Every educational system aims to facilitate the learning of information, to refine and polish skills, as well as to harness personal interests and qualities. Over the course of time, many institutions have sprung up in the name of providing academic opportunities to impressionable minds. They range from the affluent and popular choice of private schooling to the less renowned and the very recent addition of the charter schooling system.
Previously posed as questionable in its effectiveness, homeschooling has started to gain an audience as a successful teaching method, especially throughout the west. This alternative, however, is weighed down by the laboring changes it demands. The biggest adjustment comes in the form of a major lifestyle change. The duties and responsibilities of both a teacher and administrator rest on the shoulder of the parent, who now juggles three roles at the same time. This can be an added cause for stress and exhaustion, especially for working parents.
For the control and ownership this method guarantees, it also marred by the pains to afford expensive classroom resources. Parents can, however, seek solace in purchasing learning resources that are offered in bundles at economical processes and alleviate their financial concerns. A prerequisite for such an arrangement is careful planning and meticulous scheduling on the parent’s part.
Parents of homeschoolers are tasked with covering a broad range of subjects and introducing a structure that mimics school conditions. These efforts at home invariably come at the cost of a suffering family income in which either one or both the parents need to dedicate ample time at home for the education of their children, also, in turn, fostering the need to tighten the family’s spending at the same time. This requires parents to master skills such as those of careful budgeting and time management. The full scope of responsibilities is enough reason to cause serious burnout in parents that hope to tread on this journey together with their children.
The lifestyle change is of much impact as it sets the pace for household activities and routines. Home activities would need to be coordinated with homeschooling plans. In addition to this, because of the abundance of time spent with their children, parents might struggle to spend time with each other or even alone, in the day to day demands of homeschooling their children.
In case a child has special needs, homeschooling provides a bleak alternative for meeting all of the child’s learning needs. In such a case, seeking help from an outside special education therapist can be complimented with a homeschooling schedule so as to cater to all of the demands of the children. Similarly, all facilities provided at a typical school system; a school-nurse, swimming pool, library, etc would now need to be provided or arranged for by the parents of the children which is an added burden.
Contrary to popular belief homeschool socialization is a phenomenon that exists beyond the myth, and homeschooled children are highly socially aware if not more than their counterparts attending regular school. This socialization differs however in that homeschooled children are not exposed to the same levels of peer pressure and bullying faced regularly by their school-going peers. Homeschoolers on average hence don’t face self-esteem issues stemming from bullying and harassment issues as frequently as their school-going peers.
Creating this safe environment where parents can ensure the values and morals of their children are not tainted by the pressures of their classmates, means that their children on average have less daily interaction with a large number of kids in their age group. These children tend to also have small friend circles. This can also mean that homeschooled children are at the risk of spending less time on average participating in prearranged sports and activities with their peers.
These numbers, however, fail to capture the entirety of the situation as other statistics have shown that on average, homeschoolers take an active role in their communities by seeking to volunteer or take part in community projects. They also socialize with a wide mix of adults outside of their homes. This is in fact due to the focus that the homeschool system places on ‘learning from experiences’. Education becomes less about grades and more about self-awareness and helping others through that awareness.
Arguably the biggest advantage homeschooling provides is that of flexibility in both designing and delivering of course content. This naturally results in an environment where one-on-one / personalized learning can flourish, where students can partake in more field trips, real-life experiences, and hands-on learning experiences. Families of homeschooled children can even take vacations and participate in activities in the interests of furthering the education of their children. Another benefit comes in the form of developing a potentially stronger relationship between parents and their children due to the added hours they spend together. The direct and active role that a parent now takes in both raising and educating their child can help to fortify the bond between them.
Moreover, one of the motivations for homeschooling children can come from their engagement in athletic or artistic talents and skills at a higher level, that leaves them less time to abide by the formats and procedures of a conventional school set-up. These children then opt to school at home and focus on honing their natural talents. Even homeschoolers without these motivations come to participate in their community’s recreational and sports activities. Homeschoolers are however not welcomed to participate in most public-school teams and hence have to resort to other avenues such as amateur leagues and local homeschool sports to satiate their recreational needs.
Research has shown that on average homeschooled children perform better on standardized tests than school-going children. This can be attributed to the academic freedom and flexibility homeschooling offers, which is perhaps the greatest driving force for parents that opt to homeschool their children. Learning and mastering of key concepts take precedence over everything else, which allows parents to spend as much time as needed on the material their child is struggling with. Similarly, it also saves spending time and effort on lessons that a child has already mastered. This increases the overall pace with which homeschoolers move through the educational content than their school-going peers.
In addition to this, in a normal class setup, the attention a teacher gives to a class is spread over 20/30 students making up the class. Individual attention is hence sparingly attained, and the pace of the class is set by what the majority of the students are comfortable with. This results in two kinds of students, those who struggle to catch up, and those who are ready to advance to the next lesson. Both types of these students grow increasingly frustrated and even bored with the lectures in some cases. The control over the pace of the lectures hence is a saving grace for such students. In addition to the pace of learning, the style of teaching can also be adapted according to the learning style of the child so as to facilitate the experience as a whole.
Homeschooling can also expose young minds to more unique and challenging experiences. Outside of classroom experiences, where children interact with the outside world around them, sharpens the absorption of what they learn in their homes and also increases engagement with the practical world.
Homeschool children on average have a higher sense of achievement and they exhibit pride in their victories because of their self-motivating behavior towards learning. Although this comes at the price of recognition limited to their families, homeschooled children are at a lower risk of being distracted by their peers in the achievements of their goals and objectives.
Although homeschooling comes at great pains, to both adopt and sustain as a delivery model, it is also equally rewarding. One needs to be mindful of the advantages and disadvantages of such a system and act accordingly with what works best to meet the child’s needs and expectations of learning and personal development. One thing to note is that, even after opting for this method, parents aren’t stuck with homeschooling forever; they can always change their mind and send their children to school if, after experimentation, it does not work out for the family.
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