homeschooling

We homeschool. 

I've been thinking lately that the longer I do it, the more I like it and the more I feel committed to the long haul (as long as I don't think about that in terms of the next 18 years. whoa.). 

So perhaps I'll do a little post about why we decided to homeschool our kids.

I had always considered homeschooling when Noah was little, though Terry and I were both public schooled. I probably felt that this is what we would end up doing, but needed help making that decision. I really weighed the reasons why I wanted to do this. 

Did I want to protect my children? Yes, of course. This world is seriously messed up. I just read an article about a kindergartner being teased about his daddy dying and the kids saying he was a zombie. Messed. Up. And that's not even the half of it in this world. My kids don't even know what zombies are. And I'm okay with that. Does that mean I will forever try to keep zombies and scary stuff away from them? No.

Back to my point of analyzing why I was even considering doing this. Was it a control issue? Absolutely it was. I knew that I hoped that by keeping my kids close to home and teaching them about our faith, that they would become true hearted believers. Absolutely. But what I had to get around was that that was not in my control. Salvation is God's work and His alone. The end. I had to accept that. 

In order to get a better feel for what homeschooling entailed and was all about, we both attended a Nebraska homeschool conference and that helped me to sort things out. It must have been when Noah was only three because he wasn't even old enough to do preschool yet and I wanted to make up my mind about what we were going to do. So we went. It was really wonderful and helpful. Though I can't recall many details from the lectures, I do remember their high school graduation ceremony pretty vividly. The parents gave their own kids their diplomas. It was very moving. You could just see how much it meant to them to have reached that point. All I could think of was all the sacrifice and hard work and love those parents put into that child and now here they were, an adult. I remember Terry and I looking at each other like, "Wow." Pretty inspiring.

I can't point to one single argument from that conference that pushed us to homeschool. What did push me over the edge was what I did when we got home. I did a Bible study. I researched how many times in the Bible words such as "teach," "mother," "father," "child," etc. were used. I came away with 18 PAGES. That's a lot of references. 

So when people talk of being "called" to homeschool, I feel a little dubious. A calling is pretty serious and I never heard a voice from on high telling me "Thou shalt homeschool!" What I do feel, however, is a strong conviction to homeschool. 

I never ever felt I wanted to be a teacher. That would have been the last thing I would have chosen for a degree. I didn't even like kids very much. When I babysat as a teenager, I totally didn't like it. Boring. I like my own kids, but I'm not one of those really sweet homeschool moms who always talks all sugary and just loves kids. That's so not me. So I'm not someone who was "born" to do this. I hear all the time "Oh I could never do that!" Yeah? Well, join the club. I can't either. And you know what? I'm still doing it. And it would be easier to go to work a lot of the time. Serious. But it's worth it.

I love my kids. And I want to do absolutely everything in my power to enable them to be all that they can be. Educationally, emotionally and most importantly, spiritually. What else matters, I ask you? Does it matter how cool and witty and "socialized" they are? Nope. I think their character and spiritual maturity are far more important and homeschooling will take them much farther.

So what it comes down to for me is that we are able to do this and I think it's the best way. Now that does not mean that I look down at public schooled kids. My husband is a youth pastor and most of his students are public schooled! I was public schooled! We love those kids. But for us, this is what we want to do.