I know, without even trying it, that I would suck at it. SUUUUUUUUUCK. I live for the day that all of mine are in public (FREEEEEEEE) school … when that happens I’m going to take a month’s worth of daycare funds and diaper funds and lay it on my bed and roll around in it.

I loved this blog. I think it takes a lot of courage to say you didn’t succeed in this endeavor! I’m not an educator, but I study education…homeschooling is tough!

Kids need social interaction at any age. Plain and simple.

My kids are home schooled and it’s going really well. We do not use a curriculum, although I ensure that we exceed all the benchmarks for our state and for 2 other states with higher standards in math and science. I don’t have a strong community of home schoolers around. People are always talking about socialization, as though home schooled kids are locked up inside and never interact with anyone else, but it’s just not so. Home schooled kids, even without participating in organized group events and organized socializing, develop the same social maturity that traditionally schooled children do.

I’m a SAHM and I love it, but I could never home school. Ever. I’m happy to teach him life lessons as they come up – love it, in fact – but to be making lesson plans and constantly making sure to teach all the things that *don’t* naturally come up AND do a good job at it? I’d go insane. Being a SAHM is already a full-time job!!

I love this article and can completely relate. I was also home schooling my preschoolerand inevitably enrolled her in preschool. My daughter also took to her at home lessons as some sort of torture. I gave it my best shot but she is just happier at school surrounded by her peers. But I most have been doing something right because her teachers tell me how ahead she is!

I can barely manage a weekend right now–I’m really amazed by people who can do this full-time. But it does sound like part-time preschool is a good way to handle it. Your son gets the structure and socialization, but the two of you will still have time together. (And it costs less than full-time, so you’re still spending less than when you worked.)

I would have punched my mom if she tried to homeschool me. I LOVED preschool. In first grade I begged her to let me go to daycare. I loved other kids so much i wanted to play with them all the time.

I started preschool homeschooling my daughter when she was 3 1/2. What made it successful was that I never pushed her. We did fun activities and if she was able to sit down and trace letters or numbers, good. If not, oh well. At this age, children learn from EVERYTHING you do so we took more of a Montessori approach and just turned every activity into a learning experience. 6 months later, she’s ready to start doing sit-down work and I thoroughly enjoy teaching her. We don’t do it every day and if her attention starts to wander (like after we went through the alphabet 23 times the other day!) we switch to a different activity. The biggest problem with the public school system is that it pushes all the children to learn the same thing at the same time, when children learn best when you wait until they’re READY to learn the skill. For many children (and parents!) teaching them to read is very stressful. If you wait until they’re ready, they will pick it right up and it’ll be easy. And in a very short time, you won’t be able to tell which child learned to read first.

Yikes!

Sorry you had such a hard time, it sounds like you were working really hard to ensure a solid pre-education. All the judgement that is thrown at homeschooling parents makes it really hard to justify homeschooling unless you are trying to mimic school in your home.

Ok, homeschooling doesn’t work if it’s “school at home” for all the reasons you mentioned. Successful homeschooling doesn’t start with an education plan, it starts with, ironically, getting the kid out of the house and into the world.

Naturally, we can’t go out every single day, but once most days involve finding the learning where it lies, instead of trying to inject learning into a child, it takes off!

I’m inclined to blame your disenchantment with homeschooling on a culture that fundamentally misunderstands childhood and learning. Screen-based distractions aren’t a non-issue in my homeschooling family, but as a part of a wholistic approach to learning, they aren’t as in demand most days as they were when we first withdrew the kids (we home schooled early on, then tried school for a few years, and are now back to home schooling).

I cannot stress enough, however, how big an asset external destinations are to homeschooling. The library (they’ll meet other kids there), the playground (ever have that to yourself? sometimes that’s awesome), a local art gallery or museum, YMCA…Most homeschooling parents walk around with a wallet full of memberships (which work out to WAY cheaper than preschool). Over time you meet lots of traditionally schooled kids (because your kid isn’t necessarily done when the other kids come out to play), and you start finding the other homeschooled ones.

Homeschooling isnt’ for everyone, but I don’t think the failure lies with you so much as with a faulty narrative of education.

I have many friends who home school and who seem to do a good job. But it is not for me. My oldest three kids are all in school and I can say honestly that the teachers there do a fantastic job. They are more patient and frankly more knowledgeable about how to teach elementary and preschool than me. And my kids also listen way better to others than to me, at least the older ones. The teachers are able to set a nurturing but structured environment that does not happen in my house. And even though I’m a college professor with experience in a classroom, teaching kids to write their letters, do art and science projects, etc., is a whole different ball of wax and SO not my forte. (Reading, math, and piano, now those I can teach). My kids also benefit hugely from being around other kids all day. Although home schoolers can also provide that opportunity, sometimes they don’t, and then their kids miss out on the value of developing friendships with peers. The decision to home school, and whether it succeeds, is all about the individual children and parents. If you have the time and inclination and talent to home school–and both you and your child(ren) are happy with that situation, more power to you! And by the way, I’ve had quite a few students in the classes I teach at the university who were home schooled. They were generally very bright, creative, great students whose parents obviously did a good job.

I want to know why kids have to go to preschool. I didn’t go to school until Gr 1 and turned out fine. He’s only 3 let him be a kid. He will learn so much this way. I have one in school and one homeschooled. Everyone is different. BTW I was an honors student.

I don’t understand the interest in home schooling. If you don’t have a degree in education, why would you think you can do it “better” than the public or private school teachers? And, besides the academics, there is so much a child benefits from in a school environment. I think you also probably have a much better relationship with your kids if you are not with them 24/7, especially as they age into middle elementary school and beyond.

Everyone is different, and should do what they need to do for their own family. However, we are currently homeschooling at the preschool level, and it’s working out fine. I do think it helps me as “instructor mom” that (a) we have twins who are not only good company for each other, but roughly on the same level cognitively and in emotional development; (b) they have never been in preschool, so they don’t have anything to compare homeschooling to; and (c) we have not allowed computer or TV games into our home, so they don’t have any longing for that. As others have noted, we get out a lot, to playgrounds and libraries (multiple ones in our area) and all the activities I can scrape up. We also arrange playdates with other kids. People seem shocked sometimes when I tell them our kids aren’t in preschool, but honestly, preschool is a fairly recent development. When I was a kid, only some kids went, not most. The generation before that, there was no such thing. Preschool is not actually *necessary* for the healthy development of a child! LOL!

No, children don’t need preschool, but many of them want to go and enjoy it, so what’s the harm? With my oldest, I did home play group-esque preschol with a few friends and we rotated teaching duties in our own homes. My next son didn’t want to do that, he wanted to go to (as he put it) a real preschool. Between seeing the Head Start kids play on their playground when we’d visit the library next door and I guess watching Blue’s Clues and Diego, he figured out what a “real” school is and was very insistent I sign him up when he was four. Why would I deny him that?

As for the original post, I can relate. Homework time is good evidence that my son’s personality and mine just don’t mesh when it comes to schooling! And, with needing to tend to my two youngest children, I just couldn’t provide the structure that he craves and requires.

Agree with Wendi and A.M…. I trained for YEARS in my profession. And teachers do the same. I would no longer think I could teach than a teacher could do what I do all day. Who are these moms kidding? Pedagogy is an art and a science. Granted, if you have that training and then want to home school, by all means, but novices, please.

I homeschooled my son. The program was a great fit intellectually. However the lack of peer interaction and programs available with this program my son became depressed and lonely.

He’s now a well adjusted high-school freshman in private school. Public school was a nightmare where I live.