The Reason I Quit
Hey Mom (notice I didn’t say Dad this time),
I’m been wanting to ask all the ex-homeschoolling moms a question and thought this would be the best and easiest place to collect those answers.
Here are my questions:
1. Why did you quit homeschooling your children? Be specific.
2. How has it been since then?
Don’t leave your name, and I will not be contacting you. I’m just curious.
Thanks for being honest and real,
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I homeschooled for a total of 7 years, starting when my first son was 4 and my second son was 2. I continued to homeschool through the births of my next 3 boys. It was very tough for me to balance being a wife, mother of 5 active boys, housekeeper, errand girl, cook, teacher and all the other hats a mother wears.. I loved having my children home but to be real honest I hated being a teacher. It was incredibly stressful for me. We even had a child go through a liver transplant in the middle of one of the school years. I never felt that I could live up to “the model” homeschool family and felt like we just barely covered the basics let alone all the “extras” homeschooling allows… 2 weeks into our 7th year I had a 7th grader, 4th grader, 2nd grader and kindergarten, and a 3 yr old…. I fell apart on my sweet husband… I missed being a mother and no longer enjoyed my children as the stress of being everything had worn me to nothing…. We called a local private Christian school and Monday morning my boys headed off to “real” school…. It has been amazing since then! I am enjoying them agian! I enjoy readings with them, something I had come to dread because I felt like I was constantly having to “school” them… I am the best mother these boys can have, cause I love them more than anything!! But It took along time and a lot of humbleness to come to the decision that as much as I would love to be that model homeschool family… God didn’t call me to that or He would have equipped me for it… And now I am so much happier and more content just being “mommy”! And my boys are thriving!! They needed more than I could provide being stretched so thin. They love school and are doing great!!
My oldest was homeschooled from 4th to 9th grade. His 9th grade year was challenging to our relationship and caused high levels of stress for our entire family. We decided it was better to save the relationship and let him return to school outside our home.
I quit because I ran out of kids! I am so humbled and proud to have been able to take this journey with my own and, for a while, with a great niece. People definitely should decide what is best for their own families, but this was fantastic for ours. Our son is now a youth pastor a couple of hours away and our daughter is in college. Neither one had any trouble getting into college at all and have been successful. Our niece is so smart anyway, but made the transition to school just fine.
I home schooled my two boys for 6 years. At the end of the 6 years, my oldest (developmentally disabled) had “graduated” and my youngest was going into highschool. Up to this point we had felt it important to keep the boys together as much as possible and the homeschooling was mainly to benefit our oldest. My husband, actually, felt our youngest should attend public high school (“ease them into the world while we are still there to monitor” and sports were the two main reasons for his decision – our younger son is a very.good athlete and that was an important part of my husband’s growing up.) He had been all for the homeschooling up to that point. And I felt if it didn’t have his blessing any more, we shouldn’t do it.
We’ve had to deal with a lot of “unpleasant” subject matter since then. And yet, again, I’m glad we’ve been here to monitor the situation and guide him through it.
We were never of the mind that everyone should be homeschooling. We just knew that was what God wad calling us to do for our family at the time.
My oldest daughter had a fabulous opportunity to focus her High School years on the health care field. She will graduate high school with 14 college credits and be a CNA with 1-2 years experience. Our son is a different story. He hates me and refuses to do anything I ask of him. He is 12 and I have lost him. The conflict in our home is so horrible that any break is welcome. There is still conflict but it is spread out some. I have failed and am just so tired. When death starts to look better than continuing, it is time to quit.
We sent our 11 year old twin boys back to public school this year because my husband believes I need a fulltime job. We have been on one income for 10 years and it hasn’t been easy, but I believe God has kept us afloat. My husband, however, does not believe our children need a Christian education and says they will be good enough in public school like he was. This year I have been sad to not spend so much time with my children, but I am doing as my husband wishes. One of the boys is in advanced classes and somewhat bored at school. The other is struggling to keep up with classes, but he is not able to get any extra help because he is not in the bottom 10% of his class. Just the tip of why public schools are not the best for every child.
