Our decision to homeschool

I have to say that June is an exciting month for me and my family. Both my husband and I are thrilled as this is the month that we are celebrating the high school graduation of our twin daughters. Or should I say, the homeschool high school graduations of our daughters. It is our first homeschool graduation. The first of many, we hope and pray that we are blessed to celebrate in the coming years. We currently have seven children and God-willing, they will all be homeschool graduates.

The decision to homeschool our children wasn't a snap decision, by any means. We didn't just decide one day to begin homeschooling. It wasn't something that, like many families, we always knew we were going to be doing. It has been a journey down a road with twists and turns, taking us in different directions each step of the way.

I don't think I had ever even heard of homeschooling, when our twins began their school journey. We just automatically enrolled them in the public schools. They attended public schools for their pre-kindergarten, kindergarten and first grade years. It was during their first grade year that both, my husband and I began to consider sending them to the private christian school run by our church. I attended the same type of school as a child, and thought how important it was that they be taught Bible classes right alongside of math, reading, history and science. So for 2nd grade, we enrolled them in our church school where they continued through the eighth grade. It was sometime during these years that I first heard of homeschooling. However, I didn't consider it could be something that would work for our family. Our children were doing well. The teachers were wonderful. I couldn't homeschool. I was only a high-school graduate. There are laws about these things. Sure that it wasn't an option for us, we continued on - enrolling our other children in our church school as well. As time went by, I remember thinking more and more of homeschool. It was just something that I couldn't shake. I now know, it was the Lord leading our family in a new direction. To be able to have my children with me throughout the day, to be able to teach them the things we wanted them to learn, to have the extra hours to train them, to keep them from certain situations that did develop, even in a private school. To be able to share special moments with them throughout the day. To be rid of the after school hassles, the homework, the early bedtimes, the early mornings. All these things kept coming to mind.

And then our youngest son, began to have trouble. He was in the fourth grade. He was falling behind. He couldn't do the homework. He had homework every evening and how we had to fight with him to get it done. Our already hectic evenings became worse. How my husband and I wished we could help him more. How, we wondered were we going to get him through his school years without all the struggles that he was now enduring? I began to wish we were able to homeschool. Anything had to be better than what we were going through. But, how? I knew the homeschool laws in our state prevented me from homeschooling. The litte bit of research I had done told me that in order to homeschool, for anything other than religious reasons, one of the parents needed to actually be a teacher. However, it was during a conversation with a friend, that I found out that our state's laws had changed. Our state was now one of the easiest in which to homeschool. It was now possible for us to bring our son home and give him the help he needed. So, we did. I began homeschooling him mid-fifth grade. The rest of that year we did nothing fancy. We used workbooks from Walmart. We printed lots of stuff off the internet. We took the time to get used to the idea of homeschooling. It was during this time that I began to think about our daughters high school years. The school they were currently attending ended with the eighth grade. We had two options. Our first option was to send them to the high school where many of the children from our church attend. A dormitory-type seminary over an hour away from home. This really wasn't an option for us, due to the high cost and the fact that both my husband and I felt that our children were still in their formative years, and needed to be living at home. The second option, naturally, was the local public high school. Now, I have to say that the thought of sending them there scared me to pieces. I was sure they could probably do well, even have some fun. I just couldn't stop thinking of how much schools have changed. How there is just so much stuff for our kids to work through. And how stressful it could turn out to be for them. I know there are many who do very well in the public school system. We just weren't sure we could send them into that type of environment. So we began thinking about homeschooling them as well. And after much thought and prayer, it was decided that, our children would continue to attend our church school, but after completing the eighth grade, they would do complete their high school years at home. However, little did I know that the Lord wasn't finished working on me yet.

The next year, leery of teaching high school, keeping transcripts and record-keeping, we enrolled the girls and our one son in umbrella type home-school, run by a church in our area. It was expensive but well worth it, we thought. Our other son began the seventh grade in our church school. Our five year old daughter also began her schooling by attending their kindergarten class. It didn't take long before we realized that this would not be an ideal situation for our family. The homeschool program required lots of running back and forth between their school and home, as did our church school. I was pregnant with our seventh child, had a toddler, and spent too much time running back and forth. We were always scrambling trying to be some place, trying to make it all fit. The homeschool program had specific deadlines. We were also having a difficult time making our monthly tuition payments. We were also beginning to see things in our other two children who were attending private school. Changes in attitude, in the way they spoke to us, the things they talked about, among other things. Our older son was having his own bit of struggles. Many of the classmates that he had grown up with, some of those who had been his friends, began changing. Some of them became disrespectful and rude. Subjects of conversation turned to things that we considered unacceptable for our children. Life choices that we disagreed with were treated casually. Schoolwork was no longer the priority. Having fun was. Many of the values that we were trying to instill in our children became something that we felt we needed to fight for. Private schools, while a wonderful experience, still have much of the same struggles that are found in the public schools of today. Please don't get me wrong, by no means do we think we have all the answers or that our children are without their many flaws. However, it became obvious to us that alot of our views on raising children were very different than many others. We also believed it was our job, our duty,as parents to make sure that we were doing everything possible to raise our children to be the best possible adults that we could. So now I began thinking, that maybe there was another way. I began making a mental list of all my concerns, spending time thinking about each one.

1.) We could ease up our budget and rid ourselves of the scrambling around by not using the umbrella school.

2.) As for record-keeping, that was easy enough. I just had to be organized. Ha! I can do that. Really, I can.

3.) High school subjects: not that intimidating, I would just learn along with the kids, if I didn't know something. Sounds easy enough, right?

4.) Okay, time to deal with those dreaded transcripts. Both my husband and I agreed, that if our children were to decide to attend college, it would need to be the local community college. So my husband called them, asking exactly what would be needed or required of anyone wanting to attend classes. Interestingly enough, transcripts were not in the list. This facility has what is considered an open-door policy. This means that all the kids had to do would be to take and pass a placement test.

5.) Why not homeschool all of them? Why keep some of our children at home and send some of them to school? Maybe we all needed to be together, working towards the same goal.

It was that easy and my list was taken care of. And so it was that we began to prepare for the next bend in the road.

We are now four and a half years into our homeschooling journey, with many more to come. Do we still have bends and twists in the road? You bet! Do our children still struggle from time to time? Most definitely! Are we confident that we made the right decison to bring our children home to educate and train them. Absolutely! There isn't a day that goes by that I am not reminded of how far we have come in such a short time. I am thankful to the Lord and His leading my husband and I to make a decison that I am sure is one of the most important decisons we have ever made concerning the upbringing and best interests of our children. I look forward to our upcoming graduation celebration with one of pride and joy. My daughters have worked hard and earned their beautiful diplomas that their father and I will be signing and presenting to them both. And I look forward to continuing on that road, with each of my other children. No matter how many twists or turns the road takes us on. God has truly blessed us our decision to homeschool.

May 21, 2007