100 Reasons to Homeschool Your Kids

By Kerry McDonald

[Excerpted from FEE.org]

This is my 100th article at FEE.org, so here are 100 reasons to homeschool your kids!
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1. Homeschoolers perform well academically.
2. Your kids may be happier.
3. Issues like ADHD might disappear or become less problematic.
4. It doesn’t matter if they fidget.
5. YOU may be happier! All that time spent on your kids’ homework can now be used more productively for family learning and living.
6. You can still work and homeschool.
7. And even grow a successful business while homeschooling your kids.
8. Your kids can also build successful businesses, as many grown unschoolers become entrepreneurs.
9. You can be a single parent and homeschool your kids.
10. Your kids can be little for longer. Early school enrollment has been linked by Harvard researchers with troubling rates of ADHD diagnosis. A year can make a big difference in early childhood development.
11. Some of us are just late bloomers. We don’t all need to be on “America’s early-blooming conveyor belt.”
12. Then again, homeschooling can help those kids who might be early bloomers and graduate from college at 16.
13. Whether early, late, or somewhere in the middle, homeschooling allows all children to move at their own pace.
14. You can choose from a panoply of curriculum options based on your children’s needs and your family’s educational philosophy.
15. Or you can focus on unschooling, a self-directed education approach tied to a child’s interests.
16. Homeschooling gives your kids plenty of time to play! In a culture where childhood free play is disappearing, preserving play is crucial to a child’s health and well-being.
17. They can have more recess and less homework.
18. You can take advantage of weekly homeschool park days, field trips, classes, and other gatherings offered through a homeschooling group near you.
19. Homeschooling co-ops are growing, so you can find support and resources.
20. Homeschooling learning centers are sprouting worldwide, prioritizing self-directed education and allowing more flexibility to more families who want to homeschool.
21. Parks, beaches, libraries, and museums are often less crowded during school hours, and many offer programming specifically for homeschoolers.
22. You’re not alone. Nearly two million US children are homeschooled, and the homeschooling population is increasingly reflective of America’s diversity. In fact, the number of black homeschoolers doubled between 2007 and 2011.
23. One-quarter of today’s homeschoolers are Hispanic-Americans who want to preserve bilingualism and family culture.
24. Some families of color are choosing homeschooling to escape what they see as poor academic outcomes in schools, a curriculum that ignores their cultural heritage, institutional racism, and disciplinary approaches that disproportionately target children of color.
25. More military families are choosing homeschooling to provide stability and consistency through frequent relocations and deployments.
26. While the majority of homeschoolers are Christians, many Muslim families are choosing to homeschool, as are atheists.
27. Homeschooling has wide bipartisan appeal.
28. More urban parents are choosing to homeschool, prioritizing family and individualized learning.
29. Religious freedom may be important to many homeschooling families, but it is not the primary reason they choose to homeschool. “Concern about the school environment, such as safety, drugs, or negative peer pressure” is the top motivator according to federal data.
30. Fear of school shootings and widespread bullying are other concerns that are prompting more families to consider the homeschooling option.
31. Some parents choose homeschooling because they are frustrated by Common Core curriculum frameworks and frequent testing in public schools.
32. Adolescent anxiety, depression, and suicide decline during the summer, but Vanderbilt University researchers found that suicidal tendencies spike at back-to-school time. (This is a pattern opposite to that of adults, who experience more suicidal thoughts and acts in the summertime.) Homeschooling your kids may reduce these school-induced mental health issues.
33. It will also prevent schools from surreptitiously collecting and tracking data on your child’s mental health.
34. Your kids’ summertime can be fully self-directed, as can the rest of their year.
35. That’s because kids thrive under self-directed education.
36. Some kids are asking to be homeschooled.
37. And they may even thank you for it.
38. Today’s teens aren’t working in part-time or summer jobs like they used to. Homeschooling can offer time for valuable teen work experience.
39. It can also provide the opportunity to cultivate teen entrepreneurial skills.
40. Your kids don’t have to wait for adulthood to pursue their passions.
41. By forming authentic connections with community members, homeschoolers can take advantage of teen apprenticeship programs.
42. Some apprenticeship programs have a great track record on helping homeschoolers build important career skills and get great jobs.
43. Self-directed learning centers for teen homeschoolers can provide a launchpad for community college classes and jobs while offering peer connection and adult mentoring.
44. With homeschooling, you can inspire your kids to love reading.
45. Maybe that’s because they will actually read books, something one-quarter of Americans reported not doing in 2014.
46. Your kids might even choose to voluntarily read financial statements or do worksheets.
47. You can preserve their natural childhood creativity.
48. Schools kill creativity, as Sir Ken Robinson proclaims in his TED Talk, the most-watched one ever.
49. Homeschooling might even help your kids use their creativity in remarkable ways, as other well-known homeschoolers have done.
50. With homeschooling, learning happens all the time, all year round. There are no arbitrary starts and stops.

Read the rest at FEE.org