More Decisions – How? Choices (Part 5)
Now that you have decided to home educate and a sponsoring school has been chosen, there remain yet more decisions to be made.
I remember when my wife and I first determined to bring our children home for their “schooling”. Though we knew the school system was not meeting our children’s needs, we brought the school home and tried to make it fit our children. This did not go so well for us. Why could we not see that bringing home a broken system, only brought a broken system home? It was not fixed by having a new venue or application. An example I often use is, when a broken vehicle is dragged home, it remains broken. The same can be said of schools.
Not only were we brainwashed with school ideology like most everyone else, but since both my wife and I were trained as school teachers we were even bigger believers in schools knowing where, how, when and what we should be teaching our children. We had it so bad, we even entertained creating report cards in early November of our first year, until we came to our senses and realized we would be reporting to ourselves. This was probably the beginning of the unravelling of our school-based thinking and transitioning to become unschoolers.
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Who Should I Register With for Home Education? Choices (Part 4)
Have you ever made a bad decision? I certainly have. However, I do believe it is better to take the risk of making a bad decision than not to make any decision at all.
I made a bad decision several years ago while enjoying a bit of warm winter weather in California. I could see the relationship with our associate school at the time was becoming strained, but I decided to wait and see what would happen. Shortly thereafter, our contract with the school was terminated and the school attempted to take over our families.
This put us into a do-or-die situation, as we had no time to apply for our own accreditation. Another school came to our rescue and we continued for another six years, during which time I did nothing toward the establishment our own school. This turned out to be another bad decision as this agency also came to threaten our demise.
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So, What’s The Attraction? Choices (Part 3)
Talk about failure! Every time I am informed a family is leaving Education Unlimited for another option, I am tempted to think we have done something wrong or failed to properly enable, equip and encourage them.
People are certainly free to choose the option that works best for them. Our job has never been to argue with parents so we respect parental decisions even when we disagree. Still, I always wonder what could possibly be the attraction of the replacement institution, particularly when people are sending their children back to school?
First things first. I am not so naive as to think everyone should home educate. There are situations that require students to attend school. Even so, most people can and should choose home education simply because parents are best able to meet the individual needs of their children.
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A Big Decision – Where Should Your Children be Educated? Choices (Part 2)
The fact that I became a public school teacher many years ago is somewhat of a miracle. I always liked learning, but I never really liked school, particularly not grade school. How did I end up working in a place like that? I never aspired to be a school teacher, that’s for sure, but I needed a job. I believed it would only be for the short term, but this career decision now includes nearly fifty years of history!
Even though my negative school experience challenged me, I decided that if I was going to be a part of that system, I would do my best to improve it. This turned out to be a major case of naivety as I quickly learned the system is inflexible. There was no changing it so the best I could do was give my all in the classroom where maybe, just maybe, I could make a difference. Once a teacher, I realized very few of my colleagues were dedicated to training children and those who were tended to stay away from the staff room where true colours went uninhibited.
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Decisions, Decisions! Choices (Part 1)
The other day, my wife, Faye and I decided to take a break from our increasingly busy workload to go to an outdoor music event. Strangely, we could not decide when to head out, and once we got there the indecision continued. Where to sit? What to eat? What to drink? Sit alone or with others? For some reason, neither of us could decide. Too tired, maybe. We found ourselves temporarily paralyzed by this indecision. I finally picked a place to sit, setting us free from our paralysis, and the rest of the decisions came easily.
While later reflecting on this unusual experience, I realized that the inability or refusal to decide is what prevents people from moving forward, even from learning and growing. When one thinks of it, life is actually made up of decisions, many decisions. And every decision has outcomes, be they big or small, good, bad or inconsequential.
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