Before I became a homeschooler myself, I thought homeschoolers were probably pretty homogenous. I was wrong. People homeschool for a multiplicity of reasons and they use a huge variety of approaches. What took me by surprise was the hostility that sometimes surfaces about their differences.
I got interested in homeschooling early on, but my husband was skeptical. One night he said to me, "It's 11:30 and you're still washing the dishes. How are you going to add school to the mix?" When our oldest turned four, I began a little preschool-at-home routine to see if I could keep all the balls in the air. We got a book called Five in a Row and gave it a whirl. We both loved it. And the dishes were clean to boot.
A couple of weeks into our experiment I was talking to an acquaintance who was homeschooling her older daughter. "This is going so well," I said. "We're both having so much fun with it!" She turned a delicate shade of scornful and sniffed, "We don't do much sitting-down-at-the-table workbook kind of stuff."
Pssssssst went the air from my happy little balloon. Welcome to homeschooling, Jamie.
By that time I had a vague idea that homeschoolers fell into different camps. I knew there was a crunchy contingent, and I knew there was a committed Christian contingent with various denominational subgroups. I told M, "I was born to homeschool, because I'm a crunchy committed Catholic." But I didn't know how hard it would be to find a place to pitch my own tent.
The unschoolers reject the rigidity of the school-at-homers. The school-at-homers are certain that the unschooled kids will never learn algebra, and how can you get through life without algebra? In my experience, homeschooling support groups tend to lean one way or the other, and it's tough to be in the middle.
When I go to my local unschooling group meetings I feel kind of quaint, with my crucifix and my Latin lessons. (But they are fun Latin lessons! Really -- we go to the Fantastic Zoo together. Draconem videmus!) At the Catholic support group meetings I feel conspicuously granola with my Birkenstocks and the almond butter-oat squares I brought for snacks. (But they are good almond butter-oat squares!) Mostly I feel like I did as a new mom at La Leche League meetings: I do not belong here.
In this area as in so many others, I am puzzled by how easy it is for people to polarize themselves and point fingers at each other's perceived errors. All of us who homeschool are stepping out of the mainstream to do what we think is best for our children. All of us are doing something that requires a substantial investment of time and emotional energy. We mostly agree that we live in a rich and lustrous world -- one in which we have too little time to drill for and take endless multiple-choice tests while staying under the class bully's radar.
Wouldn't you think we could focus on what we have in common?
I had been toying with the idea of trying to get a local Catholic group going since the one I occasionally visit, weird snacks in hand, is too far away. I don't know if it will happen now, but I wanted to send an email to the parishes nearest us and ask them to include a bulletin announcement. I had thought it might say something like "Homeschooling families: if you'd like to get together occasionally for daily mass or field trips or visits to the park, call Jamie."
It's not the announcement I'd really like to see, though. What I want to say is more like this: Let's skip the unspoken competitions about whose family is more devout and who says a longer grace over lunch. Let's not assume that faithful Catholics are required to fit a particular mold. Instead let's take our motto from Augustine: "In essentials, unity; in all else, liberty." Let's remember that we are grinding the lenses through which our children will view the world, and let's strive together to give them the clearest vision we can.
I can't seem to fit that in 35 words or less, though.
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