Bob Gets Her Own Post

. . . and I get a really easy way to sneak another post in!

Thank you Bob for putting these thoughts into words for me:

Here’s the thing: Home schoolers don’t have to act “better than thou” for people to get defensive with us; just our existence makes some people uncomfortable. By “some people” I mean other parents who are painfully aware of just how awful the public schools are, but put their kids in them anyway, because after all, they’re free (“free” in the sense that we’ve already paid for them with our obscenely high property taxes), and if you didn’t send your kids there, you’d either have to spend a ton of money or a ton of time that you would prefer to spend on other things

In my experience, some parents are a lot happier if they can tell themselves that they really don’t have any choice in the matter, because after all kids have to go to school, and this is what’s available, so we’ll just send them there and hope for the best. It makes some of them very uncomfortable when they see home schoolers refusing to go along to get along; it shoots to pieces their theory that they don’t have any choice in the matter.

You’ve hit the nail on the head, Bob.  When acquaintances first learn that we homeschool, the response is often defensive.   Not in a mean, hostile way.  Not judging us.  More like, defending themselves against being judged.  “I could never do that” is a phrase I’ve mentioned hearing a lot, for a varying number of reasons, some quite valid of course.

Our mere existence is enough to make some feel uncomfortable.  And when folks are uncomfortable around me, that makes me uncomfortable.  Without realizing it, those experiences have made me more reticent about discussing homeschooling, even on my own blog.

I can be a bit silly about avoiding confrontation.

Happy Friday everyone!

Miracles Used to be Common in America

That’s what Citizen Tom told me when he linked my Miracles post.

He brilliantly positioned my latest homeschooling post into a cultural and historical perspective.  You should go read the whole thing, but here is the gist:

“We have lost so many of our freedoms so gradually and so slowly, we don’t know, understand, or appreciate what the founders created. . . .

Nonetheless, occasionally a miracle still occurs, and some citizen takes it upon herself or himself to do what needs to be done without waiting for the government to do it. . . .

When Alexis De Tocqueville visited America in 1831-32, he found our people doing something so remarkable he had to study it. He found of nation of self-starters, people who took it upon themselves to fix what needed to be fixed.”

I told him what a great point that was, and then Tom answered with a comment that warrants a whole post of its own.  Here’s an abridged version:

Linda, when you expressed reluctance to blog on homeschool issues, I was disappointed. I think you should write about homeschooling, and I wrote this post to help you understand why.

. . . . As a homeschooling mom, you have an unusual perspective. Please share it with others.

. . . [L]etting politicians educate our children is destroying our republic. That’s why I believe we must make school choice this generation’s civil rights issue. The public school system will never teach children how they can get things done without the soft tyranny of government.

. . . . Did Jefferson accuse King George III of not providing the American colonists with happiness? Was Jefferson campaigning for a welfare state?  Of course not. . . . Ultimately, the Pursuit of Happiness is about freedom of religion, and that is the freedom power-hungry politicians most hate.

To protect our children’s God-given right to the Pursuit of Happiness, we need school choice.

You are right, Tom.  I serve as a potential window for others who may be trying to decide whether to homeschool.  I should pull the shades back further.  It’s just hard.  I worry about whether my words are actually helping matters or just putting people off with an appearance of being ‘better than thou.’

At this point I’m wondering what exactly ‘school choice’ even means.  (Or, as our political opponents probably see it, what form of The Destructor do we choose?)

I used to think that education could be fixed through two complementary avenues: a) vouchers and b) parent-initiated change from within, starting at the school board level.  Frequent relocation sidelined me from pursuing those avenues, though.

It was for mostly personal reasons that I ended up abandoning the whole system for the short-term.  Older Son had such a tough time in 3rd grade.  I’ve never posted much detail, in an effort to maintain privacy–another aspect that makes blogging difficult.

Now, we’ve been settled in Tampa for a year.  As I read Tom’s wise words and ponder my old ”a and b” solution to education, I feel a little lost.  I’m not so sure the public school situation can be improved, given the current state of our culture.

In the short-term, vouchers would help a ton of children who are otherwise imprisoned in failing schools.  I am still pro-voucher.

But in the long run, I’m not so sure vouchers are a solution either.  Couldn’t they end up providing another way for government to dictate how kids are educated?  To make sure we are using that voucher money in an authorized manner, of course.  Or, if folks get dependent on voucher money, will that lead to the same situation states are now in, i.e., agreeing to certain curricula in order to keep the funds flowing?

