When I am asked about home schooling or homeschooling, most parents are concerned about possible disadvantages, but I think it is important to also talk about the wonderful things that homeschooling has brought to our lives. That's why today I tell you the three best things that home education has given my family.
Personalized education
It is the ideal and today the most advanced pedagogues and the most precarious minds point it out. It's essential customize education.
And I don't mean adapting the curriculum a bit to the child's level, passing it on course or giving it more homework (or less) if its level is not the same as that of most of the class or what the system points out. Customize is customize.
Personalize It is to let the child be passionate about a topic and have time and motivation to become a specialist in this. Accompany it by pulling the thread so that from its center of interest many new contents and proposals are opened. That's truly customize education.
Let's give an example. Today we have studied the battle of Marathon. We have seen a movie, we have attended an online class of an American university through the Coursera platform, we have seen a documentary.
That has led us to wonder about the history of armies and war techniques. Hence, to the manufacture of weapons, metallurgy and its practice.
Public speaking, politics, democracy and dictatorship, a bit of philosophy reading Aristotle. We have represented the battle order with the playmobil. We have revised the Greek alphabet a bit and we have jumped, it is not known how, to ballistics and the hardness of metals. That is pulling the thread.
The education customization allows to adapt to the rhythms and curiosity of the child, enhancing his talents and reinforcing the areas in which he has less competition, without doing it for grades or competitiveness, but for pleasure.
A child can have a great talent for the verbal area and be passionate about dialogue or history, being able to have content possibly above what is expected in his age (for example, my son does high school courses in some subjects ) but in plastic or mathematics follow a program similar to that of its theoretical course and a "standard" curricular programming.
We can customize education And that is wonderful. Hopefully, the school will soon be able to have means and schemes that offer that to all children because they really deserve it and enjoy it.
Freedom of schedules
One of the things that I have heard in favor of the school is that children must get used to getting up early in order to then be able to enter the working world. And the truth, the freedom of schedules for me is a great advantage of home schooling.
I swear, except for a couple of awful years, I have never risen early since I finished studying. I have always looked for jobs that fit my vital rhythm and, or were flexible, or were late or were from home. I hate getting up early and my son is no different. We can get up late and take advantage of our most lucid hours to learn after a good daylight walk.
Further, flexibility It allows you to devote a few days to study with intensity and others very free, to be with friends 24 hours (a week of socialization and fun is coming that will be wonderful). Not having to force yourself if you feel bad or tired, sleep if you need it, play long hours without time pressure.
It is the life that I like and it is certainly an advantage for all, to freely choose the organization of our time in the way, more or less structured, that suits us.
Time to share
Educating at home allows you to better organize time and power spend a lot of time together in activities that are not, apparently, educational. Buying, walking, chatting, watching a movie commenting on it, cooking and eating together makes family members share many experiences daily without the pressures of marked schedules.
And is that time together it allows, without a doubt, to know each other better and strengthen ties and share emotions. That is something that no family should miss and, without a doubt, streamlining school and work schedules should be an objective. Families need to spend time together, not the few hours that many times have to start the clock.
I trust that these things that homeschooling has given my family and that make us so happy are possible for all children and their parents. Without a doubt, an educational and productive change is the only way to achieve it. What do you think?
