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Calling myself a homeschooling mother doesn't make me one By Rose Godfrey/For the Appeal-Democrat

The Chicago Tribune has been calling Lydia Price a homeschooling mother. Apparently, for the Tribune, restricting the definition of homeschooling mother to someone who actually educates her children is as nit picky as expecting me to pass all those pesky Harvard classes before saying I've earned that Ivy League degree.

Was this really written by a homeschooler?

Homeschooling is Bad Because sounds as if it was written by one of the children of  a stereotypical Fundamentalist Homeschooler and I feel for her/him I really do, if they actually exist.  But just because this was their experience with being homeschooled doesn't mean it is everyone's. Honestly this hatchet job on homeschooling sounds as if it were made up.

Because you might have to spend the ten years after being homeschooled for 18 years recovering and trying to find out all of the things that were hidden from you. All of the things you were not allowed to know- about history, science, the world... I'm not kidding- this is MY experience. Not pushing it off on anyone else.

We choose to homeschool our children because we wanted to provide a better academic education for them then was available at the local public schoools and because we wanted them to be free to dress as individuals not forced to look like clones in mandatory public school uniforms. We certainly didn't want to hide anything from them.

And if you are doing a kick-ass job teaching your kids everything and MORE then why would you be afraid of someone checking in to make sure it's all okay. I mean, for the sake of the kids that aren't in a right situation, other homeschool families should be advocating for it. 

I did a kick ass job educating my boys, they are both doing very well in college. That said I did not want some bureaucrat telling me what I had to teach and when I had to teach it. I am sure the bureaucrat would have found some reason my eldest son couldn't start college at 16.

We don't learn how to get along by sequestering ourselves away and hiding. We don't learn how to be more open-minded. We don't learn to accept.

None of the homeschoolers I know sequester themselves. We are out in our communities often doing volunteer work and lending a helping hand. We belonged to a INCLUSIVE homeschool group, PEAK Homeschool Network,  when I was actively homeschooling.

Now I have to question WHY a site that sells homeschool curriculum would publish such nonsense. Did they do so in order to attract traffic to their site? I certainly wouldn't buy from them if that is the case.

Carnival of Homeschooling

The CoH is up at Raising Real Men.

Book Review ~ Neighbors by Jan T. Gross

A chilling account of how the Poles of Jedwabne killed their Jewish neighbors during the German occupation. Mainly out of greed, but also due to long held superstitions spread by  Catholic Priest that the blood of Christian Children were used in Jewish rituals during Passover.