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Someone was put down by a friend of a friend on Facebook when she asked publicly for advice for her first day of homeschooling. This person happens to be a teacher and stated that he/she “spend[s] every waking moment trying to think of ways to get the exceptional ones to reach a little higher and look a little deeper, it’s not a part-time pursuit. Teaching is a calling.” Why is it that people who are opposed to homeschooling seem to think that those of us who do it are incompetent? These are our own children. They don’t think that we spend more than every waking moment trying to think of ways to encourage our children to become great thinkers and respectable people? They don’t think that it is our “calling” as well?

We may not have the many hours of sitting in a college classroom learning all of the different methods to teach a subject or how to manage 20+ children in a large-group setting or how to make an effective bulletin board, but that does not mean that we are not qualified to teach our own children. We know our own children better than anyone. We know how they learn best. We know what they need to know. And if we hit a wall along the way, we know how to research ways around it. If they need us to slow down on a concept, we can do that without letting them fall through the cracks. If they are gifted or advanced, we can expand or accelerate as needed so that they do not get bored.

I am not opposed to those parents who decide that public school is the best option for their children. But that is not the choice that we have made for our own children. Every child, every family, and every situation is different. It is time that people need to look at things on an individual basis and stop making blanket accusations.

* The above mentioned quote is a quote of a quote, so may not be entirely accurate. I do not know who it came from either.