Our kids started out in public school, but we decided to pull our oldest out due to bullying. When our middle child’s teacher heard that we were homeschooling the oldest, she recommended that we homeschool our middle one because he was having trouble keeping up in her class. As we brought our kids home, everything was fine for the first year or so, but then I noticed that my kids were beginning to get really lazy. I enforced stricter and stricter schedules to try to keep them on task, but they continued to become more and more lazy in their work. Life also got in the way, making it even more difficult to adhere to the schedule and finish all of their work each day. Every single day, I felt like a failure. After several years of trying to make homeschooling work, I begged my husband with many tears to put them back in school. I really miss having my kids at home, but educationally, I believe that it was the best decision for them. While we were homeschooling, our middle child seemed to be regressing educationally. He was at a second grade level in math and had trouble reading stand alone words when he was 10 years old. After putting them back in public school, they are surprisingly doing very well. Even our middle child who was so far behind is now in the top 3 of his class. Our other child has been nominated for the gifted and talented class and is also adjusting very well.
Hi Todd, I homeschooled for a total of 6 years. The first 2 years I worked and homeschooled. In short, it sucked. Then I got to stay home and homeschool for another 4 years. My son is the oldest and when he was 14 we put him back in school due to his complete and total defiance. It was a BATTLE all the time. I literally could not handle it for one more day. (Yadda, yadda, yadda we catered to his learning styles, modified, adapted and everything. It just wasn’t working) I continued to homeschool my daughter for another year and a half. I would have loved to continue but the truth is I HAD to go back to work. My husband was working ridiculous hours to keep us afloat. We live very modestly but again it just wasn’t working. He was working himself to death and really beginning to break down. I decided that sacrificing my husband on the altar of homeschooling was not honoring God. So we found a good school, put both the kids in as a trial and I stayed home for that first year just to be sure. They did well and I went back to work. I do still miss many aspects of homeschooling but my kids are ok and my husband is much happier. One thing is that I was surprised and disappointed how many people seemed to disregard us as friends because we were no longer homeschoolers. Of course the true ones remained and do not look upon us differently. But I was very surprised by the attitudes of some and the lack of support for our decision.
I am quitting!! After 29 years of homeschooling five children all the way through, my baby will graduate and I will be out of a job (that job anyway!). I am truly humbled and blessed by The Lord to have been able to educate and nurture my children for all these years. There have been more times than I care to admit when quitting seemed like a great option. Instead, I kept my eye on the goal and fulfilled what I knew God had called me to.
As the president of a large (150 families) homeschool co-op and support group, I can tell you why many moms quit. Most, they are worn out. They have poured themselves out for so long that they just break. Teaching school 4-6 hours per day, laundry, keeping the house marginally clean, taking kids to music lessons etc. I can relate to them. We are in our eight year of homeschooling and I have no time to do anything other than child rearing and school. I have no hobbies, no interests and no time to develop any. I haven’t read a book for fun in 5 years, maybe longer. It is exhausting.
Other reasons are financial or educational, they need to bring in a salary for the family, or feel they cannot provide a good enough education. Classes for high level math, sciences, writing, etc. abound, but on-line and in fee based ‘co-ops’, but they are expensive. Locally, a parent that enrolling their child in homeschool classes for Algebra 2 can expect to pay $700 per year per child. Add in Chemistry and Logic and the price goes up to $2000 a year. If you have 2 or 3 kids in high school, that is a lot of money. If you can’t teach Chemistry or Calculus, you don’t have much of a choice, you can quit and enroll them in school, or pay. In my state, Alg. 1, 2, Geometry and pre-cal are minimum requirements for college admission. It is a lot of pressure and many moms cave. Homeschooling has become a big business and has gotten expensive. Gone are the days when an cheap correspondence course would suffice for a Calculus credit.
I stopped homeschooling this school year because I was BURNED OUT! My oldest is strong willed and complained about his school work everyday in 8th grade. He is now in public high school 9th grade, and although he still complains about school work, he is happier over all and is now on the football team. And he is in most pre AP classes. My second son has several learning disabilities and homescooling is ideal for him. We found that technology was key to his learning. He is also very compliant but I didn’t have anything left in me to be his teacher. We homeschooled three consecutive years prior to this; and it was good for that season for our family. Both boys have experienced public and christian schools prior. But putting them both in public school this year has given me time to rejuvenate and get healthier over all. I love having the break from them to focus on me. As homeschoolers you are together 24/7. It can be too much at times. I always say that I will take each year at a time. So, this year I will enjoy “me” time, and I do!
