Why homeschool? part 1

Tusen takk til alle som arrangerte konferansen om hjemmeundervisning i helgen, og til alle som kom. Konferansen var veldig lærerk og nyttig. Vi fikk høre både fra akademikere, de som ser på hjemmeundervining gjennom sine akademsike briller, og fra de som er på basis nivå, de som underviser barna sine hjemme.

Jeg snakket på søndag om hvorfor vi valgte å ha hjemmeundervisning. Hovedpunktene av foredraget leser dere videre. 

Why do we educate our children at home?

I. Introduction: stating the main reason.

The question why some parents choose to educate their children at home is raised very often. Many believe that homeschoolers are unhappy restrained kids chained to a table and kept in a dungeon. Of course, this picture is anything but true :). 

I myself was never keen on homeschooling and ironically was educated as a SCHOOL teacher, first in Russia, then in Norway, with a Master's degree in multicultural education. Moreover, my oldest daughter went through school and is finishing her last year of public high school this semester. 

So I chose homeschooling first as a solution to a current problem which arose at school my children attended, and only later developed a strong conviction that this is the best choice for our children. 

I myself worked at both private and public schools and can testify that no matter how hard you try it is just not possible for a teacher to meet and address every child's need in a classroom setting. You have a diverse group of kids, with different talents, interests, starting points, level of language development and hormonal change. To treat a classroom as a homogeneous group is dangerous, but is is exactly what happens because teachers simply don't have enough time to reach each child and someone always will remain a mystery. 

On the other hand, even though they will never admit it, teachers don't LOVE my children the way I do. And their goal thus, being very attractive, differs nevertheless from my goal as a parent. School aims at educating and socializing  my children, giving them opportunity to grow up into good citizens. While my goal is to help them to become happy, free, well-functioning adults who are well equipped for life. The notion of LOVE is never mentioned in academic research. Parental involvement, test results and success are. That is why it is so important for homeschoolers with experience to voice their side of the story so that the academics will be able to legitimize the notion of love and include it into their research studies.

So, in a nutshell, we educate our children with hope to help them grow as happy free individuals well equipped for life.

to be continued...