122 Benefits of Homeschooling

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From the good folks at Teaching Home (see clickable link at top front page of this site)

www.teachinghome.com/

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The Benefits of Home Schooling
Whether you are reaffirming or reevaluating your decision to
educate your children at home or are considering this option for
the first time, reviewing the unique benefits available to home
schoolers will provide the conviction, confidence, and commitment
that you will need in order to persevere.
For a Christian, your decision to home school should be
based on a determination that this is how you can best fulfill
God's mandate to teach and train your children.

For He established a testimony in Jacob
And appointed a law in Israel,
He commanded our fathers
That they should teach them to their children,
That the generation to come might know,
even the children yet to be born,
That they may arise and tell them to their children,
That they should put their confidence in God
And not forget the works of God,
But keep His commandments.
Psalms 78:5-7

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger,
but bring them up in the discipline
and instruction of the Lord.
Ephesians 6:4

Seek the Lord through His Word and pray for His promised
guidance, then agree as husband and wife on this important
decision.

"Recently we moved out of state, leaving behind our church,
friends, and family who were so encouraging and supportive of our
decision to home school. Since our move, I have been quite
discouraged, questioning my capability, my commitment, my
convictions from the Lord.
"As we sorted all this out, taking inventory of why we began
in the first place, our daughter made it all very clear when she
said, 'Mom, you should listen to what God has put in your heart,
not what man has put into your head.'" -- Shirley G., Colorado

The Home-School Advantage
Teaching and training your children at home can provide the
optimum environment for your children's spiritual training and
character development as well as their social and academic
welfare. Consider how teaching your own children at home can
open up wonderful opportunities to excel in the following areas.


Academic Benefits
Research shows that home-school students’ academic
achievement, on average, is 15 to 30 percentile points above the
national average in reading, language, and math. For
learning-disabled students, there are higher rates of
academically engaged time in home education as well as greater
academic gains. Some of the home-school advantages listed below
will show you why this is possible.

A Solid Foundation in the Basics
Basic skills (reading, writing, math) must be thoroughly
mastered and then retained through review in order for children
to acquire, use, and communicate knowledge in other subjects.

• Educationally, the one-on-one tutorial method has always been
a superior teaching method. Individual attention has many
advantages over a classroom setting where many children at
different learning levels are taught at once.

• You can emphasize basic skills that are often neglected
today.

• You can slow the pace or add more practice if necessary for a
child to master a skill, rather than trying to build on a shaky
foundation.

• You can use excellent, time-tested methods (such as phonics
to teach reading), as well as unique materials written especially
for use in home schooling or for special needs or aptitudes.

"I left behind a career of nursing; it was stimulating and
fulfilling. But my career as full-time wife and mother is
infinitely more stimulating and fulfilling. Home schooling
allows me to round out that mothering career with teaching our
children." -- Miriam S., Maryland

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An Excellent, Well-Rounded Education
The reason Christians want their children to be well
educated is so that they have the skills and knowledge to better
serve God and others, as well as to appreciate and enjoy God and
His creation.

• You can provide your children with a variety of real-life
experiences that build the background knowledge for academic
learning as your children accompany you throughout the day during
many real-life situations. (Classroom teachers have to work hard
to create simulations of these experiences.)

• Because you know your children better than anyone else and
have the deepest concern for them, each of your children can
better have his unique needs met.

• You can recognize and accommodate your child's readiness to
learn new concepts, his abilities or difficulties in various
areas, his personal interests, and his tendencies to learn best
by methods that incorporate more sight, sound, touch, or
movement.

• You can show relationships between facts learned in all
subject areas as well as previously acquired information. This
integration of knowledge can help your children to better
understand and remember what they are taught.

• You can make available extra educational resources, reference
materials, and supervised Internet searches.

• You can use your child's curiosity, needs, and interests to
motivate learning, and you can stimulate new interests through
reading, conversation, questions, and family activities.

• Children have more time to explore new interests and to think
within the efficient, yet flexible schedule you can create at
home.

