The Path Less Traveled

“Home schooling. The radical idea that a family can raise and educate it’s own children without the government’s help.”

I was home schooled my whole life. My mom made us, my three brothers and I, wake up at 8 and start school at 8:30. She individually taught us until middle school. Which benefited us SO MUCH because we each learned differently. Heaven forbid it, but not all children have the same learning curve. Our curriculum offered classes taped on DVDs for grades 6th-12th. Each class was 45 minutes, homework and/or tests were assigned by the teacher on the DVD, and graded by my mom. And you thought parent-teacher conferences were scary. We were required to pass the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills just like everyone else. My brother Kyle and I took college classes at our local community college our junior and senior years of high school to knock out gen eds.

As for extra curriculars, I took private piano lessons and my brothers played horns in our public high school band. Other activities (choir, drama, track and field, basketball, education fair, art class, speech class, writing class, and formals) were through our local home school organization. We even had P.E. through the group on Friday afternoons. However, instead of changing into gym clothes and playing dodge ball, we went: sledding, ice skating, roller skating, hiking, swimming (at the YMCA), bowling, and to the gymnastic gym. I know this may be a shock to some of you, but we have friends too.

I get a lot of judgmental facial expressions and  questions when I tell people I was home schooled. I don’t feel like I missed out on anything. I wasn’t trapped in a government ran building for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, with a hundred kids my age acting like idiots. I sat at my kitchen table doing my biology homework with my earbuds in, while drinking a hot cup of coffee. I had home cooked meals for lunch. My family was able to take a random Tuesday off to go to the Henry Doorly Zoo on a beautiful, crisp, fall day. My mom didn’t lock us up in the house, she invested herself in our education. Which has been a blessing I don’t take for granted.