Home schooling or homeschooling, if you like (in fact, you even see it hyphenated, as in home-schooling) has been about for about 30 years now, although, of course it was all people had before state intervention in education. Out of the way rural places in huge countries like the USA, Canada and Australia still have to rely on home schooling to a great degree, although it is less difficult now with the wide-spread use of radio, television and the Internet. Video cassettes also have an important role, as do books still.
Nevertheless, home schooling has become very much in demand in the cities as an alternative to urban public schools, which are frequently seen as hotbeds of disruption, violence and narcotics, especially by the middle classes and not without some valid cause, to be fair. However, there are also other just reasons for choosing home schooling, which we will go into later.
First, it must be pointed out that the decision to go for home schooling has to be a family one. This is because it will turn “normal family life” on its head and place an added monetary strain on the family purse. For instance, one parent will have to cease working. This cannot be allowed to be a cause of resentment, or both parents could take part-time employment and share the children’s educational time. Whichever way you decide, you will not have two full-time incomes any longer. Working from home on the Internet could be a partial solution here.
Home schooling will also upset everyone’s social life. So, the parents’ social life is restricted by not meeting work colleagues every day, but so is little Johnny’s, particularly if he has already spent some time in a normal classroom. He won’t see his friends from class as much and they may drift away from him or even resent him.
On the plus side is that the family will become a lot stronger as a unit by studying together at home schooling. Both parents will have a complete knowledge of what their child is learning and will be learning. While maintaining a broad-spectrum education, you may however opt to focus on aspects of, say, history or science, that particularly interest your child. It allows you the freedom to match your child’s education to his or her own interests, something that state education cannot do well with large classes. Your child will also be less under the influence of the rowdier elements in school and be able to concentrate more on studying.
A word of caution might be useful at this juncture. Do not be tempted to force your child to learn too quickly. It is tempting for a non-professional teacher-cum-proud parent in home schooling to push the child much harder than he can go. Remember that most people are just average. You ought to be on look out for signs of burn-out and bad feeling at all times.
Once you decide to go for home schooling, you will have to pick a basic programme, run through it yourself to familiarize yourself with it, buy or locate in the library any supplementary books, videos and software, make a lot of notes and stock up on pens and paper, folders, binders and filing cabinets and you’ll be ready for your first term at home schooling.