Chapter 1

Why We Homeschool

All good parents homeschool their children. Some do it full time. Some do it part time in partnership with professional educators. And some do it while their kids are on break from traditional schools. If you teach your children at all, you homeschool.

Homeschoolers cut across all segments of the population. Although the movement is indisputably largest in the United States (reliable research puts the number of American homeschooled children at 1.5 million, or 1 to 2 percent of school-age children), Canadians, Europeans, and thousands of expatriated North American families in the military, in missionary service, in business, and in the civil service are also embracing homeschooling.

Homeschoolers advocate dozens of educational philosophies, ranging from strict school-at-home programs to militant unschooling. There are parents who have homeschooled from birth, parents who enroll their children in supplemental classes, and parents who embrace public or private school and supplement it with their own after- school and weekend programs.

While the homeschooling movement is often perceived as conservative in nature, a sizable number of homeschoolers are adamantly liberal. Homeschoolers cover the range of human experience. They include self- avowed "hippies," rural farm families, gay couples, single parents, grandparents, stepparents, and kindly aunts.

Some families homeschool in small church or neighborhood "co-ops," some are affiliated with charter or private schools, and some go it alone. Some homeschooling families are devoutly religious; some have no religious affiliation at all. The homeschooling community embraces Pagans and Catho...