Homeschooling in the USA
continues to grow at a strong pace, with more and more parents shunning traditional
schools in favor of teaching their kids from the comfort of their own homes.
Data from the National Centre
for Education Statistics suggest that the number of kids taught at home is
growing by 3 to 8 percent a year since the total hovered around 1.8 million in
2012. That puts the upper estimate of those being home schooled at around 3.5
million children.
So why are so many parents
turning to homeschooling their kids? Here are four reasons to consider
homeschooling your kids.
It will help your kids love learning
For many of us, school is
synonymous with suffering. That suffering comes largely from the pressures of
passing tests and completing homework by deadlines. You are made to learn at
the same pace as everyone else with no respite. It’s no wonder so many kids end
up hating learning as a result of their school experiences. With homeschooling,
you have none of that. They can learn at their own pace without any pressure.
Most important of all though is that it can make learning fun. If your kids are
among those making soccer more
popular than MLB among 12-17-year-olds, then get them working out points scenarios and
outcomes as part of their math work. If your kids find learning fun, they will
learn to love it and that will set them up for life.
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| Samuel, age 8, in full soccer gear! |
You can move with the times and teach your kids the stuff that matters
All too often, schools are
stuck in a certain way and method of teaching. They will often deal only in
established facts and when a new discovery is made, it can take years for that
to filter through and for kids to find out about. With homeschooling, you are
free to teach what you want. If there is a Jawbone Discovery that changes what we know
about the history of the human race on a Tuesday, your kids can be learning
about it by the Wednesday. You’ll also be able to knock on the head skills like
calculus problems which hardly any of us have to use in life, instead focusing
on skills like budgeting and personal finances which we all need in adulthood.
You can help your kids focus on what they are good at
Your kid might be a talented
artist, particularly gifted at music or have a flair for writing. Homeschooling
can let them flourish by focusing more on the skills and talents that they are
good at, rather than the ones they are not. If they have a genuine chance of
being the next Pablo Picasso, Taylor Swift or JK Rowling, then homeschooling
can help them achieve their dreams.
They’ll avoid the bullying of the school playground
Bullying is a big issue and
it happens in virtually every playground in every school in the country. Even President Obama
gave a speech about bullying in 2011. There are people who have a utopian idea that
every kid in every school can get along fine, but if we can’t do that as fully
mature adults then why should be expect our kids to be able to do it?
Homeschooling removes the threat or prospect of your kids being bullied, making
them far happier at the same time.
