by Barbara Frank
A while back, television reporter John Stossel wrote yet another of his columns criticizing America’s public school monopoly, where he also explained why we need school choice. I’m with him on that. But after bringing up homeschooling and how successful it is, he made a comment that bothered me. He said,
I don't know how these homeschooling parents do it. I couldn't do it. I'd get impatient and fight with my kids too much. But it works for lots of kids and parents….
I’ve heard this one many times. Sometimes people have called me a saint for homeschooling my kids all these years, adding that they could never do it. Often, that’s a cop-out. They have other things they’d rather do than homeschool, but they don’t want to admit it.
I don’t know if that’s where Stossel is coming from, but there is another possibility. He (and those other parents) may be thinking about who their kids are right now and what kind of relationship they have with them. Their kids come home from school sullen after being locked up in a classroom all day, hardly interested in tackling their homework, and willing to fight about it. Meanwhile, Mom and Dad are beat from a long day of work preceded and followed by a harrowing commute. They feel like supervising the kids’ homework about as much as having a root canal, but it must be done. So the exhausted parents fight with the cranky kids about doing their homework, and that’s the picture homeschooling brings to mind when these parents consider the concept.
People only know what they know. How can we get across to Stossel and the rest of them that homeschooled kids aren’t kids who come home every afternoon irritable and tired? Kids who haven’t gone to school have ownership of their time. They don’t have to ask for permission in front of 30 kids when they have to go to the bathroom. They eat when they’re hungry, not from 11:15 to noon because it said so on their schedule. They don’t have to worry whether their clothes are in style; it may be pajamas, anyway. The freedom homeschooled kids have makes them different people than they would have been if they’d been going to school every year.
We homeschooling parents are different, too. We spend more time with our kids than most parents do, so we get them when they’re rested and ready to learn. We get to know them so well that we can handle the times when they’re tired and cranky because we also get to see them when they’re happy and fun to be around. And if they’ve been homeschooled all their lives, they’re even easier to deal with because they’ve missed out on picking up a lot of the obnoxious habits that schoolkids tend to pass around like viruses.
Does this mean we never get impatient with our kids or fight with them? Unfortunately not. We are human, after all. We all have our bad moments and bad days. But because they're just one part of the whole, it’s no big deal. Families who live and learn together on a daily basis are much more accustomed to every facet of family life, the joy and the troubles.
So Mr. Stossel, don’t write off homeschooling as something you could never do. If you gave it a chance, you might find your relationship with your kids rising to a whole new level. But whatever you decide, don’t stop fighting for school choice. It’s needed…desperately.
Copyright 2011 Barbara Frank/ Cardamom Publishers
Excerpted from Stages of Homeschooling, an upcoming eBook series from Cardamom Publishers. Learn more at www.cardamompublishers.com. Barbara Frank homeschooled her four children for 25 years. You’ll find her on the web at www.barbarafrankonline.com and www.thrivinginthe21stcentury.com
A while back, television reporter John Stossel wrote yet another of his columns criticizing America’s public school monopoly, where he also explained why we need school choice. I’m with him on that. But after bringing up homeschooling and how successful it is, he made a comment that bothered me. He said,
I don't know how these homeschooling parents do it. I couldn't do it. I'd get impatient and fight with my kids too much. But it works for lots of kids and parents….
I’ve heard this one many times. Sometimes people have called me a saint for homeschooling my kids all these years, adding that they could never do it. Often, that’s a cop-out. They have other things they’d rather do than homeschool, but they don’t want to admit it.
I don’t know if that’s where Stossel is coming from, but there is another possibility. He (and those other parents) may be thinking about who their kids are right now and what kind of relationship they have with them. Their kids come home from school sullen after being locked up in a classroom all day, hardly interested in tackling their homework, and willing to fight about it. Meanwhile, Mom and Dad are beat from a long day of work preceded and followed by a harrowing commute. They feel like supervising the kids’ homework about as much as having a root canal, but it must be done. So the exhausted parents fight with the cranky kids about doing their homework, and that’s the picture homeschooling brings to mind when these parents consider the concept.
People only know what they know. How can we get across to Stossel and the rest of them that homeschooled kids aren’t kids who come home every afternoon irritable and tired? Kids who haven’t gone to school have ownership of their time. They don’t have to ask for permission in front of 30 kids when they have to go to the bathroom. They eat when they’re hungry, not from 11:15 to noon because it said so on their schedule. They don’t have to worry whether their clothes are in style; it may be pajamas, anyway. The freedom homeschooled kids have makes them different people than they would have been if they’d been going to school every year.
We homeschooling parents are different, too. We spend more time with our kids than most parents do, so we get them when they’re rested and ready to learn. We get to know them so well that we can handle the times when they’re tired and cranky because we also get to see them when they’re happy and fun to be around. And if they’ve been homeschooled all their lives, they’re even easier to deal with because they’ve missed out on picking up a lot of the obnoxious habits that schoolkids tend to pass around like viruses.
Does this mean we never get impatient with our kids or fight with them? Unfortunately not. We are human, after all. We all have our bad moments and bad days. But because they're just one part of the whole, it’s no big deal. Families who live and learn together on a daily basis are much more accustomed to every facet of family life, the joy and the troubles.
So Mr. Stossel, don’t write off homeschooling as something you could never do. If you gave it a chance, you might find your relationship with your kids rising to a whole new level. But whatever you decide, don’t stop fighting for school choice. It’s needed…desperately.
Copyright 2011 Barbara Frank/ Cardamom Publishers
Excerpted from Stages of Homeschooling, an upcoming eBook series from Cardamom Publishers. Learn more at www.cardamompublishers.com. Barbara Frank homeschooled her four children for 25 years. You’ll find her on the web at www.barbarafrankonline.com and www.thrivinginthe21stcentury.com
