Not long ago I got this question on my blog and my answer sums up our decision to homeschool our children.
Think and pray about your vision and objectives for educating your children. Consider the needs of each child in your family. Consider your needs and those of your husband. Consider the educational opportunities available in your community. If you are a Christian, ask God how He wants you to educate your children. Once you have done this, you may decide not to homeschool at all. Homeschooling is not for every family or for every child…the fact that Dimples attends school is an example of this in my own life.
If, however, you are strongly persuaded that you want to homeschool, the objectives you’ve created can be applied as a filter through which to view the myriad of choices homeschooling offers. You must have an overall vision for your family as well as goals and objectives for individual children.
To give you an idea of what I mean, I can share with you the three objectives Russ and I have in homeschooling our children. To be honest, we didn’t have these objectives 19 years ago; we had a small vision that grew over the years. I suspect that is true for many families, but you still need a vision as you set out on a journey. Otherwise, you may not end up near your destination.
1. We want to provide our children with a distinctly Christian education. This means we want to pray with them, read the Bible with them, instruct them in God’s ways, incorporate Bible study into their education, and so much more. We want our children to know Church History, the stories of great missionaries and heroes of the Christian faith, and our own life of faith as a family.
2. We want our family to be tightly-knit and our children to be not only siblings, but the closest of friends. We want our children to be family-oriented rather than peer-oriented. I’ve written about peer-orientation in the past and cannot recommend Hold On to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers
3. We want to customize our children’s education to suit their specific needs, interests, and goals. This is the fun part of homeschooling when you get to look at your child and ask yourself, “What are her gifts and talents? How much time (and money) can we devote toward developing this gift?” It is also an opportunity to look at our children’s weaknesses and ask ourselves how we can help them overcome those areas. These may be academic, character, or spiritual weaknesses, but as parents, we want to devote ourselves to helping our children grow past them.
If you are considering homeschooling, or if you are homeschooling without a vision, take the time to think and pray about what you most want for your family and each of your children. Write it all down and then begin to explore how you can accomplish your vision.
… I really want my kids to have a strong foundation in an education that lines up with our beliefs.