Today, Henry and I are getting ready to mail our annual Christmas letter. Yes, we realize we are a bit late this year. We really struggled with what to say about our blogging efforts.
At first, we had a line that said something diplomatic like "The purpose of our blog is to encourage parents to be more involved with their children's education."
That sounded so wishy-washy that we then changed it to, "The purpose of our blog is to encourage parents to take responsibility for their children's education."
This phrase bothered me. Parents are responsible for their children's education, no matter what they do. Whether parents delegate their duty to public or private schools, choose to homeschool, hire tutors, use distance learning programs or a combination of all of the above, ultimately the parents are responsible for the well being of their minor children.
I just hate it when parents complain about their children's school, yet do nothing about it. Or worse, the parents pretend they are the victims when it is discovered that their children never mastered elementary reading and math skills. Children are dependent upon their parents to look out for them. If the parents themselves act like dependent children, what hope have the children for protection.
So, we changed it to, "The purpose of our blog is to remind parents that they are responsible for their children's education."
Henry felt that might be too provocative for many of our friends and relatives. It also left out any reference to the responsibility of the child to develop his talents. In the end, we settled with something factual but bland. "We discuss homeschool related issues on our blog."
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
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Related Tags: Christmas newsletter, parental responsibility, public school, homeschool, distance learning, private school, blogging
4 comments:
"The purpose of our blog is to remind parents that they are responsible for their children's education."
I love this, but I do understand that many folks would find it confrontational. Funny, it is often the same folks that have no problem calling homeschooling crazy, without your asking for their opinion.
My prayer is a day will come when people will understand that outsourcing education is a choice, not a given, and is NOT the most natural or benefical one to be made.
In three years of blogging, I've discovered that "bland" is sometimes the best way to go.
Your final compromise wording sounded fine to me.
Afterall, you don't want to start the year off getting people (especially family and friends) annoyed with you.
You guys do an amazing job with your blog - and I am glad we found each other on Cyberspace.
I'm reminded of the phrase, "You can catch more flies with honey than vinegar."
I agree that there is a lot to be said for bland. Annoying friends and relatives or being confrontational won't improve their view of homeschooling.
I too have learned a lot in our year plus of blogging. I'm so glad to interact with our "blog" friends. So many times I've read something on a blog and have been inspired. I need to get better at leaving comments so that others know how much I appreciate their words.
Blogging also has made homeschooling easier. I now have access to so many different examples of homeschooling.
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