Many of these homeschoolers have gone the “unschooling” route.
“While their peers are in school, Caroline and Jessica have the run of the town, to join clubs, visit museums and take classes. Caroline learns English in a teen book club, history from DVD documentaries and science at the American Museum of Natural History.”
That kind of freedom is what makes homeschooling so attractive to the rich. Why put restrictions on your child’s learning when you have such amazing resources all over the city of which to take advantage?
By Mimi Rothschild
The South Florida Sun-Sentinel ran a story last week about a homeschool homecoming phenomenon in South Florida. Complete with a “big game” (Soccer, not football) and a dance, which I’m sure brought back a little modesty and chivalry to the world of dance, the homecoming celebration looks like a blast.
“We’re going to win the soccer game,” said Keeley Sproc, a 16-year-old junior from Oakland Park who plays midfielder and has been taught at home for about six years. “Then, we’re going to rush home and get pretty.”
Apparently homeschooled teenaged girls haven’t lost their sense of glamour in all those cabin-feverish years at home!
“I got really cool shoes,” Sproc said. “Sparkly.”
It’s good to see that these girls are given a chance to cut loose and “get pretty” for once. Sometimes it can be difficult in homeschooling situations to provide good, clean, fun like this on a large scale. Kudos to the enterprising parents and organizers who got this homeschool homecoming off the ground.
As homeschooling becomes more of a “mainstream alternative,” we’re going to see things like yearbooks, dances, sporting events, graduation ceremonies, and more. I’m excited to see how these traditional affectations of the public school world are applied to homeschooling. Hopefully it will bring a little bit of legitimacy to our world, in the eyes of the media that is.
I’m curious as to how popular this homecoming trend is among homeschoolers. Is there anyone out there who has seen similar celebrations take place among co-ops or other networked homeschoolers? Feel free to leave a comment. I’d love to hear more from this blog’s readers!
By Mimi Rothschild
For those of you who haven’t been following this week’s series of posts, please check out the last few entries before reading these tips. It will give you some context.
As adolescence stretches far into young-adulthood, it’s clear that homeschooling parents need to do something to help their teens develop into healthy, productive, mature adults. Here are some things that parents can do to help smooth out the transition from the homeschooling nest into the mean, cruel world.
Encourage part-time jobs
Some parents are under the impression that teens should not have to worry about getting a job. After all, they’ll be working for the rest of their lives. Nothing could be further from the truth! A part-time job is an excellent way to prepare teens for life in the workplace. Every teen should have the opportunity to make some extra money while learning valuable real-world skills. The extra money that they will earn will be tremendously helpful while they get on their feet. It’s also excellent for college applications and resumes.
Establish strong fiscal responsibility
Young adults living at home with parents is a disturbing trend among our youth. When I was a kid, I couldn’t wait to get out of the house and strike out on my own. Today, college loans and a competitive job market for college grads ensure that teens will have a tough time making the transition into adulthood. You can help your child make the switch by instilling money management techniques in your homeschoolers. There are a variety of books available for such a purpose.
Establish consequences for mistakes
There are few things more damaging to a child’s development than removing natural consequences out of pity. When a teenager messes up, and he or she eventually will, it’s important that parents don’t bail their children out all the time. By not doing so, you are setting up your children for a life of dependence on you, on others, or on the state.
De-mystify perpetual adolescence
The concept of perpetual adolescence connotes the idolization of youth as being something that adults should strive towards, even as they age. This concept is highly correlated with Rosseau’s “noble savage.” It’s important that we instill a respect for the elder in our children. We want our teens to look towards adulthood with anticipation, eager to experience the freedom and autonomy that comes with being an adult. Today, young adults look at their lives with an “it’s all downhill from here” attitude. To break this perception, explain to your teens the benefits of adulthood from an early age.