The home-schooling decision

Home-schooling has been on my mind lately.

I started thinking about it recently when Hannah made a remark one weekend that cut me to the quick.

She was lying on the couch reading a book, and I was at the end with her feet on my lap. It was quiet, with nothing but the sounds of the dishwasher and John Matthew playing with building blocks in the next room.

She said, “Ahhh. This is so nice. You know, sometimes I feel like home is just a place I come to visit.”

She explained that she feels most of her time is spent at school, and so little of it at home. I had to agree. I feel that way, too. So I simply said, “I hear ya, sister.” Then I let it go.

It has bothered me since then. Children should feel rooted in home and family. If they feel home is just a place they visit, are they as rooted as they need to be?

But I’d been thinking of it before then. It started when I was pregnant with Hannah and has continued persistently throughout each year of both kids’ lives.

The most serious thought I gave it came in Hannah’s kindergarten year. She was five. So incredibly smart. She read the first Harry Potter novel at 4 ½, and then began plowing through one novel after another. She’d steal our jazz and classical CDs to play in her room. She wanted to have long conversations about the details of what she was reading. She did everything early and was so self-assured. A confident child ready to conquer the world. Then she went to school.

One day after school she seemed agitated and grumpy. After having a snack she went to her room. Ten minutes later I heard her yelling and sobbing. I opened her door to find her standing in front of her mirror, awash in tears, screaming at the image in the mirror that she was stupid and ugly. A little girl told her those things, and she believed them. She internalized them. She was wrecked by them for weeks. She was just five.

Then we moved here. I didn’t feel the public schools were an option after reviewing ACT scores and school rankings. We enrolled her in private school. The academics are okay. But culturally and socially, I’m still not comfortable with what she’s experiencing on a daily basis.

So I delved into lots of material about home-schooling this weekend. I’d do it in a heartbeat if we could manage losing one of our incomes, but we can’t right now. So I’m looking into how other parents who both work full-time during the day have managed the home-school approach. I’m encouraged by what I’m reading. We’ll see what happens.

It would require a significant sacrifice from Karl and me. Can we do it? I don’t know. We’re in the thinking, reading, talking stages.

But I’ll be honest—I want this to work more than anything.

B.