Home Schooling???

SO I am probably going to meet many unhappy faces after posting this blog, but since I write it for me, I really don't care at this point. The topic: home schooling. Pretty much any topic concerning children in which you don't smile and nod at everything some other parent believes in and agree with, is going to be frowned upon and argued with and quite frankly, I am tired of it.

In this case, I come at the topic of home schooling as a person who went to college and was trained for 4 years as an educator before entering the public world of education and teaching for 2 years. Does this make me an expert on the subject, no, but it does make me a knowledgeable one and that is the point I am getting at. I am seeing more and more moms out of the blue up and decide "hey, I am going to home school my kids." So, do they even know what that involves? Not a one.

Sure, they know they have to go to the Board of Education and pick up their packet but that is where it ends. To me, it is an insult to regular educators. Whether you are an intelligent person or not, unless you have training or a background in the subject, how can you possibly think this is a grand idea? You get your hair done by a professional, trained in their art. If you do this with something as superficial as hair, how is it justified to take something as important as your child's education and leave it to someone who has no clue what they are doing, even if that someone is you? Just like there are good hairdressers and bad ones, the same can be said for teachers and school systems. Hell, the same can be said for just about any profession.

This is what irks me. I worked hard to earn my degree and was proud to be a teacher even though I am no longer one. Who is to say I will never go back to it? But to pretend to think you know what teaching entails when you have never studied it in detail, to think you can plop worksheets and a computer in front of a kid and call it teaching, does the profession a disservice as well as that child. This isn't like the game you played when you were 8 and made your siblings be your "students". All you are doing is taking away from your child in socialization skills and contributing to their educational detriment. Not only that but in order to teach effectively, you need structure, consistency, and a schedule that is detailed and stuck to. The few people I have heard, boasting that they can home school are unfortunately the same people whom I have never seen show a modicum of any of these attributes.

The only way I find home schooling to be helpful is in the case of some physical and mental handicaps and even then, only if you have proper educational training yourself. If for some reason it has to be home schooling then at least have enough sense to find someone with a teaching background who is home schooling in your area to take them to.