Homeschooling Family Interview: Meg

Meg happens to be one of those homeschooling moms who started homeschooling with a bit of apprehension. But now it sounds like she's really enjoying the ride. If you want to read more about her family life, she has a blog and it's appropriately named Get In, Hang On.

1. How long have you been homeschooling?

We fell into homeschooling our older child in the fall of '99. We had just moved to Indiana and there was NOTHING like the small private secular school he had been attending in California. He was entering 4th grade and after three years of classes of 10 kids and the same teacher, we thought that a public school classroom would be a bit of a shock.
I wasn't very keen with the idea, and filled my husband's ear with reasons why I couldn't do it. Lucky for us that private school he had been a student in was very helpful and supportive because we "started" right after we moved and were still living in temporary housing. I had no idea what I was doing.

He graduated high school last year (homeschooled all the way through) and is now a freshman in college.

Our younger child was entering Kindergarten when we moved and since we weren't really sold on homeschooling, we enrolled her in the public school. She lasted 2 years and came home in the fall of 2001. She's now in high school and continues to be homeschooled.

2. One of the main benefits of homeschooling is the freedom and flexibility it allows. Can you give us a few examples of how this freedom and flexibility benefited you (your family)?

I guess the freedom and flexibility has benefited us in three ways.

First, my husband's job includes some travel and we have been able to join him on most of it. Most of the travel involves him going to conferences and so while he is busy in meetings, the kids and I explore the area. This has allowed us to spend weeks learning the history and culture of places like: Washington D.C., New Orleans, Atlanta, San Diego, Maui, San Francisco, and Montreal.

At one point he had to go to New Mexico for a year and we all went with him. Because we were homeschooling, even though our son was in high school, the year did not require us to worry about transferring credits back to his school from another state.

Second, over the years we have had some health and personal issues impact our lives and the fact that we decide how and when "school" happens has allowed us to respond to the issues without falling behind. Whether it was as simple as taking a few days off to deal with a funeral or taking a three month break because of a massive seasonal allergy flare-up (in New Mexico). When we were ready to refocus on education, we could pick up where we left off.

And lastly, the freedom has allowed the kids to have control over what they wanted to study. It's made us jump through some hoops making it happen, but they have had the chance to explore topics and tangents as it's appealed to them.

3. Another benefit of homeschooling is the fun factor. Can you give us a few examples of some especially fun times you had as a result of homeschooling?

Where do I begin? I guess most of our "fun times" happen within the context of our homeschool group.

One year, our group did some overnight trips - Chicago and then St. Louis - and we all stayed in the hotel together.

The last two years we staged full length Shakespeare plays.

And it's great when we actually get enough snow to sled (MAYBE once a year) and someone calls for us all to go sledding together. Watching a group of 2 dozen kids of all ages sled is a lot of fun (though cold).

We also enjoy going to the family homeschooling conference in Chicago and realizing that there are 600 to 700 homeschooled kids running around for your kids to meet and get to know.

4. We all have funny experiences while homeschooling. Can you share one of yours with us?

Funny, instead of fun. Shoot, I know they happen, but I'm afraid that I can't think of anything in particular.