Monday, March 20, 2006

One of our first reasons for homeschooling

HomeSchoolBuzz has a link to an article in the Baltimore Sun about a family who left the public schools to homeschool. The second paragraph of the article is:

"I was astounded at how superior home schooling is to public school," said Turner, who home-schools three children ages 6, 13 and 17. "The children get back this love of learning that all children had when they were 3 or 4 years old."

One of the first reasons I wanted to homeschool was so my daughters would retain their love for learning. Young children have great curiosity and are constantly asking questions. After “No!” the next favorite word for children seems to be “Why?”

One of the light bulb moments in my life was the realization that learning had become a chore for me. I graduated from a fairly decent high school. I had taken some college level courses. But my attitude towards education was it was something to be endured. When I had free time I didn't do things like read history for fun, or study a new language. There was little joy or excitement as I started my college years.

Around the time I got married I found again the joy that comes from learning new things. I didn't want my daughters to go through public schools which forced all the children to learn at the same speed, the same topics, in the same way.

We are happy to see the love for learning that our daughters have never lost. For example our daughters love the PBS specials on King Henry the Eighth’s wives. They have watched them over and over again.

My wife leaves some children magazines around the house, like Ranger Rick and Muse. For awhile our oldest daughter would take them along in the car and read them out loud to her sisters. My wife says the two younger girls were excited to learn about spiders.

Our oldest daughter is reading historical fiction right now. She was very frustrated to learn Friday that she couldn’t check out any more books. Our library only allows forty items to be checked out at one time. She has found a couple books she loves so much that she wants to buy them.

Homeschooling is the best way to help children retain their love for learning. We are so glad this is an option for us.


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Technorati tags: homeschooling, homeschool, home school, home education

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Henry,
I happened to blog about this topic today, too, but in response to an article in Jewish World Review. I was astounded to read an education porfessor basically state that unschooling wouldn't work for all kids because not all kids have curiosity!
That just makes me sad.
Karen

Robert M. Lindsey said...

As a librarian, I am very glad to see your daughter using the library to it's fullest!

Anonymous said...

That is one of the reasons we started homeschooling too! I wanted them to keep the love of learning. I didn't want them to be told they can't learn that now.

Great Post!