Home Schooling

One of the subjects I'm asked about more often than you'd think is, "What's your opinion on home schooling?" It's odd for me since I've rarely come in contact with homeschoolers but being in a school setting for the last few years has definitely shed some light on the subject for me.

When I was a child I wanted desperately to be home-schooled. I hated wearing my uniform, hated school lunches, hated the bells. I craved flexibility and math lessons in my pajamas. That's the "dream" of home-school for so many, but it turns out to not be the reality for the kids I've met who were home-schooled. Some have had tutors come to them daily, some have "classroom" areas set up in their homes, and some even have a regular school day schedule. In college I met a young woman who had been home-schooled in a regular day school, just in a private classroom with other home-school students. Because they were attending the school they had to wear the required uniform, and they also met with different teachers throughout the day.

As most teachers, I disagree with the theory of home-schooling for a number of reasons. First of all, while I am an educator I would never dream that I have all the knowledge I need to teach my child everything they need to know to be ready for high school or college. I just don't. No parent does. Second, in a home setting if a child acts out they're punished/disciplined as they are at home. There's no definition between punishments. If a student acts out in my class they're going to get demerits and maybe a detention. For home-schooled students, detention and home are one in the same. What's the difference between taking away the TV for an hour because they sassed back at the dinner table versus taking the TV away for an hour because they didn't do their homework? Parents who home-school would need to get creative and find ways to inspire and motivate their kids, which of course could be considered bribing. I'm not an "incentive" teacher. I'm not going to reward a student for doing what they already know they need to do. I find incentives to be more of a "last chance" for control of the classroom. Perhaps I'm doing it wrong, but they've just never worked for me.

Another issue I have with home-schooling is that, despite what parents say and what their best intentions are, home-schooled kids are nearly always lagging behind in social skills. Because they're not engaging with their peers on a daily basis they tend to be a little more socially awkward than the rest of us. Junior high and high school are hard enough, and then thrusting a home-schooled child into a social setting, even one they're familiar with, just makes for an awkward situation in which your child has no fun and no friends.

Kids NEED rules and order. They may hate it, but they NEED to stand in line and wait until the bell rings. Seriously. Come visit my school any day of the week and you'll see that if I were to say, "Go grab your coat" and not specify which row should walk into the coat room or ask for line leaders to lead the class down the hall that there'd be chaos. "But what are we supposed to dooooooooooooooooooooooooo????" Quizzical looks and demanding, needy question askers would be tugging at me, desperate to make order of the chaos. I kid you know. Kids like knowing that everything happens in order, and most adults to as well. To take away that order puts them on edge. To not have that order to begin with makes kids, in my opinion, more confused and less able to adapt to order in high school and college.

Simply taking your child to a church youth group or making them play on a weekly softball team doesn't fix the problem, either. Sure they're getting social interaction, but the home-schooled child is often "weird" or the outsider. From my experience (which admittedly is limited, but it's been the same in every case I've encountered) the home-schooler doesn't engaged and doesn't understand the social cues beind sent out by the other children. The child might come from a home where everyone there loves and adores them and listens to every word they have to say, but in social situations that's not the case. I've encountered adults who talk and talk and talk and talk and dominate the conversations because they're afraid of the silence, or because they just assume that everyone wants to hear what they have to say. Social cues aren't something you learn in a classroom with a notebook and pencil--they take time to learn and master.

The one home-schooled child I knew well is a struggling adult. Because she grew up in a very closed environment (her parents both worked from home and she has a very honest, but also very boundryless relationship with them) she's VERY unprepared for life outside her little bubble. "Anna" grew up in a very small family and attended a very small and very literal Southern Baptist church. She has a very sweet disposition, but anything different from what she is used to makes her twitch a little. For example, when attending college for the first time she was completely struck that homosexuals actually existed outside Chicago. She thought for sure that there weren't gay people south of I-80, apparently. Regardless of what your feelings about homosexuality are, you have to at least agree that it's something we encounter everyday and it's not going away. It's just another difference found in people all over the nation. However, Anna just stared in shock when she met her first lesbian. Apparently this woman wasn't anything like Anna expected, and the way she kept her distance it was clear she thought that she could catch some gay disease or something.

