Homeschoolers are only human

Do you ever get tired of reading about homeschooling families where every project is inspiring, the days flow effortlessly, the kids are talented, and the parents are calm, organised, creative and endlessly patient?

There was a time in our early years of homeschooling where, instead of feeling encouraged, I started to feel despondent by the articles in homeschool magazines and newsletters.

My kids were, at best, average. Ordinary. As were our days. I struggled to keep the house vaguely functional. Money worries and living on a low income limited our opportunities. I was perpetually tired and run-down.

Little did I know that I wasn’t the only homeschooling mum living this reality.

In those early weeks and months, we crave reassurance that homeschooling isn’t going to damage our children or ruin their chances later in life. We seek out stories that celebrate the successes. We share the magical moments. We don’t want to admit that life isn’t as rosy and wonderful as we want it to be.

And for a while I did that too. My first newsletter, published for a small but growing state-wide audience, was deliberately upbeat and positive. I was scared of voicing my doubts, divulging the reality of my less-than-perfect days, or I felt that I wasn’t coping, and was failing my children.

After all, there were enough people around me – family, friends, school, and in the media – voicing their doubts and concerns, convinced that our ‘experiment’ would fail and we’d soon return to living a ‘normal’ life.

One day I realised I was complicit in creating the illusion of a homeschooling life that was unrealistic, and one that actually fed, rather than relieved, those feelings of inadequacy. I made a promise to start writing about the less-than-ordinary days too: the messy ones, when everything went wrong, the kids constantly quarrelled, things broke, and I lost my temper.

I decided that it was important to remind myself and others that we’re only human. We don’t need to be super-parents.

It was a relief. Parents started contacting me, saying thank you, and how much better they felt that they weren’t alone in feeling lost and overwhelmed. Many of us stopped feeling lonely. Because, back then, homeschooling could be very isolating. There were so few of us doing it.

However, decades later I still detect a persistent undercurrent that homeschooling families somehow should rise above ordinary family life. We’re not allowed to be ordinary. We’re meant to better than that. As though, having withdrawn our children from a flawed education system, we’re supposed to give them a utopian educational experience and that will result in children who display academic excellence and perfect social skills.

That attitude is not, and never was, real or realistic.

Homeschoolers are human. And humans err. They also hurt each other. They get things wrong as often as they get them right. And believe it or not, they have the same set of social skills as everyone else. I have yet to meet someone whose social skills are perfect or flawless. No one enters adulthood beautifully or perfectly socialised. Whatever that is supposed to mean!

Just because we choose to homeschool our kids doesn’t mean we’re saying we’re perfect or better than anyone else. It just means we want something different than what the local schools can offer.

Most of us just want to do the best by our kids. Families homeschool for different reasons: some are refugees from school, mending painful wounds, whose kids have been bullied or have fallen so far behind the schools can’t help them, their learning needs unmet. Some seek academic success, or to pursue a niche career. Some want to avoid indoctrination. And others are idealists who, like me, see beyond our immediate family and enjoy the challenge of being part of an evolving revolution in education.

I see past the differences between us to celebrate those things we have in common.

My goal since I began writing about our homeschooling life and my thoughts about it, has always been to build bridges between home educating families, to make it easier to feel okay about doing something that is so radically different and outside of the norm. Homeschooling can feel particularly alienating.

Home educating our children is an extraordinary task.

I’ll always be here to talk about what, for us – an ordinary family – has been an extraordinary educational journey.

For those homeschoolers that, like me, want to be ‘out there’ publicly supporting others, it helps to remember that we’re all human. We can be an opinionated bunch with diverse philosophies and beliefs. Sometimes we don’t articulate those with the required nuance or grace. We can also have very different ideas about what constitutes support and what form that should take. We argue and fight among ourselves. We make friends and we lose friends. We’re only human.

Sometimes our personal lives get in the way of our community roles and our capacity is low, or time runs out. Sometimes the weight of expectation is that, although we’re only volunteers, we must act at a professional level at all times.

People looking on at the homeschool community might think that because we are all doing the same thing — educating our children at home — we’re a group that thinks and acts the same, with the same needs. That’s not, and never will be, the reality.

The nature of home education is that it reflects an amazing diversity of experience and a strong need to be and act as individuals, to honour our individual differences as families, and to protect our right to do so.

We’re not a unified bunch that can be neatly described and categorised. And that’s something I emphasise, celebrate and continuously want to honour. It’s been my goal from the beginning and sits at the core of my advocacy and support work.

We’re more alike than we are different and by sharing our stories we can help each other.

We are working out how to be home educating parents as we go, learning on-the-job. All of us worry that we’re not getting it ‘right’, that there is more we should or could be doing at any given point in time. We all make mistakes. And that’s okay.

I do recognise that now my children are grown up I have less in common with other home educators than I once had. The issues and problems faced by the current generation of homeschooling parents are, in many ways, different to the ones I faced when my children were young. Although some of my thoughts and insights are timeless, many have become obsolete.

I love that there are so many voices in this space now, sharing the joy of being home educating parents.

My message to them, and to everyone else, is to always remember that home educators are only human. We don’t have to present ourselves – or our homeschooling – as polished, perfect and successful all the time.

I’m dropping Notes most days and would love to connect with you that way — you can add a comment or like. Don’t forget we can keep the conversation going on any of my posts by adding a comment there too.

If you’re homeschooling in Australia, don’t forget to download my FREE Resource Directory for a bumper list of educational and curriculum providers and suppliers, as well as comprehensive guide on getting started how to register as a home educating family.

Whatever your approach, your lifestyle or education philosophy, I’m here to support you. Take what you need, leave the rest. I want you to lean on my experience because I’ve leant on others — we are in this together, growing and learning from each other!

That’s all for now! Until next time, Beverley