Shelli Bond Pabis
COLUMN: Some homeschooling is good for all kids
When I first announced on my blog that my husband and I were planning to homeschool, someone commented that she was going to do a very radical thing and that was to supplement homeschooling with public education. I thought that was great because every parent should take the position that learning first begins in the home.
On the opposite spectrum, I know of a parent who once said, “Why bother to teach him that? That’s what school is for.” Well, of these two examples, guess whose child will most likely succeed in school?
Homeschooling will be a journey for us, and we’ll have to evaluate its worth for our children as we go along, but I know one thing for sure: we will always foster a love of exploration and learning in our house.
I’m not talking about pushing my children, turning them into little geniuses or taking away their playtime. Believe it or not, this one of the main reasons I want to homeschool. I want them to have more unstructured time in which they can play and use their imaginations.
But I have noticed that my son gets excited about the things I’m excited about, and if I see that he is interested in something positive, it is easy to reinforce his interest by getting excited about it too. If learning isn’t forced, and it’s made to be fun, children can pick up information at amazing rates. I’m sure this isn’t new information to many parents.
My son loves sea animals. Not only does he love the little toys that he has gotten as gifts, we also let him watch some nature shows about ocean life. Occasionally we sit down and watch YouTube videos about whatever animal he likes best.
Learning simple facts about sea animals has spurred his interest in learning facts about all animals. Sometimes he’ll ask me an arbitrary question like “what does a frog eat?” and we’ll go look it up on the computer.
Now that my son is old enough for pre-K, I’ll be setting aside time specifically for learning, but I hope we can build upon what we’re already doing. I want him to have the opportunity to learn about what he loves and find ways of teaching him the basics of reading, writing, math, etc. by using what he loves as a starting point. This is the beauty of homeschooling – that we can go at our own pace in the way that fits us best.
Unfortunately, I think public school has no choice but to follow one curriculum at one pace, which leaves many students behind. I don’t think this one-size-fits-all approach will ever work perfectly, but I do think any student will get an extra edge if their parents “homeschool” them first and supplement that with public, private or whatever education works best for them.
Shelli Bond Pabis is a Winder resident and columnist for the Barrow Journal. You can reach her at shelli@mamaofletters.com.
Homeschooling will be a journey for us, and we’ll have to evaluate its worth for our children as we go along, but I know one thing for sure: we will always foster a love of exploration and learning in our house.
I’m not talking about pushing my children, turning them into little geniuses or taking away their playtime. Believe it or not, this one of the main reasons I want to homeschool. I want them to have more unstructured time in which they can play and use their imaginations.
But I have noticed that my son gets excited about the things I’m excited about, and if I see that he is interested in something positive, it is easy to reinforce his interest by getting excited about it too. If learning isn’t forced, and it’s made to be fun, children can pick up information at amazing rates. I’m sure this isn’t new information to many parents.
My son loves sea animals. Not only does he love the little toys that he has gotten as gifts, we also let him watch some nature shows about ocean life. Occasionally we sit down and watch YouTube videos about whatever animal he likes best.
Learning simple facts about sea animals has spurred his interest in learning facts about all animals. Sometimes he’ll ask me an arbitrary question like “what does a frog eat?” and we’ll go look it up on the computer.
Now that my son is old enough for pre-K, I’ll be setting aside time specifically for learning, but I hope we can build upon what we’re already doing. I want him to have the opportunity to learn about what he loves and find ways of teaching him the basics of reading, writing, math, etc. by using what he loves as a starting point. This is the beauty of homeschooling – that we can go at our own pace in the way that fits us best.
Unfortunately, I think public school has no choice but to follow one curriculum at one pace, which leaves many students behind. I don’t think this one-size-fits-all approach will ever work perfectly, but I do think any student will get an extra edge if their parents “homeschool” them first and supplement that with public, private or whatever education works best for them.
Shelli Bond Pabis is a Winder resident and columnist for the Barrow Journal. You can reach her at shelli@mamaofletters.com.
Trackbacks
Trackback specific URI for this entry
No Trackbacks
Comments
Display comments as
(Linear | Threaded)
#1
mythoughts
on
08/15/10 at 11:30 AM
[Reply]
Granted home schooling has been looked upon as a radical thing to do but as a history buff i can tell you the public school systems teach kids bits and pieces of history and 75% of that is wrong..The only downside i see to home schooling your child is the social interaction however with some creativity that be resolved..
#1.1
Edwin Gravitt
on
08/22/10 at 12:30 PM
[Reply]
Anything people choose to do for themselves and their families is looked upon by those in the liberal mindset is looked upon as radical. So let's just do it. You are correct about the history that is being taught to our unsuspecting children, except in my opinion, 90% of what they are taught is not true, especially about the civil war era. Both the northern and southern states lost that Lincoln war of northern aggression and we are all, now living under the 10 planks of the Communist Manifesto as the result. Thank you for your time.