Naysayers and Skeptics

I never realized what a storm of strong opinions swirls around this topic of homeschooling. After I unveiled this blog yesterday, I spent much of my time replying to emails, mostly addressing a few fervent objections to the idea of homeschooling. I did also receive enthusiastic encouragement from some quarters. It seems I have tapped into a subject that is very rich, very charged. This excites me.

The naysayers and skeptics have their arguments down. Here are the top three.

1. Homeschooled kids are weird.
Too much time with mom and dad makes kids a little, well, different, right? That's the worry. "Socialization" is the buzzword. Where do the homeschooled kids get it if they have no teachers, no lunchroom monitors, no Lord of the Flies reenactments on the playground?

I have to admit this was one of my chief concerns at the outset. Then Michael and I met Emma, a 15-year-old girl who has become my poster child for the homeschooling movement. Emma is self-possessed, pretty, and forthright in her opinions. When Michael asked her if it's hard for homeschooled kids to make friends she said no, then added, "Well, maybe if they're socially awkward!" Emma spent most of our visit running to and from her computer so she could instant-message with her friends.

2. Parents who homeschool their kids are weird.
They're either born again, or they live somewhere off the grid in Montana, making their own shoes out of tree bark. They're definitely vegetarians from Woodstock. (Ahem! That describes me and Michael perfectly. Does that mean I can't argue with this one?)

But really, a little research has found that homeschooling in America is growing by about 7 to 10% a year. The born-again vegetarians might have started it, but the new wave of homeschoolers is a pretty mainstream bunch. Either that or the population of American weirdos is growing exponentially.

3. I could never offer my kids the kind of stimulation that school provides.
Another concern that I shared. Until I began to recall what passed for stimulation in my public school when I was growing up in suburban New Jersey in the 1970s and 80s. We began with macaroni art and graduated to dull classroom lectures. My friends and I passed notes and doodled in the margins to keep awake. My brain slumbered on until college, when it woke with a jolt.

Emma probably gets more stimulation in one day than I had in one year as a high school sophomore. Here are just a few of her activities. Creative writing sessions with a local author. Irish dance classes. A weekly apprenticeship working with animals at a local farm. Voice lessons. Higher math with a family friend. A private-school enrichment program offering photography, yoga, and horseback riding. Lucky Emma. She has the space, the freedom, the time to find herself and follow her passions. Something most of us don't get to do until college, if at all.

These are certainly not the only objections I've encountered to homeschooling. I hope to touch on more in future posts. Meanwhile, tell me yours if you've got 'em.

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Busting the Stereotypes

Before I had a child, I had a vague mental image of homeschooling: a conscientious mother presiding over a litter of kids poised with pencils and workbooks at the kitchen table. Never in any daydream would I have inserted myself into this Norman Rockwell montage. Certainly not in the role of the mother/teacher.

My daughter, Amelie, came along two years ago and turned my head in another direction. She inspired me to question things - like the role of school and conventional ideas about education. My husband, Michael, and I began to wonder whether a traditional school setting was something we wanted for our spirited little girl-child. Would it knock the spirit right out of her?

When I tell people that we're thinking of homeschooling Amelie, I'm quick to say, "It's Michael's idea." As if to say, "He's the crazy one. I'm like you. I'm normal - REALLY!" And it was Michael who began to feed me books about homeschooling, books that smashed my image of the mother and kids around the table - an image that is not only stereotypical but also outdated.

The world of homeschooling, I'm finding, is big, diverse, and infinitely creative. Not just the domain of the fundamentally religious or the radically anarchistic, homeschooling is breaking into the mainstream in a big way. It's flexible and mobile, taking parents and kids away from the kitchen-schoolroom and into the world. I'm starting to realize that it might even be fun.

I haven't decided for sure whether or not homeschooling is for me and my family. But I'm curious. Curious enough to read the books, meet the parents, hang with the kids, join the Yahoo groups, and explore the secret corridors of homeschooling firsthand. This blog will take me there - and you too, if you care to come along for the ride.

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