Naysayer Numbness

It's that time of year.....that Back to School time of year....and each year it becomes less and less noticeable to us. This is our tenth year to homeschool. I can't believe it. By the end of this school year we'll have been at this nonsense for an entire decade! A DECADE!!


What a journey it has been. Not just the homeschooling - the whole shebang. Because I don't know if I've mentioned this....I think I might have once or twice....but Ellie is now settled into college life. On a full music scholarship that had nothing to do with me as I can't even play Chopsticks BUT what I might not have mentioned is that she also received an academic scholarship that almost covered the full tuition. And I am taking credit for that. Now then, you might be imagining me standing before the kids....chalkboard behind me...some sort of book in my hand....but honestly - we unschool. I don't "teach" and they haven't been "taught." So what do I do? I encourage learning. I show them how to find information. I help them set goals. I help them devise road maps for meeting those goals. I drive them places and buy them things and make sure they have what they need to get where they're going. I talk to them, ask them questions that make them think, and most importantly, discover and learn new things right along with them. I will take credit for raising kids who know how to learn, and who can figure out what to learn in order to do the things that are important to them.

When we started this whole Homeschooling Business there were many naysayers. Naysayers you say?? Yes I say!! Naysayers! People saying, "Nay!" We heard it all, let me tell you.

You have a learning disabled son - don't you think he should be in school with professionals who can help him?

You have a *GIFTED child* - don't you think she should be in school so professionals can challenge her?

You have Jules - don't you think he should be in school so you don't kill him?


Addressing these issues one by one:
There are professionals at the school. Many are dedicated and want to teach. Most are overworked, stifled, tied up and pushed down, and basically unable to teach the way they want. They're using their own money to buy things for their classrooms, which are overcrowded. Some are talented at teaching "the middle" while simultaneously keeping the go-getter challenged, as well. Very few have the time or resources to deal with the one who just isn't getting it at all - due to normal developmental variances or do to some sort of undiagnosed learning disability. Pretty much everyone knows that this is what the schools are like...and yet....all I heard (and sometimes continue to hear) was Don't you think the school would do a better job? Ummm....maybe if I were Actually Dead.

Joel made it through first grade and on his last day the Entire Institution breathed a big old sigh of relief. His teacher was so thrilled to say buh-bye that she was literally tossing free stuff at me and giggling like a little girl as she ushered us out the door. I think it was the first time she'd ever actually smiled at Joel - but what a smile it was! "So long!" she shouted. "You'll do great!" That was my one big vote of confidence and it was really just giddy hysteria. *Before you think this woman might be a horrible person, let me just share something Joel recently (he's almost 17) said to me about his first grade experience.

"So like there were a lot of kids in the classroom and some of them were up in the front of the room and The Lady was like doing stuff with them and talking to them. I just sat in the back with my buds peeling the paper off crayons and tossing them at people. I really didn't think what was going on up there had anything to do with me at all."

There you have it. But let me just add that Joel was doing this out of boredom, not out of any sort of longing to start a life of crime and corruption. He was later diagnosed with four learning disabilities, one of which makes it hard for him to understand English - (I'm not kidding) - and so the kid was just trying to entertain himself because he was stuck there for 7 hours, after all. He was pulled out of the "regular classroom" several times a week. This confused the heck out of him and did nothing to address his specific learning issues. The woman who was in charge of helping him read (something he didn't do successfully until he was ELEVEN and that was with a ton of help from a whole bunch of us non-professionals pouring our blood, sweat, and tears into it) was mean. Plain and simple. I haven't met many mean teachers - but I have met a couple and she was one. So he went to her for reading because he was "slow" and she basically did nothing to help him. In fact, she kept him in at recess to "write lines" and then became angry when he couldn't do it (he couldn't write his name at that point, much less I will listen in class.....). He also went to Reading Fluency because his reading speed wasn't up to benchmark standards. The fact that he couldn't read at all, much less quickly, didn't figure into the equation. So he went to Reading Fluency where two professional women who may or may not have finished high school timed him as he sat quietly not reading. He also went to speech, where he told the therapist he "wuved" her. Because he did. And she was a doll, although he continued to say "wuv" for many more years. The one place he almost never went - was the playground. Because he was constantly being punished for not understanding what someone had said to him, or for not being developmentally able to cooperate with their demands. People would listen to all of this and then say, "But there are professionals there...you don't know what you're doing..." and I began to get suspicious that the institutions of learning were actually factories of stupidity.

