The Decision

In February this year I made the decision to start home schooling my son, JT, who is eleven and in year 5 at a local christian school. I will homeschool him between April and November, which will be for three school terms. He will then go back to school in 2008.

The decision to home school my son was one I have thought seriously about for a couple of years and towards the end of last year I felt that the time was right to plan to home school in 2007. I have hopes for how it will go but I expect it to be a journey of both challenges and surprises and so I thought that creating a blog would be a helpful way for me to reflect on the process and also be a way for others close to me and JT to check in to see how it's all going. Perhaps there are others interested in home schooling and education in general who might find it interesting.

Why am I doing this?

Well, I'm NOT doing it because I feel the 'system' has failed JT. It's true, that JT has often said he doesn't like school, but funnily enough he hasn't said that much this year and was actually enjoying school this term. (It's a fantastic school and JT is popular in his class). However, I do think there is a lot to be said for alternative models of education and learning and I came to a place where I felt I needed to give it a shot. The worst that could happen is that the whole experiment fails and JT begs me to put him back in school. I'd rather that, than be sitting around in 5 or 6 years time thinking, 'why didn't I follow that nudge?'

My background (before becoming a church pastor) is as an educator and I have a passion for teaching. I love teaching 'new' things to people. I don't think I would have made a great long term school teacher, but teaching short courses or helping people learn one on one is something I really like. There are loads of successful home schoolers that don't have formal teaching training - but for the record, I have a degree in primary/infants education and also a masters in adult education. What I noticed in doing both those degrees is that the childhood education course taught me how to teach kids in classrooms, whereas the adult education majored on the importance of 'experience' and 'reflection' in education. My belief is that it is not just adults who learn richly in an experience based context, but it is children as well. So I'm thankful for what I was able to learn doing the Masters and so in home schooling I expect to draw on that philosophical base, more than perhaps the 'classroom' model.

I am also a Christian and committed to the example of Jesus. I see in the ministry of Jesus an emphasis on developing disciples through relationship and experience. As a church leader I want to see this take place in the lives of others, but ESPECIALLY I want my own children to grow as disciples. I figured that having some focused time out of the school environment will allow JT to be 'discipled' in aspects of life and faith. As a Christian parent (married to a lovely wife I might add), I also want to take seriously my responsibility to impart to my own kids. The early verses of Deuteronomy 6 have challenged me on this over the years.

My own paid work takes up about 50 hours a week but it also provides a lot of flexibility. I often work from home and so from a logistic point of view I will be near to JT through the process. There will be times where I will be able to take him with me into various work contexts. These will be times for JT to either observe and reflect on whatever it is I am doing, or he will simply bring some work along with him to do. To be honest, I don't know how the balance between work and 'teaching' is going to go - but I am committed, in so far as is possible, to the principle of 'integration' rather than 'compartmentalisation'. There are simply not enough hours in the week to 'add this on' to what I already do. It will have to become 'part of' what I do. As well as my work and family, I have interests in music and soccer coaching. It will be interesting to see how the whole timing thing works out. If necessary I will drop back to 4 days paid work a week.

This post is becoming way too long for a blog - so I better wrap up by saying that I hope that through home schooling my son to extend him in areas where he is strong, solidify areas where he is weak, and introduce him to areas of learning that he wouldn't get at school. Above all, I want to give him a love of learning, and an experience that will provide a strong foundation to every aspect of his later development - spiritually, relationally and academically.