My son was in first grade when I knew I wanted to homeschool him. He had always been a curious learner and we loved supplementing his public school education academically and culturally. When he came to me and asked me to teach him cursive I was excited to support him. I reached out to his teacher to ask what method our school used so that I could be sure to teach him the proper style.
His teacher responded to me by saying that they don’t like children to learn cursive before being taught in the classroom because they don’t want the children to learn bad habits. I was crushed. She was asking me to stifle my child’s interest in learning.
My conflict with homeschooling was always that I couldn’t imagine not working. We’ve depended on having two incomes and eliminating one income source was just not an option.
Cut to this year. My son will be starting high school in August. The fear I have surrounding kids’ (especially teens’) access to guns far outweighs any concern about having one income. We are preparing to take the leap of faith; I will leave my job in August and we will begin homeschooling our son.
Our son is excited and I’m excited. This is a heavy weight for my partner who will be supporting us financially — but he also supports us emotionally and understands that this is something we want to do. It’s something I need to do.
The loose plan is to do a combination of online education, self-directed learning and co-op classes. There are so many free and inexpensive options out there. I will be learning a lot about resources and I’m eager to share them with you!
Homeschooling Humanist 