Why I like being homeschooled

Thursday morning I met Elizabeth and Michelle at Bruegger's Bagels for some food before we headed over to Colonial Baptist to talk with some moms who were considering homeschooling through high school...or not. A lady whom we all know had asked us to come and talk about what we have liked about being homeschooled through high school, what we didn't like, what sort of curriculum we used, what outside activities we enjoyed, and what other sort of life skills we thought were important to learn and possibly best to learn while being homeschooled were, etc. Derek ended up being there as well, and it was very nice to see him again. He's taller than I am in my 2 1/2 inch heels. Scary...

Thinking about what I was going to say, discussing it with Lizzie and Michelle and then talking about it with the moms has really opened my eyes. I mean, these past two years I have actually been able to see what a complete blessing it has been to be homeschooled. I don't know where I would have been without it. Probably I would have run away and gone off to do something stupid and never come back, gotten kidnapped, put back into school somewhere in Mississippi, and tried to run away from that only to be arrested for tomato-field-lifting and sent to live in the confines of a NASCAR stadium with a controlling father who would make me pick up tire fragments and not even let me eat dessert. That would be most unfortunate.

*ahem* ...SO...I thought I might do a little tribute to nobody in particular and write a list about what I have really liked about homeschooling so that the world can see it's really the only way to go. For people like me. I mean, I guess there are strange people out there that love to live their lives in the classroom, but seriously. Anyhoo, and without further ado, before I catch the flu and say achoo, and then boo-hoo, before I get better and say woo-hoo and whoopdie-doo and put on one dancing shoe and dance with you and the others, too...

I feel like I've already done an "oo" rhyme thing before...darn it.

So before I go I just want you to know that I like the whole flow of the homeschooling show not that it is a show but I had to stoop so low because I had to mow and foe-got to find a good woe-rd to rhyme and so I...give...up...*sigh*

So, here it is, fo-shizz, 'cause I'm a rhyming whiz:

Homeschooling has allowed such freedom. My parents never had any objection with me just going off and studying what I wanted to (as long as it was appropriate). Occasionally they thought it was appropriate to make me write a report about whatever I was interested in, and I actually liked taking what somebody else had written and putting it in my own words while arranging things so that it sounded very official. Yeah...I'm weird like that. I've been writing creatively, though, ever since knew how to write, whenever that was. I remember I wrote something when I was five in a little notebook. It was one paragraph, and told what everybody was doing. Daddy was at work, mommy was in the garden, Marck was probably in the grass somewhere and I was, of course, writing. Hasn't changed much, come to think of it, except Marck goes on bike rides, there's Robert on the trampoline, Nancy's probably eating grass or chasing her tail, and Skyhopper's probably sleeping.

Very valuable information, I'm sure, but back to what I was saying.

I know I was very excited about getting the new homeschool curriculum catalogues every summer, because I could go through and circle the things I wanted to do the next year. Actually, it was very, very, very sad this year when the Sonlight catalogue came. I nearly cried knowing I don't get to do anything! I still made a list of literature, though, and my mom might order some! :) Happy, happy, joy, joy.

Being close to my family is definitely a big plus to being homeschooled. I see all these other families who don't homeschool, and I get confused. They just don't seem to like being a family! And isn't that what "family" is all about? (sorry, starting to sound like a Disney movie here, but I can't help it.) We may not always get along, but in the end I think it's like Clay Aiken says, the people you love most are the people you consequently fight with more. Probably because you're almost too comfortable with them, and you know each other so well that you can hit all the tender spots. BUT I still love my parents and my brothers a whole lot, and would certainly not want to be distanced from them like other kids seem to be from their siblings.

I happened to be one of those overly-rebellious types when I was younger (but I'm working against my type now...developing a new one, that kind of thing, or at least meeting myself somewhere in the middle [wherever that is]), and so I believe it was a very wise decision that my parents made to keep me here at home during the time I would have rather been at public school so I could get away with more things. Stuff like having a boyfriend and wearing immodest clothing at times were my sole goals in life, and I was convinced that the only way to do that was spend the majority of the day away from the house where my parents could not be to make sure I wasn't embarrassing them (or my future self...heh-heh). I believe this is where the tomato-field-lifting and NASCAR confinement part would come in, if you know what I mean. If you don't, ask me later but not on here, if you know what I mean. If you STILL don't know what I mean, either you're an idiot, or I am for assuming that you can read my mind. If you don't know what I meant by that last sentence...oh, forget it. Go eat some pickles and celebrate Eleveno-de-Mayo. Or Dia-de-Madres. Or WHATEVER.

I've never really have developed low self-esteem by worrying if I'm popular enough. I don't know if everyone really does that or if that's a Lizzie McGuire thing that doesn't really exist. I mean, I do still feel a little silly being the only non-mom at the pool who still wears a one piece, but at least now I have the excuse that I can't really afford anything else because all my swimsuit money goes to the Fund for Buying Swim Team Suits for Jessica that She Can Swim Laps in Association Organization (FBSTSJSCSLAO for short). I may get a tankini sometime though...they just look better but ANYWAY...

My parents really "unschooled" us in a lot of ways. We were never signed up for formal music lessons, but I remember the day, I was four or five, when we purchased our little upright piano. I think I would have never really understood music without it, even though I can't really play it very well. But it was always there to fool around on, and gave us a background for any and all other musical endeavors which we might pursue or are currently, as we speak, pursuing.

If I was ever reluctant about school it was in the area of math. I still hate it. After a while my parents decided I was a hopeless math case and basically gave up. I learned a little here and there, and I've certainly learned enough to get me through life (not college, just life...so why do we learn math in college if we're not getting a scientific-ish degree and therefore won't need that math again?). But I would have totally flipped out if I had done math in public school. That, if nothing else, would have triggered the running away part.

My political views and even my scientific views are greatly influenced by my parents and the books they assigned me. Richard Maybury is amazing. He holds the exact viewpoint I want to about history and politics. Nothing else has satisfied. As for evolution vs. Creationism, I've always understood that God created the world and evolution is a cultish hoax of a moronic belief in something really nonsensical (no offense to any evolutionists out there), but by homeschooling I've learned exactly what makes Creationism right and evolution wrong, and it's so simple!

Homeschooling is wonderful, and I expect I'll only leave it for about fifteen years till I have my own brood of children to homeschool. I may do it slightly different from my parents, but I'll keep a lot of the same traditions. They were pioneers, and I'm gonna have my own way of doing things, no doubt, as a second generation homeschooler. But they surely made the right decision, and I don't want to deter away from that too much. Thank you mom and dad!

So...what do you guys think about homeschooling?

~Jessica