No Other Option But to Homeschool

No Choice But To Homeschool
Parents come to homeschooling from many different angles. Some were homeschooled and desire to continue the same learning with their child. Others come to the decision to homeschool through research and an urge to create a different learning environment then the local public school. When dealing with special needs issues there is a large group of parents that have come to homeschooling because they have no other choices.

We were part of that last group. As our oldest grew to school age we put little thought into what school she would attend or what type of learning was best for her. Frankly we were a normal busy young couple with little idea how important it was to find the right setting for our child to flourish and learn.

When our oldest was diagnosed with ADHD we hit a brick wall. It was time to stop and consider what and how she would cope in a school setting or if there was an alternative.

Chris’ perspective is for my children to have a love for learning. I was concerned that the public school system would see the problem, ADHD, and not my lovely child. That my daughter and later my son with autism would be forced into a mold that would not allow them to develop a love and learning that I missed.

I wanted our children to make learning a delightful part of their life.

I was also concerned that our son and daughter would be forced to be on medications. The local school at the time was known to send home letters suggesting children that were overly energetic and possibly ADHD be put on medications. My wife and I strongly disagreed with putting a child that was 5 on heavy duty medications when her behaviors could be tolerated and accommodated at home.

My wife and I went through the system when standardized testing was only done at 3 grades and not a big deal. Now entire curriculums are based off the test rather than a solid well- rounded education.

That’s not education, that’s memorization for the purposes of passing one test.

I had a catholic school upbringing and felt that God needs to be part of our education. I am more and more concerned about what they are teaching or not teaching in schools today. The handing over of your most precious child to a stranger for hours on end every day of their life for 12 years seemed to be ridiculous, especially when I knew they were teaching things that went against our Christian and family beliefs.

I felt that we had no choice but to homeschool for the safety and educational success for our children.

One of the principles that come to mind is a private instructor or tutor. If you had the ability to have a teacher instruct just your child you would do that in a heartbeat! Your child could move as fast, or slow as they needed. Homeschooling is exactly that!

For a gifted child that grasps concepts quickly you teach the lesson and can skip the redundant and boring practice. On the other hand a child that is not able to spell or do language arts well you can go slow and steady despite what other kids their age are doing.

While you may have joined homeschooling with the feeling that you have no other choice now that you are here there is plenty of choice. Your child and family will be calmer with learning at home. You will be able to try different ways of learning that are not generally possible in schools like kinetic learning, advanced learning in one subject while helping lagging other subject.

Make a decision to homeschool this coming year and do it with all your heart and focus!

You can homeschool your child with special needs and do so quite successfully! Our daughter with ADHD and later we found out has dyslexia is deciding on a college! What a wonderful journey it has been to watch that energetic hyper child grow into a teen and thoughtful sister, friend, and sister in Christ.

God bless your homeschooling journey!

Chris and Heather are a husband and wife team fired up to help and encourage family homeschooling and dealing
with special needs. They are blessed with 5 children and 3 angels. The children and Heather have a genetic
disease called mitochondrial disease that gives them medical and learning disability to work with. They are
uniquely trained through life experience to help other special needs families! You can find Chris and Heather at Special Needs Homeschooling , or Laurie Family Ministries and their attached Facebook pages that are very active with questions and answers for many!