Are you ready to homeschool your child? Are you sure about this? Homeschooling is not for everyone. Here are four reasons you should not homeschool! If you fit into any of the following four descriptions, you probably should not choose to home school your child! Are you part of any of these groups?
You should not homeschool your child if you expect sunshine, roses, and rainbows to greet you every morning and follow you throughout the day.
Honestly, if you expect every day to be perfect, homeschooling is not for you. Dealing with kids never equals perfection. Kids are kids – they don’t always know what to do or how to act. Or how to handle emotions or stress. Homeschooling requires a sense of reality – and guess what? Reality is never perfect!
Also, please do not choose to homeschool if you expect the world to revolve around you. In the world of homeschooling, your kids must be your focus mot of the time, not yourself! You must lead them, guide them, instruct them, train them, advise them.
You should not homeschool your child if you are a neat freak and cannot imagine anything in your home being out of place.
I am not saying that neatness and order don’t matter, but if you expect your home to always look like a showplace, homeschooling is not for you. Homeschooling involves books and papers and crayons and colored pencils. It might include science experiments and math manipulatives and “construction” projects. Scissors and glue, tape and glitter, crayons and Legos all can be part of any homeschooling day. And not every project gets finished in one day. Horrors! You might have a science project on the table for three days!
Of course, we need to teach our kids to clean up after themselves. Nothing good ever comes out of complete chaos. But at the same time, life happens. Learning can be messy. Things get spilled, projects fall apart, something might break. Your home is not a museum exhibit; your home is life!
You should not homeschool is you cannot remember the last time you looked at a book, let alone read one!
A big part of homeschooling involves books. Textbooks, workbooks, reading books, library books – all sorts of books! If you are allergic to books, homeschooling is not for you! Teaching our kids to read, and to love to read, should be a primary emphasis of our home school. Reading skills sets them up to be independent learners. Good reading skills prepare them to excel in life!
Encourage your kids to read! One way of doing that is to be a reader yourself. Let them see you read. Show them that you enjoy reading. Reading takes you around the world without ever leaving home! Read!
You should not homeschool your children if you feel that your children get in the way of your social schedule.
Did you ever watch the movie Mary Poppins? Remember Mrs. Banks from the movie? Always busy with her social schedule, her fellow suffragettes, but never had time for her kids? She was forever passing her two kids off to the nanny, or the cook, or the housekeeper. Don’t be like Mrs. Banks. Homeschooling requires involvement with your children, spending time with them.
If you choose to homeschool your kids, you need to devote yourself to spending time with them, interacting with them. Let’s face it – homeschooling requires time, your time! Even with online options, you still must devote time to making sure your kids understand the concepts and do the work. Time is required.
I hope you did not find yourself in any of these categories! Congratulations! You are ready to start on your homeschool journey! Are you still feeling a little overwhelmed? Read our Homeschool 101 Basics.
Feeling like you need some more help? Look through the website, schedule a coaching session, ask some questions! We are here to help you!
