Post by streamy on Nov 9, 2012 12:35:24 GMT -6
I am thrilled I found this group, but also sad that it is so small. Are there any other anti-home schooling movements out there? I actually feel so passionate about this issue I could start one on my own and I'm not one who ever starts anything.
I'll try to be brief. I am a mother who home schooled my kids for the 12 years I was married. My husband and I were firm believers in home schooling, but not for religious reasons.
We were/are both eccentric and anti-social. We wanted to control our children and make them weird like us, basically to get some validation. It sounds awful but after much soul searching that is the conclusion to which I have come. My husband actually did articulate that he wants our kids to be weird and not normal.
If you had asked us at the time, we would have said the usual; that we wanted to protect them from bad outside influences, that we wanted to spend all our time with them, that we could do a better job, etc.
I left my husband, because he was a joyless control freak who treated us all worse than dogs. I'll spare you the details, but some of them include not having TV or any media but radio, never going anywhere, not having nice clothes to wear, never spending or making money, farming for subsistence, no contact with anything that could be called pop culture... you get the idea.
After I left him I put our kids in public school. They have been in public school four years now.
The result... proportionately to how long they were in our home schooling care, they are badly damaged.
The oldest one is the worst, having entered school at the age of 12. She had to repeat 7th grade twice. She spent her first year in school in constant tears over her deficits and realizing how bad the situation was. She gets extensive tutoring in math and still struggles with elementary level stuff. Socially, she is only this year making friends. She has terrible self esteem.
The next oldest has finally caught up in math but is also almost backwardly shy and reading at a level four grades below his. He response to us making him "weird" to "protect" him: he will not talk to or acknowledge his father and actually wishes him dead. He wasn't too happy with me either, but I am repentant and we have come a long way.
The next oldest is also painfully shy, but has two friends. She is doing well in all areas, although she is a terrible speller. She is close to her dad and he has her convinced that she wants to stay home with him and be home schooled again. She is now 12.
The next three younger kids enrolled at normal ages or close to it. They are all in gifted classes, winning art and writing contests, playing instruments and not shy at all.
All of my children are smart as whips, but the older ones will always bear the mark of the homeschooling, and not in a good way at all! We, their parents, did irreparable harm to them in our zeal to make them strange like us.
The oldest two have had to have therapy. It helps, but it will never be as good as it could have been for them. It breaks my heart. My ex remains unrepentant and his relationship with our two oldest remains destroyed, all because of home schooling.
Because my third child wants to return to homeschooling my ex-husband is preparing to drag me back into court soon to get the order modified so he can home school our four youngest kids again.
If there are any resources for, or research supporting, anti-home schoolers to use, I would love to know about it. My ex is active in the home school legal defense fund and is going to pull out all the stops.
I would say, yes, as much as I love freedom, I think home schooling should be illegal. I'm sorry to say, there are just too many whacked out parents, like us, who will do everything they can to mess up their kids.
Thank you to whoever put up this forum.
I'll try to be brief. I am a mother who home schooled my kids for the 12 years I was married. My husband and I were firm believers in home schooling, but not for religious reasons.
We were/are both eccentric and anti-social. We wanted to control our children and make them weird like us, basically to get some validation. It sounds awful but after much soul searching that is the conclusion to which I have come. My husband actually did articulate that he wants our kids to be weird and not normal.
If you had asked us at the time, we would have said the usual; that we wanted to protect them from bad outside influences, that we wanted to spend all our time with them, that we could do a better job, etc.
I left my husband, because he was a joyless control freak who treated us all worse than dogs. I'll spare you the details, but some of them include not having TV or any media but radio, never going anywhere, not having nice clothes to wear, never spending or making money, farming for subsistence, no contact with anything that could be called pop culture... you get the idea.
After I left him I put our kids in public school. They have been in public school four years now.
The result... proportionately to how long they were in our home schooling care, they are badly damaged.
The oldest one is the worst, having entered school at the age of 12. She had to repeat 7th grade twice. She spent her first year in school in constant tears over her deficits and realizing how bad the situation was. She gets extensive tutoring in math and still struggles with elementary level stuff. Socially, she is only this year making friends. She has terrible self esteem.
The next oldest has finally caught up in math but is also almost backwardly shy and reading at a level four grades below his. He response to us making him "weird" to "protect" him: he will not talk to or acknowledge his father and actually wishes him dead. He wasn't too happy with me either, but I am repentant and we have come a long way.
The next oldest is also painfully shy, but has two friends. She is doing well in all areas, although she is a terrible speller. She is close to her dad and he has her convinced that she wants to stay home with him and be home schooled again. She is now 12.
The next three younger kids enrolled at normal ages or close to it. They are all in gifted classes, winning art and writing contests, playing instruments and not shy at all.
All of my children are smart as whips, but the older ones will always bear the mark of the homeschooling, and not in a good way at all! We, their parents, did irreparable harm to them in our zeal to make them strange like us.
The oldest two have had to have therapy. It helps, but it will never be as good as it could have been for them. It breaks my heart. My ex remains unrepentant and his relationship with our two oldest remains destroyed, all because of home schooling.
Because my third child wants to return to homeschooling my ex-husband is preparing to drag me back into court soon to get the order modified so he can home school our four youngest kids again.
If there are any resources for, or research supporting, anti-home schoolers to use, I would love to know about it. My ex is active in the home school legal defense fund and is going to pull out all the stops.
I would say, yes, as much as I love freedom, I think home schooling should be illegal. I'm sorry to say, there are just too many whacked out parents, like us, who will do everything they can to mess up their kids.
Thank you to whoever put up this forum.