30 / 48
Page 30
2017 EDUCATION MAGAZINE
LINCOLN DAILY NEWS MARCH 1, 2017
S
ome say that education is on the verge of changing.
Both conservatives and liberals alike say that
with President Trump’s choice of Betsy DeVos as the
confirmed Secretary of Education, some things are
bound to change (some say for the better and some say
for the worse).
Both conservatives and liberals alike are also saying
that perhaps the time is right for home-schooling
as an option to public and private school education.
Both the state and federal government say that home-
schooling is a legitimate way to educate children. It
is the opinion of some that home-schooling may be
an answer to opt into a system of education that is a
better way to educate children or a way to opt out of a
system of education that some see fails some students.
This article attempts to explore the reality of home-
schooling through an interview with three people;
two home-schooling teachers (
Alice
and
Teresa
)
and one home-schooled student (
Michael
)
. In
the interest of privacy some of the names have been
changed. Their answers, however, are interesting,
engaging and provocative.
It seems that parents who choose home-schooling are
often questioned about the legitimacy of their choice
to home-school and often challenged personally
on this subject. For those who home-school their
children, it is not just another choice: it is the right
choice. And the results prove it.
Here are the questions and their answers:
Q: How did you decide to home-school your kids?
Alice:
I wanted the freedom to be directly
involved in encouraging and challenging a lifestyle
of learning at the appropriate pace for my children.
Teresa:
Once our oldest kids began first grade in
a local, private school, I began to have an interest
in home-schooling them. My college degree was in
a special education and I enjoyed being a stay-at-
home mom, so home-schooling was an opportunity
to combine both of these passions.
It wasn’t until two years later when we made the
decision to switch. One of our children had a mild
learning disability and I often spent a few hours
each night re-teaching content to this child after
school was over in order to help with homework.
Since I worked almost full-time in a different
school, it really made a long day of school for
us both and it contributed to a stressful home
environment. In addition, I noticed that this child’s
love for learning was beginning to be squelched
and we didn’t want that to continue.
We hoped that by switching to home-schooling,
we could address the needs of this one child and
decrease some of the stress level related to school.
Other key factors were that we liked the idea
of having the whole family at home rather than
being torn by different work and school schedules.
It offered us both flexibility as a family and the
time to be intentional about developing family
relationships.
A home-schooling primer for the rest of us
Not for everybody:
Continued
u