New Beginning Fellowship

These Frequently Asked Questions about homeschooling will hopefully help but the best way to find out more is to contact us about one of our meet ups.

WHAT IS HOMESCHOOLING?

At a basic level homeschooling is choosing to home educate your child rather than sending them to school. It is a legally recognized option under the Education Act and one that is becoming increasingly popular.

WHY DO PEOPLE HOMESCHOOL?

	As long as homeschooling embraces a healthy understanding of the individual, an exploratory and challenging child-blossoming environment and a steady supportive family foundation, there is no school model that can compete.
	–– Gea D'Marea Bassett , "Free School or No School" in Life Learning Magazine , Nov/Dec 2007

People choose to home school for many different reasons. Some of these include:

a critique of school: concerns that their children's needs are not being met; a feeling that the schooling system limits their children's creativity; concern over the impact of bullying and peer pressures in a school context etc.
some simply see their children not enjoying school or their child’s self esteem being negatively impacted by the process
many embrace the flexibility and freedom that not going to school provides: from holidaying during school term to choosing your own weekly / daily schedule
many from an attachment parenting background see homeschooling as a natural progression of their family living and learning together
others enjoy the opportunity to really focus on and nurture the individuality and unique aspect of each children which teacher/ student ratios makes impossible
some are particularly attracted by the un-schooling approach of getting totally behind a child's interests and passions, which is simply logistically impossible in a school system

For many, the deepest and most abiding benefit of homeschooling is the claiming (or reclaiming) of the their family. Homeschooling families spend an incredible amount of time together living, learning and playing. They have the opportunity to develop a depth of understanding and a commitment to each other that is difficult to attain when family members spend their days going in separate directions.

Whatever your initial reason, you can be sure that as you get started on homeschooling you will find many other motivations also.

	I suppose it is because nearly all children go to school nowadays, and have things arranged for them, that they seem so forlornly unable to produce their own ideas.
	–– Agatha Christie

I AM NOT A QUALIFIED TEACHER, CAN I STILL HOMESCHOOL MY CHILDREN?

Definitely - in fact very few homeschoolers are qualified teachers. Many have not graduated from University and some did not even finish high school. The only necessary requirements to home school are a love for children and an interest in learning. Just as you helped your children to learn to walk and talk by providing models and guidance, parents of homeschooled children help their older children by proving tools and resources.The best support for all children are people who love and care about them and who respect their particular way of learning - people who have the time and the patience to provide one-on-one attention.

Homeschooling parents do what teachers wish they could do in the classroom but cannot for lack of time and help and an excess of students. Any teacher can tell you that the children who do well in school are the ones whose parents are involved in their education. Homeschooling is total involvement.

WHAT ABOUT SOCIALISATION?

Some would argue that it is schools that have a problem when it comes to socialization. Consider the socialization issues arising from a child being placed with 25 other children of the same age with a single adult/ authority figure within a confined space for many hours each day. Contrast this with what homeschooling can offer. Homeschooled children have the time and freedom to get to know adults and children of a variety of ages, on their own terms in real world situations. With greater control over their own time and who they choose to associate with, many homeschooled children will become more self reliant, confident and less dependent on peer approval. You, as their parents, along with their broader community (including other home school parents) will also have the opportunity to play a greater role in their life. Most homeschooling families participate in home school groups, community activities, sporting, dancing, art, music or other structured activities which provide plenty of opportunities for connecting with other people.

Basically the good news is that with the support of home school groups and/or other community networks a homeschooled child has amazing access to healthy, nurturing socialization.

We need to get kids out of the school buildings, give them a chance to learn about the world at first hand. It is a very recent idea, and a crazy one, that the way to teach our young people about the world they live in is to take them out of it and shut them up in brick boxes.. Aside from their parents, most children never have any close contact with any adults except people whose sole business is children. No wonder they have no idea what adult life or work if like.

–– John Holt

HOW DO HOMESCHOOLED CHILDREN LEARN?

	What we have to learn to do, we learn by doing
	–– Aristotle

The fact is that children love to learn and do so from the moment they are born. Home school families learn together and in many different and often unexpected ways. Learning is explored by differently by each family based on a number of factors including which homeschooling approach they pursue. Homeschooling families have the opportunity to experience the world and daily interactions more naturally and spontaneously than their school counterparts. Homeschooled children, with the support of their parents and broader community, are able to see the world, engage with it and are literally always learning.

In this way learning does not just happen in a classroom, but through living life, experiencing the world and engaging with people.

	What we want to see is the child in pursuit of knowledge, not knowledge in pursuit of the child
	–– George Bernard Shaw

WHAT ARE THE DIFFERENT APPROACHES TO LEARNING THAT YOU MENTIONED?