Ellie made it through third grade. She made it through third grade because she did, in fact, have some truly wonderful teachers. But by the time she entered fourth grade - Joel was being homeschooled and it just seemed a natural progression for her to come home, too. Since she was bored out of her mind and not quite getting it in the social arena - it wasn't hard to convince her. Four years later she was taking college courses through community college - banging away on the piano for six hours a day - and the rest is history. And yet, throughout it all, people would say, "But don't you think she'd be doing EVEN better at school with the professionals?" It was as if she were learning in spite of the horrendous circumstances of her homeschooling. I couldn't win the naysayers over because they had been quite successfully brainwashed and were unable to form logical conclusions. So I quit trying and we just quietly went about our business.

Even now, when met with skepticism....if I point out that Ellie is in college (as are all of her other homeschooled friends) I am told that she must be an exception because Ignorant People Are Trying To Teach Their Kids At Home!! "You're obviously not ignorant! You know what you're doing! You got it goin' on girlfriend!!" Okay - they don't actually say that last part - that's just the little voice in my head. But they do say the other things - and that's without having any idea of how I teach, if I teach, whether or not I know what I'm doing or the fact that I am, indeed, ignorant about any number of things.

Jules simply could not have survived school with any sense of self intact. I knew that before I knew he had Asperger's. He would be one heavily medicated kid in school, and I doubt he would be learning much at all, because he has very specific ways of learning - none of which involve sitting down or being still. Who was going to read to him while he spun in circles with a light saber held triumphantly above his head in school? What professional person was going to be ABLE to do that for him? "But there are professionals in the schools who attend WORKSHOPS in order to know how to deal with spectrum kids! Don't you think he'd be better off with someone who has attended a workshop?" Right here - at this point - I'm not even going to comment.

Camille and Jasper have never attended school. Camille, I'm quite certain, would love it. She's right smack in the middle of the learning curve, loves Justin Bieber and knows How To Dress (it's a recessive gene apparently). But she's doing great at home - she has a gaggle of girlfriends who are also homeschooled. They do fashion design together. They sing together. They giggle and put on make-up and paint their nails. When Joel sees them he usually likes to comment that they could pass for school kids.


The one thing Camille would not be doing if she were in school is receiving 6 or more hours of classical dance instruction per week. And Camille simply must dance.

If Jasper had been placed in school he quite possibly could have ended formalized education as we know it, leaving the whole mess in an even bigger pile of ashes than it already is. That's just the way he operates. Your logic and reasoning mean nothing to him. One of his favorite comments is, "What's that got to do with me?" And usually, he's right.  What does it have to do with him?  Luckily for him, his idea that the rest of the world doesn't really relate to him or necessarily require any contribution on his part....well, this doesn't bother me in the least. He's rocking awesome and I wholeheartedly support him in his eschewing of well.... Basically Anything Anybody Wants Him To Do. My little man can just keep on keeping on. Sometimes I get the feeling that he's the only person on Earth who sees things as they really are. He's the dude who notices that the emperor's not wearing any clothes. Nobody likes that dude - he makes us all feel stupid. It's frightening to think of what he'd be like when faced with the day to day Obvious Insanity of Mindless Busywork. They'd have to invent new workshops to deal with The Clarity That Is Jasper.

All of my kids can read (even though Jasper has tried really hard to Not Get It and when he does get it he refuses to say it out loud). All of them can write (even though Jasper has tried really hard to Not Learn How), and most importantly, they know stuff. Important stuff that they find relevant.

So let's summarize, shall we?

I'm a Success.

The End.

What say you? Yea or Nay?