There are definitely pros and cons of homeschooling that should be considered if you are looking at homeschooling for your children’s education. Taking control of your child’s education can feel empowering and efficient, but it is also time-intensive. Homeschooling is not for everyone, so if you are considering teaching your child from home, I strongly suggest you make a list of the pros and cons of homeschooling. Here are a couple of thoughts to get your started.
The pros and cons of homeschooling still focus primarily on what will happen with your children. There are several enticing reasons to teach your children from home. You have complete control over the learning process. One of the key factors in a student’s ability to learn a subject is the amount of one-on-one time that the student gets with the teacher. Obviously, having only one or two students or how many children you have, will help you provide a lot more one-on-one time than any teacher can. On the other hand, educational assessors have found that the most important factor in educational performance is the quality of teacher. A good teacher outweighs all other factors, including subject, amount of homework, and class size. While you might be a good teacher for your children, having a great teacher in a school is a huge plus.
The pros and cons of homeschooling are not just about the actual educational process. There are a lot of things that can be and are taught in school that are not math or language arts. Most people point to socialization. Being in school means learning how to navigate socially and (even sometimes) politically among a group of peers, some of which are friends and some of which are not. This is essentially how we learn to act in adult social situations. Furthermore, having a teacher means learning how to behave and respect adults that are not a child’s parents. This can be crucial to the child’s understanding of authority and hierarchy, two abstractions that can be difficult to learn at home.
The pros and cons of homeschooling will actually vary significantly based on your situation. Obviously, if you are in a position of having a stay-at-home job, it might be more possible to juggle teaching your children and fulfilling your obligations to your job.