So were we almost ten years ago. Back then, we had just had a baby girl. I began thinking about her future, and the current state (back then) of schools. I was in labor with her when Columbine happened. I think that left a lot of parents thinking.

Then, our baby girl got older. As she did, I continued to contemplate homeschooling her. I even got some beginning books for fun to see what it would be like “doing school”. (What we still call it today.)

As a part of my research, I looked into what our local school district taught. I knew what they taught in middle and high school as I had gone there myself. However, I wanted to know how they taught reading. I believed reading was fundamental to a child’s future. If they didn’t get a good grasp in reading, then they were going to be struggling through all of their school years. When I found out that the local district used what’s called “whole language” as their means of teaching reading, my decision was almost completely made. I would not have my children learning to read through any method but traditional phonics.

When that door closed, I decided to look at private schools. My daughter was already starting to read at 4. I wanted to know if any of the private schools had reading programs for their 4yr old kindergarten classes. I didn’t want her to be stifled and bored in a class when she was ready to read but they weren’t teaching reading yet. I found ONE school in the entire city who offered reading in one of their 4yr kindergarten classes. The price? At the time, it was $3500/year for that level. We could, barely, afford that at the time. However, if anyone sneezed, got sick, or looked at us wrong we wouldn’t be able to. No car repairs, no medicine, nothing extra. And forget any other children going to that school. We were barely able to afford ONE child! And the tuition only went up from there. That meant that in order for us to continue to afford the tuition as she got older, I would have to go back to work at least part time…if not more.

We continued to pray about this decision while we were looking at all of our options. Finally, we realized that the obstacles above were God closing that door as well. We were to homeschool our children.

I didn’t know where to go from there, but I prayed that God would guide me at the appropriate time.

And He did…as I’ll explain next week.

-Me