Most of the homeschoolers I know in my small town are homeschooling for religious reasons, and I didn't realize this until I started talking to them about wishing that part time public school was available in our state. Several of the members of our homeschool group made it clear that this would be a terrible thing, in their opinion. They thought children needed to be kept away from the influence of "government school" and they have not been friendly to me ever since. Several of them also told me that they would never have had only one child, as if they think all good homeschoolers should have a half dozen or so kids like they do.
So we are on our own here, with only our online friends during the school year. In the summer though, we could have kids over here all the time if we wanted. My son's public schooled friends and cousins call all the time asking to come over.
I recently talked to an adult who had been homeschooled. She is the mother of a teenaged girl in my son's acting class. She said her mother pulled her out of public school in 9th grade because although she was very bright, her grades started falling and the teachers didn't seem to care if she did well in school or not. Her mother cared enough to take her out of a bad public school, and she finished high school a year early. She was smart and didn't fit in. Homeschooling worked well for her.
I graduated from the same public school her mother pulled her out of, although years earlier. There was a lot of fighting at this school when I went to it. I remember worrying about getting to my next class safely instead of learning. I knew that I learned more outside of school and this was one reason I knew homeschooling could work, even if I was not a good teacher.
Every now and then I ask my son if he wants to go back to school and the answer is always no. He likes homeschooling. But he recently asked me if we were more like the unschoolers, because he spends about 75% of the time learning what he wants to learn. He likes being able to learn more than his public schooled friends, who only get the one hour a week gifted pull out and are expected to do grade level work the rest of the time and then have to do homework which further limits their time to pursue their own interests. I have noticed that compared to these kids, my son sounds more like a well-read adult and I think this is one of the reasons he is so good at making small talk--something I am not that good at. It isn't just that he reads a lot, he knows a lot about movies, music, and even sports even though he can't play sports, because he listens to the news and although he doesn't watch a lot of television, he watches enough to know a little something about it. He seems to know a little something about everything, just like his dad, who has this same gift of gab.
I think another benefit of homeschooling was that it made it easier for my son to have the older friends who were closer to his mental age.