One of the benefits of homeschooling is that it affords so many options. If you choose to home school you have the opportunity to find what feels right for you and your children, which also might vary over time. Some of the common approaches include:

School at Home: involves purchasing an "out of the box" curriculum including text books, study schedules and tools for record keeping. There are many curriculum options available spanning religious and secular perspectives
Relaxed/ Eclectic: is where a parent often combines various approaches. The most common variation of this is where parents have a relatively unstructured child led approach in general while maintaining set workbooks and times for math’s and English.
Charlotte Mason: with some similar concepts to natural learning, this approach prioritizes real life learning situations, however it is done in a structured framework of "living books" and narration/ discussion
Steiner/ Waldorf: there are a number of home based curriculums available that follow principles set out by Rudolf Steiner
Montessori: particular popular among younger homeschooled children this approach emphasizes interactive, tactile environments for the children engage with
Natural Learning/ Un-schooling/ Life Learning: this is currently the most popular approach within our group – it does not rely on a set curriculum or externally defined learning objectives. Instead the child is actively supported to pursue and explore their interests, curiosity and passion. This might incorporate trips, experiments, books, DVDs, mentors and more... the point is that the child is in the driving seat of their own learning.

If you think of a kind of homeschooling continuum, with ’school at home’ at one end, and ‘learning and living completely integrated’ on the other - you would find homeschoolers scattered along that line with every possible variation of what homeschooling could mean.

	Just as eating against one's will is injurious to health, so study without a liking for it spoils the memory, and it retains nothing it takes in
	–– Leonardo Da Vinci

WHAT IF MY CHILD WANTS TO LEARN SOMETHING THAT I CAN'T TEACH?

This presents a great opportunity. Rather than simply "giving them the answer", when you don't know something you can embark on a learning journey together. This process is powerful and will assist in arming your children with the confidence to access resources and learn more effectively in the future. It can also provide parents space to grow and develop as we rediscover the joy in learning and a passion for following our curiosity.

A useful paradigm shift is to see yourself as a facilitator or partner to your children's learning rather than their "teacher".

It is, in fact, nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction have not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry; for this delicate little plant, aside from stimulation, stands mainly in need of freedom; without this it goes to wrack and ruin without fail. It is a grave mistake to think that the enjoyment of seeing and searching can be promoted by means of coercion and a sense of duty

–– Albert Einstein

CAN I STILL WORK AT A JOB & HOMESCHOOL?

Homeschooling families have often been portrayed as "Dad going to work, Mom staying at home with the kids." The reality, for many families, is much different: single parents home school, working parents home school, stay at home dads home school, parents with ongoing illnesses home school. Some families home school some of their children but not others. Grandparents home school grandchildren.

It might be challenging to find ways to make it work. It may take a little creative juggling, but often many of the perceived barriers can be overcome with some thoughtful problem-solving.

I'VE HEARD OF THE TERM "DESCHOOLING", WHAT IS THAT?

Children who have been attending school often go through a process of adjustment when starting to home school. From having decisions made for them; being directed to what to learn and do and when to do it; having external motivation of grades and reports, etc. All these things and more are often part of a school culture.De-schooling is a term that describes the process of getting used to learning and living without school, particularly for those embarking on a natural learning or self directed approach.

Parents may also go through a period of de-schooling, again particularly for natural learners this might involve a process of gaining trust in your children's ability to learn and confidence to give them the space to learn what they want when they want.

WHAT IF MY CHILDREN WANT TO GO TO UNIVERSITY?

A growing number of Universities are very interested in accepting homeschooled students because they are so experienced in self directed learning. There are many different pathways to university entry including completing a bridging program via a TAFE college or equivalent or completing year 12 requirements via a distance ed program.

Basically if University is important to your child than there will be ways for them to gain access to whatever course they wish - many homeschoolers have shown that already.

Since we can't know what knowledge will be most needed in the future, it is senseless to try to teach it in advance. Instead, we should try to turn out people who love learning so much and learn so well that they will be able to learn whatever needs to be learned. Since we can't know what knowledge will be most needed in the future, it is senseless to try to teach it in advance. Instead, we should try to turn out people who love learning so much and learn so well that they will be able to learn whatever needs to be learned

–– John Holt

WHAT RESOURCES DO YOU RECOMMEND TO FIND OUT MORE?

The best way to find out more is to meet us! Come along to our meet ups and talk to a range of families who are homeschooling, each of us have had different experiences and use different approaches which can contribute to you finding your own way.

Information adapted from the Byron Homeschoolers Group.

Our children spend the majority of their young lives in the classroom. Many Christian parents take advantage of the opportunities offered by a Christian school to help train their child up in the way that he or she should go (Proverbs 22:6).

It is exciting to know that there are 923 Assemblies of God/Association of Christian Teachers and Schools (ACTS) sponsored day schools and childcare centers within the United States. Christian teachers have approximately 1260 instructional contact hours per year in a day school and over 2,000 in a childcare center. This allows a tremendous amount of direct Christian discipleship and evangelism to occur in this school system.

Private education accounts for 118,296 students within Assemblies of God/ACTS schools. According to the most current statistics from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), approximately 10% of all U.S. students are educated in private schools. Between now and 2014, the number of students in private schools is expected to continue to increase by 5%.

Christian Education Resources