"Here are some of the benefits of home school. First of
all, I can accomplish so much more in a day. It has been stated
that every six hours of institutional school is equal to two
hours of home school; so that gives me more time to involve
myself in not only academics, but also Bible study, research,
writing, voice lessons, piano playing, oil painting, and sports,
as well as learning and using home economic skills.
"Home education is an important part of my life. It fills a
need for more family-centered, biblical, one-on-one schooling.
"In home school, not only are children spared unnecessary
harassment by peers, but they have the positive advantage of
learning to relate to their parents and other adults.
"I am very grateful to my parents for their sacrifice of
time and energy for home schooling."
-- Holly H., age 18, Pennsylvania

A Christian World View
Parents can present all academic subjects from a biblical
perspective and include spiritual training.
We want our children to view all they are learning, as well
as all of life, in the light of Bible truth. The facts, truths,
and principles revealed in God's Word should form the basis for
each course of study and the standard for evaluating its content.

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,
and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding"
Proverbs. 9:10

The practical uses of acquired knowledge and applications
unique to Christians can be made an integral part of each subject
taught:

Math
Mathematics reveals the consistency and beauty of God's
truth. It is used in measurements of fair trade, in scientific
studies, and for producing all that is necessary or helpful to
mankind.

Language
Accurate reading, writing, speaking, and understanding of
language is essential for communication. Through language we hear
and proclaim God's Word, we teach and learn from others, we do
good business with each other, and we maintain godly
relationships.

Literature
God's standards for all we take in and hold in our minds
include truth, beauty, and purity.

"Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable,
whatever is right, whatever is pure,
whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute,
if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise,
dwell on these things."
Philippians 4:8

Science
Facts revealed in Scripture, such as Creation and the Flood
of Noah's time, guide our understanding of what we see in
nature. Our use of science must also respect the sanctity of
human life and reflect good stewardship of God's gifts as well as
compassion toward His creatures.

History
The Bible gives us the framework for all of history, from
the very beginning until the prophesied end of the world. God
expects us to learn practical and spiritual lessons from the
study of past events as well as see His hand in the affairs of
man.

Geography and Social Studies
The Bible tells us we are all sinners who came from Adam
through Noah, that God loves us all, and that we as Christians
are His ambassadors of the gospel to the whole world. Our
knowledge and understanding of peoples is based on these facts
and is useful for that purpose.

You can use Christian curriculum with a built-in Christian
worldview in all subjects and/or interpret all educational
materials in the light of God's Word.

"It was not until we had gone through the upheavals of three
or four years of public school and its attacks on the values we
taught our children, as well as another exhausting three years'
participation in a private church school, that God brought us to
the place where we could accept that we alone were responsible
for the education of our children.
"We prayed and agonized, then finally found peace when we
accepted the "radical" decision to home school our boys. Almost
immediately we began to experience the benefits and blessings of
teaching our 10- and 12-year-old sons at home. Problem behavior
could be dealt with immediately. Our family grew much closer and
began to learn what teamwork was all about.
"Through the wonderful Christian curriculum, books, and
periodicals we were exposed to, our eyes and hearts were being
opened to the peace and blessings that result from obedience to
God and the willingness to pay its costs. (And there were costs
-- isolation, disapproval even from the Christian community,
feelings of inadequacy, plain hard work, etc.).
"God was using the process of home schooling to restore to
us the meaning and ministry of the Christian home. As we sought
to regain control of our children's education in order to raise
them 'in the nurture and admonition of the Lord,' God's affirming
peace became more and more evident."
-- Georgina R., British Columbia

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Social Benefits
Your home and family provide the first and best context for
your children to learn effective and godly ways of relating to
others.

Family Unity
God wants us to have a home filled with love, joy, and peace
where each member of the family relates to the others as He
intends.

• Your family can experience unity, closeness, and mutual
enjoyment of one another as you spend more time together working,
studying, and playing.

• Flexible home-school scheduling can easily accommodate
parents' work and vacation times and allow time for more family
activities.

• Your family can learn teamwork as each member of the family
makes a contribution to the success of your home school.

• Your children gain respect for you in a new way as you teach
them a wide range of knowledge.

"You are lucky if you are home schooled. I'll tell you
why. You can still do school if the school closes down because
of bad weather or if you move a lot.
"If you are home schooled you can learn more, and you can be
together more as a family.
"You know why I like to be home schooled? Well, I can sew,
write letters, play with my sisters, and one is learning to
walk. If I were at school all day, I wouldn't be able to play
with them very much.
"Now you know why I like home schooling!"
-- Grace W., age 8, Missouri

Social Skills
Social skills are those that enable your children to show
love to and serve others. These skills include understanding
others, communication, cooperation, managing conflict,
leadership, and lovingly meeting the needs of others.

