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Home Schooling: Our Chance to Make a Difference
by Jim Sevy

My wife and I have decided, on two separate occasions, to pull our children out of public school and teach them at home. We have been very satisfied with our decision both times. We have seven children ages 12(g), 11(b), 9(g), 7(b), 5(b), 3(g) and 1(b) and a boy due in July. The first time we pulled them out we had children in 1st and 2nd grades. Our oldest daughter was not being challenged, and was bored and our son was being labeled because his approach was different and something as simple as him choosing an alternative way to put an art project together was landing him in "detention". Both he and my daughter blossomed with the attention and challenges that they were presented with at home. We put our children back in public school for a time when we moved to our little farm, because of a concern for the amount of time we would have available for home schooling and getting established on our new place. The children had no problem with their academic abilities and because we had kept them involved in our Church activity, and other activities such as, Scouts and dance lessons, and they had no real social problems. After a year and a half of public school we soon found out that there would be more time for our family and to give each of our children the individual attention that they each needed if we home schooled them. We also found: Our children were not being taught responsibility and that the schedule that the school imposed on us impaired our efforts to teach them responsibility. The teachers and administration of the school did not support our family’s standards of behavior. The school administration required teachers to approach their duties in a way that the administration could quantify, which resulted in an environment that did not encourage our children's natural sense of wonder and desire to learn. Because of the fundamental means by which public schools are funded and continually justified, the school is organized in such a way (grades, classes of 20 or 30), as to teach by the most efficient means and are seemingly unable to use more effective approaches to educate our children. School organization imposes a false socialization on our children. It is a society made up of arbitrarily grouped children, which are also segregated by age. This society fosters the importance of popularity and actually works to diminish the natural diversity that exists because we are all unique human beings. It tells our children that they should all dress a certain way, think a certain way, and be interested in the same things. Our children learn that if you are different you are weird, un-cool, a nerd or a jerk. It became apparent to us that we would need to again take our children home and teach them ourselves. An article published in the December 1996 American Psychological Association (APA) Monitor entitled "Home schools: How do they affect children?" (http://www.parenthoodweb.com/articles/phw75.htm) they speak to some of the benefits of home schooling and many more of the APA’s concerns about home schooling. In response to the assertions by the APA Psychologists: "lack of exposure to diversity" - We go out of the way to expose our children to much more diversity and a true and real diversity than they have ever experienced in public schools. We have the freedom to take them out into the "world" and allow them to interact with real, truly divers people in our community as well as communities that we visit. This is not a false, imposed, strained or politically correct diversity. It is real. "lack of participation in greater society" - Our children learn to cooperate, they are part of our team, they work hard with each other and accomplish a great deal more with each other than any of them could individually. They learn this lesson everyday. They do not compete with each other, but are taught and are given incentives to help each other be successful. We also teach our children about "participating in greater society" through our Church and Community activities. A very important tenant of our faith is Service to others. Many of our activities center on teaching about service and actually serving others. We have also involved them in our community activities which include our efforts with our local "Friends of the Library" organization. They have worked as hard as anyone has in our community to help with the library and to help build a new library. Many of these opportunities would not be possible if they were in public school. "potential difficulty entering mainstream life" - Admittedly there is the potential for problems getting into the "right" colleges or universities, however I am not certain that those schools are "right" if they would have a problem with one of my children. School and college isn't so much about learning "stuff" as it is about learning how to learn. A person can be successful in life if they are constantly learning and willing to challenge themselves to learn new "stuff" and apply that learning in a way that will facilitate the progressiveness and betterment of them as an individual and also those around them, such as their family members and their community. There are also many statistics that show that home schooled students have no problem getting into college and moving into "mainstream life". The other thing to consider is the value of "mainstream life". Today's mainstream is sometimes like being up the "mainstream" without a paddle. We jump into life and go along with "culturally accepted norms" of living the rat race, and running in the rut of everyday life. We should really consider whether we should want to jump into this stream. Hopefully we will be able to teach our children how to positively affect the mainstream by being in a position to think for themselves and discern the value of any activity and work and to contribute to the progress and uplifting of society and the "mainstream". What better opportunity do we have as individuals to have an effect on the society we live in, than to raise and teach our children to be caring, thinking, contributing members of society, driven to make this world a better place. © 2002 Jim Sevy. All rights reserved. Re-printed with permission.
Jim Sevy is the Father of 8 children and the Editor/Publisher of Love@Home, an Internet Resource for "Above Average" Families (more than 2.2 children), http://www.LoveAtHome.com

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