Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Home Schooling-The What, Why, How....

So many people have questions in regards to homeschooling. There are people who have written excellent articles in this regard but for now I am answering some of the basic questions you may have about homeschooling.


WHAT is homeschooling?

Webster's dictionary describes homeschool as follows:
Verb1.home-school - educate (one's children) at home instead of sending (them) to a school; "The parents are home-schooling their daughter"


It really can be summed up in that sentence. We are simply choosing to educate our children ourselves, at home. Or outside, or in the park, well you get the gist ;)


WHY homeschool?

I think this question is usually well intentioned but the answers will vary from person to person. Some of the people ask this question because they don't understand why we would choose to educate our children at home when there are at least two schools down the road. Like I said, answers will vary. For us, and many other Christians, we felt called to educate our children. We heard that conviction loud and clear! We attended informational meetings, researched online, spoke with individuals who had done it and pray and discerned. We had to wait a few years for my husband to discern but once we did, we jumped head first lol.



 In our home we are first and foremost Christian educators, teaching our children the tenets of our Catholic faith. We believe in "instructing them in the way they should go..." Proverbs 22:6  second we believe in providing them with sound academic instruction, with emphasis in writing, reading, arithmetic, science and history as well as physical exercise, and the knowledge of the arts (music, painting, etc.). We believe in doing all things for the glory of God.

Like I said, reasons will vary greatly depending on each individual family.


HOW do you homeschool?

There are many ways to homeschool.

We are more of an Eclectic homeschooling family, not using strictly one set of curriculum and adding other resources plus field trips etc.

There are Unschoolers, Traditional homeschoolers, classical homeschoolers, Charlotte Mason style etc.

You can read more about the different types here

FINAL THOUGHTS:

No matter what style you choose, where you choose to homeschool or whether you take field trips or not, I believe the most important things to do is pray, discern and KNOW YOUR WHY. When the homeschooling gets tough, trust me it will, you will need to put that why in front of you and ask God for His grace to carry on. Take heart you ARE qualified, you WILL do fine but it WILL be hard sometimes and that's ok. Just breath, put the books down if necessary and just be with your children. We all need a break sometimes :)

Have a great homeschool year!





















 

3 comments:

  1. Such a great read as we plan on homeschooling too! I was homeschooled, and I'm so glad my husband wants to also.

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  2. I've read from the current study that nothing builds a better strong esteem in a person than spending the first seven years of their life 24 hours a day with their mother. This builds strong feelings of love and safety. The lack of mother’s presence does the opposite. So the more of the early years that a child is homeschooled, the better.

    Anne
    http://HomeschoolingOption.com/

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