I homeschooled 3 kids for a total of 5 years. I originally quit when my 4th child was born and due to the lack of help from my spouse and job demands from the business we own, I felt I wasn’t able to give all of my children what they needed, both academically and as an involved mother. A small, local charter school has been the best fit for us. And in hindsight, they are receiving a much better, fuller and wider educational experience than I could have ever provided on my own (music, art, superior math, reading and science programs, technology classes, foreign language, vast array of field trip experiences, etc.). The teachers are welcoming to parents and I am an active volunteer at the school. The decision to put my kids in school was agonizing, but I thank God that they’ve had this opportunity that they would have been denied had I kept them home. My 16 year old (oldest) is in a large public high school now and is strong in his faith. He has had so many opportunities to share his faith, invite kids to youth group events and even have discussions on evolution, same sex marriage, and atheism. Though I realize some areas have very poor school systems or are radically liberal which force people into homeschooling, I think most of us homeschool out of fear. Fear of our children living in the world. Fear of what affect society will have on our children. But God does not call us to live in fear. He wants us to trust in him. “For God gave us not a spirit of fear, but of *power* and love and self control.” 1 Timothy 1:7 My kids’ ages are 7, 12, 14, and 16. My oldest 3 are active in their youth groups and are living out their faith and sharing it with others in ways they’d never be able to had I kept them sheltered in the safe bubble of our home and completely like-minded hs’ing families. We are able to instill our family’s values and faith and help them build a strong foundation, which is growing even stronger as they come across questions from friends and are exposed to events and others’ lives different from our own. Facing challenges forces us to learn what we believe and why we believe it and be prepared with a “ready defense” when people ask. “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?” What concerned me the most when I was hs’ing was that gnawing feeling that we were not living out God’s command to share His Good News, but rather we were teaching our kids to hunker down and shelter ourselves from the world. That is not God’s love. That is fear.
Todd, I’d love to hear your thoughts on these comments.
No thoughts on this one…I’m only inquiring!!!
I quit homeschooling because we moved to an excellent school district and at the same time took on two foster kids for the very first time and had them for three years. Since then I have cyber schooled one child through 7-8th grades and am now doing the same with my youngest for 5th grade. Things are going well and I don’t really miss actual home schooling and am looking forward to my youngest going back to public school next year. It will always be an option for us depending on how things are going in the public school.
Honestyly, I didn’t quit, I would still be homeschooling if I could. We homeschooled for 12 years. My oldest graduated and is now an A student in college. She did sports with the local high school, but didn’t want anything else to do with the it. I must say, at times I did second-guess our schooling vs. the high school. I was always worried that maybe the public school had improved, and perhaps their students were getting academics that mine weren’t. (We are limited in our area to private or other school choices because of distance to a large city.)
My second daughter is more social than the first and felt she was the last in her home school group to be schooling at home. She wanted to take advantage of classes in the health field that are offered, feeling that may be where her future will take her. So, she is enrolled in public high school this year. She is getting all A’s (but who wouldn’t if you didn’t take advantage of extra credits the teachers offer.) Some EC I feel are frivolous, and just a way to make the teacher/school look good by bringing up those grades. (A way to make sure they qualify for federal funding?) But really, I can’t understand why it takes her English teacher over a month to return essays to students. How are they supposed to improve on their writing without feedback for their next assignment? Also, the number of days lost to instruction because of ‘spirit weeks, (yes, plural), testing (again), practicing for end-of -course exams, assemblies, etc., is pretty amazing.
Homeschooling may not be for everyone and yes, there are difficult days. I must say, I am so glad we home-schooled all these years; I have no regrets. We have so many great memories from activities and field trips that we did together. My kids are better prepared for school and college because of the path that we took. I worried for nothing, as my kids did get more quality of an education at home with the materials and methods we used. If you feel homeschooling is a path God is calling for you, trust Him and take it!