Anna also has a low tolerance for compromise. She wants her way, gosh darn it! When asked, Anna will tell you that she never had any problems sharing or compromising at home. Everyone ELSE is the problem! However, it's clear that Anna and compromise quite well with her close-knit family because they're all very much alike. There's no fight for what to watch on TV each night because they all love the same programs. But when meeting her college roommate and having to learn to share and work out a shower/bathroom schedule and learning when to ask and when to compromise gave Anna the hardest year of her life. She just wasn't used to living with "an outsider". While her roommate was generally a good person, she and Anna were veeeeeeeeeeeery different and Anna just couldn't live with her.

Now, if you're an advocate for home-schooling I'm sure you're thinking, "Well, these are just extreme cases! I'll certainly make sure my child understands that they need to compromise with people and they need to learn to share with other kids." Oh yeah? How so? Limited social interaction makes it harder for kids to learn how to share and work with others. Sure Anna could share with her brother Travis, but she couldn't share with anyone else. She just didn't know how. Even now, when I hear her talk about her teaching career, her complaints are always about her coworkers and that they're irritating her. "They're doing it wrong! They have no classroom control! They're not prepared enough!" Really, Anna? Is that the only problem? Sure there are teachers who play a little fast and loose with their lesson plans and Lord knows there are classroom management issues, but I find it hard to believe that ALLLLLL your coworkers are underqualified and mismanaging.

I think part of the reasons parents home-school (and this is gonna be flame-worthy) are completely selfish. Maybe they're having a little trouble letting go, or maybe they're homebodies to begin with. Maybe they don't even realize they're being selfish. I don't know. However, I've to date only met one parent (a former classroom teacher) who chose to home-school for the benefit of her CHILD, not herself. In this instance, her child was being bullied relentlessly at school and she felt the school wasn't doing enough to combat what was happening to her child. She and her husband cannot afford a private school and they are not yet able to move into a new school district. She took matters into her own hands and is home-schooling her oldest child but not her younger three. His schedule matches that of his siblings, and while he's socially awkward he's doing remarkably well given the circumstances. I think that his mother's teaching background definitely helps. After all, she knows what she's teaching him backwards and forwards and she has years of elementary classroom experience. Sure she might be a little rusty after being a stay-at-home mom for so long, but she definitely knows her stuff and once they're able to move they're planning to admit their child to regular school again.

Home-schooling children because you think you can do a better job is just plain silly. Like I said, I'd never assume that I need to know everything necessary to educate a child. Furthermore, there's a reason most school districts now require a Master's degree to teach Pre-K and Kindergarten. Those early years are important for education. Kids learn to play WITH one another, not near one another. They learn to share, and they learn to have a schedule and order and to be just a little bit responsible for one another. I believe the Pre-K teacher at my school is one of the best around. All students who attend Preschool here and continue on to Kindergarten know how to read and write (at least a little) by Kindergarten. They learn to play with other kids and they learn how to behave and follow classroom rules. They are far better prepared to enter the upper grades than those children who don't attend Preschool at all. Even if Mom and Dad are teaching Junior his letters and numbers, Preschool is much more than just playing, snacking, and napping these days. It's critical for success. When polled, the 8th grade students (graduating in a few weeks) who attended Preschool are among the brightest and smartest in their class. Those who didn't struggle much more academically.

