When people ask me why I homeschool, I give a couple of short answers. Here's the first one: We have a problem with authority figures.
While being "tongue in check," this sums up how I feel about giving up personal freedoms for convenience sake. We, as parents, have a moral obligation to provide for the education of our children. Even if you get involved at school (volunteer in the classroom, serve in the PTA, help with fund raising, and see that homework is completed), you are still not likely to get the kind of education you want for your children.
Why? The school does not see parents as clients to whom they are accountable. The education system has its own ambitions, which have more to do with political power than needs of children. In the end, the system serves only itself.
If you take into consideration how much time involved parents put into school and time spent doing car-pool, I think it would be comparable to the average homeschooling parent. The big difference is that homeschool families take on the whole responsibility. If things aren't working, there is no one else to blame. In return, if things aren't working, families have the power to make necessary changes.
So, throw off the shackles of your oppression. Take your kids home, take your life back, and be free.
7 comments:
//We have a problem with authority figures.//
I am so going to borrow that, for those rare occasions when I get caught up in a homeschool conversation with a schoolie.
I love this concept, and live it. The truth is, I think many parents find it too difficult and time-consuming to be the authority figure to their own kid. I am always baffled that those who would never think to lend out their car to strangers would lend out their kids to the same year after year! I wonder how things progressed to this point without people protesting !
It is very sad how many parents seem oblivious to the danger. My rule is if I don't know somebody well enough to feel comfortable giving them my credit card and social security number, then I'm not going to trust them with my kid.
Yeah, it doesn't seem like parents are "partners" with the teachers in education. It just seems the parents are the slaves. I mean, at my old elementary school, my mom had to voulenteer at the school carnivals frequently.
"It just seems the parents are the slaves."
I agree. Too often the school seems to think they can just tell parents what to do, what are the rules, when the children should show up and so on. There is no negotiation or flexibility.
We have some good friends who decided to take the children to Italy. The father was going for work. They were going to be gone for a month. The school threw a huge fit. At first they said the children couldn't go. The mother told the school the children were going. Finally the school decided to allow the children to go and sent alone some school work.
True story.
This is a great blog and it's really gotten me thinking.
I think that public school teaches us to be good workers in an obsolete economic system. I was reading something about the history or public schools that said they were designed expressly for the purpose of churning out factory workers. Explains a lot about what I remember of school.
The modern economy demands people who can think for themselves, innovate, etc., and school doesn't do that.
Greg - I am glad you are enjoying our blog.
You are right, one of the many problems with government schools is it does a poor job of preparing students for the new challenges in our society today.
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