“My question is about your views on Home Schooling vs. Group Schooling. Why did you make your choice to educate in the home? Was this informed by your being a part of the Public School system?”

I have actually been pretty determined to home school as long as I have known I wanted to have children. So this choice predates my teaching experience. I formed my opinions largely as a result of my own experiences in school. I moved around a lot so I never really settled into one school system enough to “go with the flow”. I was always either ahead or behind everywhere I went. I got to see how many other people handled school though. I was always shocked by the people who were never given any individual attention by teachers–kids who weren’t stupid, but needed help. I watched the smart kids get bored. I watched the whole class get derailed by the behavior problems of one or two kids and no learning was allowed to happen. This always offended me on a deep level. I always felt *pissed off* when kids would disrupt the class so that I couldn’t learn. And there was nothing the education system was able to do to fix the problem.

As I grew up and talked to adults about how school worked for them when they were younger I have grown more and more appalled that the ‘smart kids’ just sort of floated through without ever being seriously challenged while the ‘dumb kids’ were never helped enough to allow them to really catch up. What is the point of spending 13 years in a classroom where your needs are never specifically addressed? I’m a damn smart cookie. I’m more than capable of teaching everything that a kid will see up through about 9th/10th grade. I can also do this in a way that is tailored to the needs of my kids so they can either move faster or slower *according to how they learn*. We can spend more time on projects. We can do more cross-curriculum focus. Once they start getting into the highest levels of math and science I am going to struggle, but luckily I believe in asking for help when you need it. Noah can cover any math we need and there is nothing wrong with starting to take classes at a JC at 13/14 if they really want to push into harder science than I can handle.

Then I became a teacher and was repeatedly told to keep pushing through curriculum no matter if I was really serving my students or not. The overwhelming anger I felt at knowing that I was becoming part of the problem is something that I can’t forget. It’s why I made kids come in after school if they weren’t getting stuff. It isn’t possible for me to spend individual time in class with 30 different kids. I don’t think teachers are awful for this–I know it isn’t physically possible. I blame the system. And instead of looking at my kids and trying to figure out who to blame for the gaps in their education I am going to step out of the game and say that the buck stops here. *I* will be the responsible party. I’m good with that.