Alasandra's Homeschool Blog

Distinguishing Between Public School at Home & Homeschooling

In a guest post on Spunky's blog Annette discusses the importance of distinguishing between Public School at Home and Homeschooling.

For those of you who just don't understand the difference, I'll attempt to explain; in terms hopefully even the densest among us can understand. Public School at Home is like renting. You may live in the house, you may consider the house your home; but no matter how often you refer to it as your home it still belongs to your landlord. You can't make changes to the house without his permission and he can kick you out when your lease is up. With public school at home the government (landlord) calls the shots. Homeschooling on the other hand is like being a homeowner, you are free to make changes to your home whenever you want, if you want to rip out the carpeting and replace it with tile; there isn't a problem it's your house. With homeschooling the parents (owners) call the shots. Those of us who wish to distinguish between public school at home (renters) and homeschoolers (homeowners) aren't being mean, we don't feel superior, we aren't elitist and we aren't trying to keep you out of our neighborhood. We are merely trying to explain that there is a difference between doing public school at home and homeschooling. We don't want people (especially lawmakers) to blur the lines. We don't want the government to take away our rights. We will cheerfully welcome you into our groups; just do everyone a favor and don't call yourselves homeschoolers. It confuses people like Dee, who think just because Dan voluntarily chooses to do public school at home and have government oversight other homeschoolers should fall in line and do public school at home too.

Be sure to check out Annette's post on Spunky's blog, she has done a lot of research and her post is very informative.