Wow! - 57 Unique Benefits of Homeschooling
By Joel Turtel (04/26/08)
Parents, is homeschooling the right choice for you and your children? Maybe you think you don’t have the time to homeschool because you work. Perhaps you don’t have confidence in your ability to teach your kids because you never took “teaching” courses.
But consider the alternative. Public schools can destroy your children’s self-esteem, destroy their ability to read, strangle their love of learning, put them in physical and moral danger, and wreck their future.
In contrast, here’s 57 unique benefits homeschooling can give you and your kids, as written and explained by Laura B., a smart, wonderful wife, mother of three, homeschooler, and business owner who works from home and still focuses on her family!
Homeschooling (or low-cost internet private schools), can have the following extraordinary benefits for you and your children:
1. Be with your family
2. Set your own schedule that’s convenient for you and your kids
3. Vacation when you want
4. Choose curriculum that best suits the needs of your child
5. Be totally aware of the state and progress of your child's education
6. Keep your child away from unnecessary peer pressure
7. Keep your child away from the bad influence of other children
8. Love, nurture, and teach your child the character and morals you value most
9. Make learning fun
10. Make learning as "experiential" as you want
11. Don't have to get up at the crack of dawn to get your child dressed and fed and off to school where they’re so tired they don't learn well anyway.
12. Break up the day however you want to fit your child's learning attention span
13. Teach your child without any "assumed limitations." Teach multiple languages, develop one skill or subject -- the sky's the limit
14. What you teach an older child naturally filters down to the younger child(ren) making learning much easier and faster for siblings
15. Teach at the pace and developmental stage appropriate for your child
16. Avoid educational "labeling"
17. Keep your child as far away from drugs as possible
18. Never have to worry about bomb scares or mass shootings
19. Allow your child to do, think, discuss, and explore in ways not possible in a rigid classroom setting
20. Constant positive reinforcement and gentle correction. No abusive words or actions that scar your child's psyche
21. Don't use the school system as a babysitter. Most parents only need three to five hours a day for homeschooling their kids -- the rest of the day is often filled with unnecessary "busy work"
22. Develop your child’s life skills such as cooking, cleaning, and organizing that are easily learned with the additional time spent at home
23. Spend as much time outdoors as you want to enjoy nature and the world around us
24. Teach the value of responsibility by providing daily jobs for your kids
25. To make money management as natural as breathing by allowing even small children to do tasks, earn money, save it, and spend it in an appropriate manner.
26. Never have your child beat up by a bully. Teach self-defense skills that will enable him to deal with any situation, but not until he is mature enough to handle the emotional aspects of confrontation
27. No pressure or set "expectations" from teachers on a younger sibling that follows an older sibling in the same school
28. Be around when your child needs to talk
29. Take a break when your child needs a break
30. Bond as a family through family group activities
31. Pass on your religious beliefs and morals to your children and stay away from the "indoctrination" of other school systems
32. Teach sex education when and how you want
33. Develop your child's imagination and teach diverse problem-solving skills, instead of one institutionalized method of thinking
34. Unlimited possibilities for extra curricular activities that interest your child.
35. Not having to live up to the expectations or skills of others
36. Develop the individualism and unique potential of your child
37. Avoid traditional school "group activities" that may leave one student doing all the work or ruining it for everyone else
38. Never have your child feel the failure, embarrassment, or teasing from "failing" a grade
39. To keep your children out of the care, custody, and control of people you don't know who naturally teach their (sometimes warped) values to your children, whether they realize it or not
40. No opportunity for your child to "just get by" with academics
41. To have your child learn initiative naturally, because there's no peer pressure or fear of embarrassing himself
42. Allow your child to have input and say in subject matter and learning style, so learning will be exciting and an adventure, rather than the boring drudge it is in most public schools
43. Allow your child to focus on growth and development -- not following the latest fad or being in a certain group
44. So your child will only be surrounded by people who love him, encourage him, and want the best for him.
45. To make sure your child doesn't end up graduating without knowing how to read or knowing other basic skills, due to educational failings of your local schools.
46. Keep your child out of private schools that have peer pressure, teacher criticism, drugs, sex, and alcohol that your child never needs to be around
47. Avoid grading scales and testing that gives no positive benefit to your child
48. Not to give local, state, or the federal government control of your child’s mind and future, that they arrogantly assume is theirs
49. To easily pass on your unique heritage or language to your child
50. So your child is not limited by "age" or "grade" to advance in or explore subjects in which they are interested or gifted
51. To teach your children to enjoy life and learning
52. To allow your children to go to work with Mom or Dad when you all want to -- not just on the one "go to work with a parent holiday"
53. Go to as many field trips as you want, to places that interest your child
54. To just take a day off when everyone feels like it
55. Flexibility to switch to or experiment with different curriculum and teaching methods to perfectly suit your child’s interests and abilities.
56. Teaching your kids to read quickly with phonics. Not having your child waste 12 years with idiotic “whole-language” reading methods that public schools use, which wrecks a child’s ability to read.
57. Re-igniting your own love of learning, by teaching your kids.
Parents, if you are disgusted with public schools and want your children to have the great education they deserve, why not consider homeschooling? Millions of parents now homeschool their kids, and many of these parents are only high-school graduates.
In the last three chapters of “Public Schools, Public Menace,” you’ll find many ways to homeschool your kids or use internet private schools, even if you work. Homeschooling can be a lot easier, and take a lot less time than you think. It can also bring you great joy in teaching your children.
Joel Turtel
(Printer friendly version) Email: Joel Turtel
