Why Do You Do It?

Sitting here in the momentary quiet of the Non Stepford home, the time between The Princess finally having given in crying for Wolf to tuck her in, and Wolf and Caitie stomping in the house from archery lessons, I actually have a few minutes to post! w00t!

So, since being granted entrance to the 'Cool Moms Group' aka Moms Without Blogs, I thought I'd set about dismanteling some 'homeschooling myths' right off the top, with a series of blogs.

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Ok, so its now the next morning. *sigh* See how things go in the Non Stepford house? Wolf and Diva came home, yammering away about their introduction to archery class, and there went the rest of the evening. Next thing I knew, I was heading up to bed, exhausted.

But I'm back now.

So, where was I? Oh yeah, trying to answer one of the most commonly asked questions, "Why do you homeschool?"

Well, part of the answer could be found on the front page of yesterday's paper: Teens Swarm Bus Driver. That kind of crap scares me, and its happening more and more. But on a far more immediate note, Diva was being bullied at school. We followed the regular channels, only to be told by her teacher, "'John' is a nice boy, he wouldn't do that." So, basically our daughter was a liar. Huh. Then came the parent teacher meeting Wolf attended with Diva. (It was insisted that children attended) The teacher announced that Diva didn't think rules applied to her, and the teacher had a niece that was the exact same way at Diva's age. That niece was now a meth head, and a high school drop out! Also, Diva had no reading comprehension.

I was enraged. First of all, to say such things in front of my child. Second, so say such things about an eight year old to start with! And, shoving the predictions of Diva being a strung out meth head aside, I knew for a stone cold fact that Diva had reading comprehension. She was constantly reading at home, and talking about what happened in her books...and you have to have reading comprehension to do that!

So, I tested Diva's reading comprehension, just to prove it to myself and Wolf. Had her read about 8 pages from Little House In The Big Woods, about butchering a pig (something she couldn't just make up details about) and I wrote out 15 questions as she read to me. She had no clue I was doing that, so she wasn't reading with any more care or attention than she normally would.

She got one question wrong, and that was: What did Pa make a balloon out of? She answered, "The pig's lung." when it was the bladder. I asked her about it, and she explained that she knew it was an internal organ, but couldn't remember which one, but she knew that lungs held air.

Smart kid.

As angry as we were, we didn't yank her right then and there. I wasn't prepared. I still regret NOT pulling her, because she went through two more months of torment at the hands of the teacher, and of the students before we said ENOUGH! and yanked her butt. For two months, I watched my daughter cry every day after school, stomp in the door, throw her things on the ground. It was just a nightmare.

Thats what began our homeschooling. It wasn't a well thought out decision, it wasn't a grand plan to raise perfect children without the taint of public schoolitis, it was because my daughter was losing her shine. She was losing who she was under the pain of being bullied both by students and her teacher. As her mother, I had to protect her from that.

When she came home, I was completely aghast to discover that her schoolbooks were blank. Except for a page or two, they were blank. I pulled her in February, and had no earthly clue what this child had done all year.

I spent the next several months just working with her to bring her up to where I thought she should be. Then we had her take the basic skills assessment test. You probably remember taking this a time or two in school...the paper workbook, and the answer sheet where you colour in the ovals? Yeah, that's the one.

After a few months at home, my Diva, who had never gotten anything higher than a C on a report card...well, her lowest score had her a grade and a half ahead of her actual placement. Her highest had her 4 grades ahead.

Seeing the positive changes in her, emotionally and academically tells me that homeschooling is whats best for Diva. She's more confident with her peers now, she worries less about their opinions of how she acts, and more about how she feels and thinks about things. She loves to learn, without worrying that someone is going to make fun of her for it.

I intend to homeschool the Littles as well, for similar reasons, plus I can see a teacher telling me Tazzie has ADD/ADHD. I don't believe for a moment he does, he's simply a boy, and doing and being what young boys do and are...busy and active. Not a great fit for the classroom, but something that we can work with and around at home, lol!