Some may think, especially with all of the other things I do with the kids, that I am just as crazy as they thought, lol, but I have my reasons.
We have decided to home-school for the following reasons.
a)Patrick is not vaccinated, he had reactions to the first two sets, therefore, we did not finish his vaccinations and we would be indefinitely harassed for this decision when having Patrick in the public school system. We can get a waver, however, the school system treats parents like criminals and the children as if they were diseased in situations like this.
b)The school system here sucks.
The last years review of the public school system, and the academic rating was some of the lowest in the country. Out of 13 schools in Clovis, I believe that
10 failed to meet all of the requirements. The schools here are underfunded, under staffed, and frankly I know I can teach my child more, and more efficiently than the school system can.
c) Kindergarten is now all day. ALL DAY! From 8-3. That is 7 hours away from your child. I have known three sets of parents who have pulled their children from kindergarten for multiple reasons. Their complaints were that it was too long, the children were irritable and exhausted at the end of the day, the teachers were isolating, and humiliating their children, and one parent
compared the kindergarten to a prison camp for children. No talking, expectations beyond 5 year old capabilities, and only one recess for the entire 7 hours.
d)And lastly, the Attachment Parenting mother in me just won't allow it. Patrick is a sweet, sensitive, highly gifted child, and I know, without a doubt he would be crushed, and humiliated, and guided into the same little box with all of the other children. There is no "unique", there is no
"individuality". Patrick is highly imaginative, and I know that this would be stomped out of him, his desire to create, to learn, to ask questions and get answers. As an ap parent my job has been to protect my child from things that may hurt him, and his spirit and curiosity would most
defiantly be in jeopardy in the school system. I am a stay at home mother, and my dedication is to my children, my job does not stop at age 5, where I can ship him off for 7 hours. At the cost of
what? No thank you.
So we are homeschooling. He can learn more from me, how he needs to, how he learns, at his pace. We will be joining a home-school co-op so that we can be involved with other children, activities, field trips and sports should he choose to be involved. We just started him in Tae-kwon-do, and he is loving the socializing and activity. The homeschooling laws here seem pretty easy. I have to register our home-school each year, and I have to file a vaccination exemption form once a year. Then just keep all of his work, calendar, and info in a file should the state choose to come in and check our progress.
Patrick is excited to start, and we have been, "unofficially" doing some home-school already. He is excited to be learning his letters and his name among other things. Here are a few example of some of the things we have been doing.
Every day we are learning the days of the week, and the order they go in. We also check the weather and change it for each day.
For our first week, we are focusing on the letter Aa. Each day we do something different. We talk about A through the day, we rhyme A, we find A wherever we are, we sound out A,
and do activities that start with the letter A, or eat food that starts with the letter A.
Patrick has been learning to write the letter A, and his own name. It will take practice and time, but he will get it. I am so proud of his efforts.
And we read a story about the letter we are working on. He loves the little stories about each letter so far.
1 comment:
I'm glad you are homeschooling Patrick. I think it's an awesome decision, and the very best decision for him.
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