Homeschooling Before and After!
I have been thinking for a while now of making a ‘before and after’ image for homeschooling! I think I made one that only homeschoolers could understand…
This was a really interesting exercise to do!
Firstly, choosing the before picture. As homeschoolers we often see the failure of the school system. The sad, the stifled and the bullied. So it would have been easy to pick a picture of a sad or bored child for ‘before’. But lots of school children appear ok, don’t they? They seem to enjoy it, like seeing their friends and don’t mind the system.
So I chose a picture the way most people see school. The children look happy enough. And they are being taught in a nice environment with other children their age.
And therein lies the problem. They are being taught.
They aren’t finding out what they are good at. They aren’t finding their passions. They aren’t exploring their environment. They don’t have the freedom to learn what they want, when they want, in the way they want.
They are not free.
So my ‘after’ picture represents all that. A boy learning something because he WANTS to. Being helped yes, but not taught in that traditional sense.
And that to me is the before and after of homeschooling. Choice. Passion. Freedom. These were my reasons to homeschool.
I am sure most people won’t ‘get’ my before and after picture for homeschooling.
If you ‘get it’ – please share.
I completely understand those pictures. My son (he has ADHD) was always having issues in school but other than not paying attention he did well on lessons and test, had friends, and appeared happy. Problem? He was always bored and therefore always in trouble. Now, homeschooling him again he’s found that even when we’re “doing school” there is no such thing as a wrong time to learn something else, if he gets distracted or bored we move to something he wants to work on (and go back to the other later) or he helps with his two younger sisters and feels like the “teacher”. Homeschooling saved him so that he could be himself…
I think you hit the nail on the head Chrystal. It is about our children finding themsleves. And that is difficult in a school environment where you are told what to do all the time – no matter how pleasant that environment is. Am glad he has taken to homeschooling. You sound like you are doing a great job!