Homeschooling is a family -based learning. It was started in the United States first and spread around the whole world later. According to the Americans, homeschooling is ’Learning in Freedom’.Today more than one million homeschooled children in the United States and tens of thousands of other learners around the world are learning outside of school. As a teacher by profession, I thought it would be good to share my thoughts with you on this concept of learning.
Homeschooling has it’s own pros and cons. Here, parents need not bother about getting their children admitted in a good school, buy uniform, shoes and other stuff related to attending a regular school.They need not worry about the safety of children while going and returning from school.They can take care of their children’s lunch, snack very easily.Children get full attention unlike a classroom, where the teacher cannot give individual attention to every child. Here the parental interaction is more, as children learn to read at home.
I have a cousin sister living in United States with her family. She has four children, ranging from age 7 to one year old child.She is giving them all homeschooling, the reason being she is unable to send them all to school.All her children have very little age difference . It is really difficult to get them all ready for school in the morning. She wants to send her children to regular school after they grow a bit. That’s a good idea.When children are very young, they can be homeschooled and then admitted in a regular school.
Homeschooling children miss out many events held at school like Sport’s day, Founder’s day, picnics, class study tours, visit to a place of interest etc.
I understand, there are special books for homeschooling students. There are many children, who have successfully finished their homeschooling and have entered Universities for higher education.This is due to the fact that parents have taken sincere effort in homeschooling them.
When you talk about schooling in a private or public school, children begin to learn many other things apart from just studying in the school.They realize they have to get up early in the morning, to get ready to go to school. There is an order in their lives, which is totally lacking in homeschooling. Children may take their own time to get ready for learning, as they are going to be taught just by one of their parents. They take the parents for granted, where as if it is a school, children will learn to respect the teacher.
Children become more independant, when they are exposed to the outside world.They can achieve this only by attending regular school.They learn to tackle problems, and to get along with their friends. They are disciplined in many ways.The regular school has a counsellor, to whom children can go for any moral help.
I don’t think homeschooling has become popular in India.I have heard of parents standing in a long queue to get admission for their children to get a place in kindergarten class.
I feel, a home with parents is always a school for children at any age.They learn many things from their parents.Actually, they look up to them as their role models. So, children should be sent to regular school for regular studies since after returning from school they have enough time to learn many things from parents. They may get bored eventually, if they are with parents the whole day.
When children mingle with other people like their teachers and friends there is a growth in their personality. My advice would be to have children homeschooled, when they are very young and need parent’s help and then admit them in a proper school after the age of six or seven.