The only sure way to give taxpayers “school choice” is to not tax them for schools in the first place, or at least drastically reduce the amount of government spending on schools.

What are my chances of successfully selling that one to the public at large?

Alright everybody.  Guess I’m done.  Please do share your thoughts.

Miracles

I haven’t posted much about my personal experience with homeschooling this year, for pretty simple reasons.  First is the busy-ness.  Next, when things are going well I feel as though I am bragging.  When things are going poorly, well I just feel like a whiner.  Either way, bringing up the issue often feels like I’m putting traditional Brick-and-Mortar peoples on the defensive.

Anyhow, as I often say in my really real life, no news is good news.  Which means that the school year has gone well.  Which means that sometimes I want to pull my hair out, often it’s a day-in day-out drill, and sometimes I feel the blessings of great miracles.  Those great miracles are mostly everyday things to most people, but to me–miracles.

Three-year-apart brothers who act like best friends (most of the time). . . a second grader reading at third grade level . . . a fifth grader who takes charge of his own Latin studies (because I am no help) . . . children who are excited on group-class days . . . camaraderie with like-minded parents . . . and freedom.

The freedom is easy to describe.  Anyone who has worked for a large “Dilbert” type corporation can be likened to the typical parent with school-aged children–a cog in the machine.  Homeschooling is like running your own business.  You don’t get to clock out, but the decisions are all your own.  No zero-tolerance policies.  No TPS reports.

Speaking of miracles, there is the Tampa Bay HEAT.  All year I’ve been grateful for the various homeschool a la carte schools, fellowship groups, and co-ops.  The HEAT, though, has stood out.  The obvious reason is the opportunity for team athletics, but I didn’t truly understand the group’s impact until last night’s Sports Dinner.

After all, homeschooled kids get a chance for team athletics in Florida–the state from which the phrase “Tebow law” originated.  All homeschoolers have to do is try out for their local public school’s team.

Let’s face facts, though.  An impassioned superstar will benefit from a Tebow law.  He gets to compete on a first-rate team, and his talent will likely guarantee the team’s acceptance of an outsider.

What about the average, or even the below-average athlete?  As the mom of a decidedly untalented, albeit enthusiastic, athlete, I’m not too interested in a Tebow law.  Older Son probably wouldn’t have made the team, whether homeschooled or not.

But Teresa Manganello had a vision.  Her vision was of homeschooled children playing sports with other homeschooled children, thus incorporating a key component of healthy family life:

Community.

HEAT is three years old now, and recently acquired full membership of the Florida High School Athletic Association (FHSAA) for their high school level program.  I’m betting their accreditation will soon include middle and elementary school levels.  The HEAT keeps growing.  I’m proud to say that my son was a member of their inaugural elementary boys basketball team.

The team boasted seven players–a team formed simply because there were enough warm bodies.  Barely enough to give players a rest during games, of which of course they won exactly none, but what do we homeschool moms call that?  Character building we chorused, smiling.

And my son, who the public schools are more likely to put on “the spectrum” than on an athletic team, was awarded Most Improved Player.

Guess who is ready to go for Most Valuable Player next year?

Miracles.

Waxing Unpolitically

I’m still here, really really!

I’m just doing uncomputer-y things lately.  We had a wonderful trip to Tennessee, visiting people and places without internet connection, and I am too cheap to carry a smart phone or figure out the “air card” thing I’ve heard about.

It even snowed.  Snowed!  In the three days we inhabited the mountains of Tennessee, we “Floridians” got to enjoy a winter wonderland.  Serious you guys:

We were so enamoured by this east-Tennessee town’s beauty, quiet, and supermajority-ness that a survey of real estate within our price range became necessary.  (Note to property buyers:  “rustic and unique” is not as good as it sounds.)  Next, we traveled west, taking the same old I-40 of our youth and visiting loved ones along the way.

At one particularly delicious catfish restaurant in rural Dickson County, the boys began an immediate friendship in the way that only children can.  The only source of entertainment was a claw crane, and those kids wheedled enough coins from us grown-ups to garner a blue monkey, an orange monkey, an orca, and some kind of creepy pig-dog critter.

The arrival of deep-fried goodness interrupted their creature collecting.  Then, handwritten notes started passing from table to table.  When our out-of-town status was revealed, phone numbers were exchanged.  I didn’t put much thought into that exchange.  My boys are mostly monosyllabic on the rare occasion that they are forced into telephone conversation.