Something else I've encountered with home-schooled kids is that they learn early on that "outsiders are scary." They're not like them, therefore we "normal folk" are strange and different. I've never, ever met someone who attended a home school who didn't think "the rest of us" were trustworthy, normal, and not weird. If your parents work from home and you learn from home, you have no baseline for what normal behavior looks like. Sure, you're normal. Normal for you. You have no exposure to anything different. By the time you enter the mainstream, everything different is weird and not trustworthy. Yes, if a student attends regular school, people and things will still be weird. However, they'll be less eye-popping than if that student were home-schooled and effectively sheltered and then thrust into real life.

Something else that comes up when home-schooling is discussed is the fear parents have when they send their children off to school. Shootings, gangs, drugs, drinking, partying, curse words, stress...I can definitely understand why parents, when weighing those obstacles, could want to keep their kids at home. But here's the thing: I spend 6 hours a day with these kids. I can only have so much of an impact, as can their friends. Technology has made it easier to get access to all those potential threats, but the role of the parent hasn't diminished. As a parent, you have access to your child all the time. You shouldn't have to worry that your child will descend into the seventh circle of hell and become a liar and drug addict if you've done your job right. All those fears are normal and I don't know that they ever go away. But worrying comes with the territory of being a parent. Parents worry, kids don't. That's life. However, as a parent you can educate your child and make sure they're not going to make bad decisions. Will your kid screw up? YES! At least, I sure as hell hope so. That's what kids do. They make mistakes but they learn from those mistakes with the right training. You can't be with your child every minute. It's just not healthy. But you can educate and teach your child right from wrong and what the dangers of drugs and alcohol are and hope and pray that they actually listened to you and will make the right decisions when faced with a choice.

Another issue, one most work-at-home parents don't consider is the time required for home-schooling. You'd effectively have to quit your job to teach your kid, or hire a tutor to get your work done. Or, learn to live on little sleep and work at night. Teaching children who can't work independently makes it nearly impossible to do your "real job". Scheduling can help, but let's face it. You had kids for a reason. You love them and want to spend time with them. You're not going to want to teach kids for an hour, then give them 2 hours to go outside and play while you stay holed up inside. You want to spend time with them and enjoy their company. Some of my favorite memories of school and childhood include coming home and being able to tell my parents what I learned today. I felt like a genius when I learned how to multiply and divide and my parents enjoyed my stories and my demonstrations of what I learned in school.


Bottom line, kids NEED to learn from people other than their parents. They need to learn from other teachers and their classmates. They need to learn to follow the rules and work with kids who aren't them. Only children have a hard enough time learning to work with other kids, why make it harder for them? If a parent is considering home-schooling, my best advice for them is to strongly consider the reasons behind it. Why do you want to home school so much? Will your schedules allow it? What sort of schedule will you follow? Do you have any plans to admit your child to a normal day school once they're older? Also, what kind of socialization will you have planned for "after school"? What if your child doesn't like it and wants to quit? What will you provide in the place of that dropped activity?

I know parenting is tough and Lord knows you want what's best for your child. However, what's best for you isn't necessarily the best for your child. Look at all your schooling options. Private schools are hurting in this economy and might be willing to work with you and give you a financial aid package to make tuition affordable, or maybe you can work at the school part-time to defer some of that tuition. If private isn't even an option on the table, look at your local schools and take a tour. Meet your child's teachers. If you don't like them and like the idea of your child being home, strongly consider hiring an outside tutor or forming a home-school group. Trust me, with the way schools are closing left and right these days there will be plenty of former teachers looking to keep working until they can get another classroom placement. Charter schools are also an option: a public school with a private feel. In Chicago, charter schools are essentially forcing out "bad kids" with a behavior code and the bad kids are turning to neighborhood schools. If your kid doesn't have a behavior issue, then they should be fine.

To me, there are almost always better options than home-schooling. It doesn't seem healthy for anyone involved. Attachment issues can form, and few home-schooled children grow up to be well-adjusted teenagers and adults. You are the most important teacher your child has, but you can't be there all the time, and your child can learn valuable life lessons from you while you leave the letters and numbers teaching to the professionals.