• There are many opportunities to practice social skills in the
context of normal family life and under your guidance in groups
of friends, families, and your local church.

• Negative socialization by peer pressure from classmates can
be avoided through home schooling.

"Do not be misled:
Bad company corrupts good character."
I Corinthians 15:33

• Your child can develop confidence in interacting more often
with people of all ages and stations.

"The first time I heard of home schooling, I had very mixed
feelings. After meeting several children who were home schooled,
I was very impressed. they were intelligent, well-adjusted,
polite children. These were qualities I wanted instilled in our
own children.
"Home schooling was the answer to my prayers. I knew it
would be a lot of work and responsibility, but I had no idea how
much fun and enjoyment I would receive!" -- Teresa W., Kentucky

Life Skills
Practical preparation for adult life includes skills such as
managing finances, running a home, cooking, shopping, driving,
repairs and maintenance, voting, researching information, and
keeping one's body fit and healthy.

• Your children can receive training and practice in these
skills as they work and live with you throughout the day.

• As they develop these skills, your children can begin to take
responsibility for some of these areas, thus rehearsing for
adult life.

Confidence and Independent Thinking
We want our children to have the courage, good sense, and
strength of character to think and make decisions for themselves
based on Scripture, truth, and logic, rather than following the
crowd and the latest trends.

• Children can develop confidence and independent thinking away
from the peer pressure to conform and in the security of their
own home.

"We are so thankful to the Lord that I can be at home, not
working, and that our children can be home schooled. If they
were in school, they would never get to garden, play games, or
spend time with their dad. We feel that we are fortunate to be a
home-school family." -- Karen R., California

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Spiritual Benefits
Providing for your children's spiritual welfare and training
is the most important part of your parental role.

Bible Teaching
Consider your responsibility for your children before God;
He commands you as parents to teach your children His Word, the
most important thing they will ever learn.

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart
and with all your soul and with all your might.
These words, which I am commanding you today,
shall be on your heart.
You shall teach them diligently to your sons
and shall talk of them when you sit in your house
and when you walk by the way
and when you lie down
and when you rise up.
Deuteronomy 6:4-7

• You can read, teach, and discuss God's Word in many
situations when you are together throughout the day.

• You have more time available to systematically study God's
Word together (perhaps in a formal Bible study curriculum) and to
help your children memorize and meditate on God's Word.

"As I look back, I realize that it has really taken the
whole 1st grade year to "deprogram" our daughter from the outside
controlling influences that really did take away from my parental
authority.
"I do see academic achievement, but I have learned that you
can have all the academics in the world, but without the godly
character binding it all together, you will not be equipped to
face life." -- Carol S., Maine

Salvation and Spiritual Growth
Your children's salvation is the first priority. Then
follows their spiritual growth through loving dedication and
obedience to God, knowing and speaking to God in prayer,
Christian fellowship, and ministry to others.

• You can make personal application of Scripture and guide your
children through your example, teaching, discipline, and training
throughout each day.

• You can teach your children that God's Word is the final
authority for your faith and practice and teach them how to look
up what God says about any given topic using Bible study tools
such as a concordance.

"Home education is more than 'book learning.' It is,
rather, a discipling process, leading our children to the Lord
Jesus, and then equipping them to serve Him and lead a godly
life. Our more important textbook should be the Bible."
-- Deb H., Iowa

Character Development
Ranking higher than academic training in importance to
Christian families are excellent character qualities, gracious
manners, and self-discipline.

• Home schooling makes quality time available to train your
children in these areas and minimizes harmful influences from
outside your home.

• You can better model your own dedication to God, good
character traits, disciplined habits, and enthusiasm for learning
when your children are with you more each day.

"When I first began home schooling 10 years ago, I was
chagrined every time a school lesson had to be interrupted for
character training. After much prayer, I realized that these
character training times were the most important aspect of our
children's education. They were not interruptions; they were
opportunities!
"This realization changed my whole outlook and enabled me to
relax and appreciate the opportunities that I have to correct our
children's behavior and train their character."
-- Joy Marie Dunlap

"Our convictions have grown stronger over the years. Even
though we have many ups and downs, the benefits are far greater
than the problems.
"Children are truly a gift from God and such a blessing to
have around." -- Mr. and Mrs. C., British Columbia

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Proverbs 22:06 Tells us to "Train up a child in the way he shall go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it". -Me