Homeschool MeMe

THE Donna Young has tagged me to tell how we got started in homeschooling.  This is so boring, you may not even want to read it.   

Back when I was of age, in the year of our Lord 1993, a child was born into this family.  A baby boy.  He was just like any normal boy, after all he has a normal mother.   Well he wasn’t so normal the first three months from colic, but that is his father’s fault, I am sure, and it is getting away from the point.  Back to the point here.

Fast forward for a very long time of two years.  A new family joined our church.  They had just had their fifth child.  We started to go to their home for Bible study.  They are such a good family. It was there that I found out, they homeschooled.  I didn’t know anything about it and thought it was illegal.  This woman of five enlightened me on the fact that it was not illegal and begged me not to call the police.  Ok, the last part isn’t true, I am just trying to make this more exciting. 

When she told me it wasn’t illegal, I promptly said, “I can’t homeschool.  I am not a certified teacher.”  She replied, “If you are his mother, you can homeschool.  You don’t have to be certified.”   Well, light blubs exploded in my head and gave me a headache.  Oh wait, that wasn’t lightblubs, that was my son screaming again.  Being one who likes to follow, I said I will also homeschool.   I started making phone calls, called the school board to get information, blah, blah, blah. 

I found out quickly during that time, that other homeschoolers were not willing to give me any advice, help, whatever.  Since my son was only 3, by then, they felt it wasn’t worth their time to talk to me.  After all, he was not technically being homeschooled.   After that I went back to the family and asked a bunch of questions.  I hadn’t wanted to bother her before, because she has five kids and was busy trying for a sixth.  That has nothing to do with homeschooling unless you are doing health education or math.  Back to the subject here. 

Barnes and Noble had a lecture on how to get started and I went there.  I also went to Rock Solid’s lecture.  I was very pleased when both times they said I was doing a good thing by starting the research when the boy was so young.  Most of the parents there had older kids already in school.  I was the only one with a 3 year old.

I have noticed in the past several years, homeschoolers have been more helpful with the mom’s of really young ones.  I have given out lots of information to parents with 3 year olds.

So, that is my sorted story.  It really had nothing to do with our believes or how I wanted the boy to be raised.  It was just because I wanted to.