Well, they were mostly monosyllabic.  Now, our older son has become most decidedly polysyllabic, chattering on the phone every other night, often until we tell him to hang up.

Have you figured it out yet?  That new friend is a girl.

Yep.

Child-raising is a humbling hobby.  The minute you’ve got ‘em pegged, they enter a new phase.  A new and scary phase.

Now we are home, but still I stray from the computer.  Mostly because I had to get it fixed because it was overheating and the fan sounded like a commercial airliner preparing for take off.  Also because of the homeschooling.  Also because of my garden.

I am not a gardener; I am a mad scientist.  Or a mad gardener.  Anyway, the mealy bugs and tobacco worms (or things that resemble the worm my mother-in-law once authoritatively labelled a tobacco worm) did a fair bit of damage, and also my impatience has caused problems.

If I had been patient enough to read up before planting, then I would have known that drainage concerns dictate the plot should be on the highest point, or at least raised several inches from the ground around it.

Makes sense when you think about it.  Florida is dang swampy.

So, impulsive me has been forced to continually add dirt, after each thunderstorm washes wide gullies through my plot.  The pepper plants have languished as a result.  They sit, dwarfed and sad, feeding a single pepper and threatening to just give up and die.

The strawberry plants weather it all with good cheer, but every time the cheer results in a reddening berry, bam.  Something swoops in and consumes it.

Sigh.  The biggest successes are the unplanned additions:  yams and red potatoes that sprouted whilst being neglected in my pantry.  The farming book says don’t use grocery-bought potatoes for seeding.

Uh-huh.  My new potatoes beg to differ.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter.  I’ll be waxing politically again eventually.

On the Homeschool Battleground of the Culture War

Photo obtained from http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,511825,00.html

Via Lady Liberty 1885 comes homeschooling news I’m rather embarrassed I didn’t know:  one of the German families persecuted for homeschooling has petitioned for asylum in the United States, and Eric Holder’s DOJ is fighting this grant of asylum in federal court.

Eric Holder thinks there is no fundamental right to homeschool.  So if all Germans are banned from homeschooling, no grounds for political asylum exist.

Wow.

Maybe I’m not so surprised.  Eric Holder and his ilk don’t really believe in natural rights generally, do they?  To top it off, homeschooling is a right-wing-extremist-bitter-clinging-Bible-thumper’s issue, so combating it would be instinctual.

Caffeinated Thoughts lays out all the details, quoting generously from homeschool pioneer and HLSDA founder Michael Farris.  DOJ makes additional legal arguments, all of them horrifying.

You know, when I pulled the boys out of brick-and-mortar school, part of me was actually looking forward to playing the rebel’s part.  Disappointingly, the typical response of the everyday person has been respect, even encouragement, rather than the skepticism or derision I was looking forward to refuting.  Articles like Glenn Reynolds‘ and Paul Elie’s lend further support to the idea that homeschooling is becoming an accepted, mainstream concept (or, as the Professor quotes Buffy, “not just for scary religious people anymore.”)

Our ruling class may hate homeschooling and try to get rid of it, or more likely try to provide some oh-so-reasonable federal regulation and oversight “for the children.”  Attempts to regulate are already popping up and needing a whack-a-mole-smackdown on the state level, like in post-Newtown Connecticut or in South Carolina.  Their attempts will fail, however, if they don’t succeed in ”othering” the homeschooling population as something suspicious and dangerous.

They are trying it.  Check out the title of this news article linked over at Lady Liberty’s, about a murdering homeschooled teen, for example. But this is one battle of the culture war the left is currently losing.  Homeschooling is growing steadily, and in my anecdotal experience people just aren’t scandalized by the idea anymore.  Everybody knows somebody who does or did it successfully.

“Oh, you are homeschooling.  That is so great, but I could never do that,” is probably the most common response I get.  It makes me uncomfortable.  It also tells me that the next hurdle in normalizing the concept of homeschooling is to convince the average parent that they can do it, too.

Not that they must homeschool, but that they could if they wanted.  I worry that too many parents don’t trust themselves to educate their own children.  Those that feel they couldn’t get along without a  public school are at the mercy of the government benevolent to provide it.  The “experts” certainly encourage this kind of mentality, using impenetrable academia-speak to build their intimidating field of expertise.

Imagine the decrease in governmental coercive power, if every parent with public school-attending children woke up tomorrow and decided, not that they are going to pull their kids out.  Just that they could pull their kids out, if pushed hard enough.

Have a great weekend, everyone!