A Homeschoolers Experience with the Public School

I’ve had an interesting time with the Homeschooled Young Man during a volunteering opportunity. We spent 2 days with around 140 kids ages 8 ½-11 years old. These public schooled kids took part in engaging and hands on activities over the course of two school days. The presenters were upbeat and kid friendly. The kids were well behaved and quiet...too quiet actually for my liking.

Over the course of 8+ hours I spent with these adorable 8 ½-11 year olds, I did not hear the usual giggles from the girls that I am use to hearing, nor small talk amongst boys that I am use to hearing. I saw emotionless faces, frowns and blank stares from these children. But, I saw a hunger in the children for attention from the presenters, when those men and women engaged one on one with these children. Each boy and girl was eager to talk with and spend time with these adults. But after each session they became like little robots. Back to frowns and staring at the floor while being told to line up against the wall, "1-2-3 eyes on me" by their public school teacher. I know that public school teachers will say that this is a must to keep order. But it makes me think of when we had 4,000 adults and children for a homeschool meeting at the state capitol a few years ago. There had to be order and quiet voices with almost 2,000+ kids involved, there were no robot children in the group nor forced lining up against the wall, yet there was no chaos.

At 14 years old The Homeschooled Young Man was a group leader of about 25 children and 2 public school teachers. He held the door open for the group on 11 different occasions and was told “Thank you.” only 3 times over the course of 2 days each lasting 8+ hours.

I was pushed and shoved numerous times throughout the days without so much as an excuse me, sorry or anything by these students.

Then after awhile I had opportunity to sit back in a chair in the back of the room and sort of take it all in. It was then that I noticed the clothes that the teachers were wearing. Skin tight workout pants that stop at the calf, that showed panty lines and a bold written word across their backside, another one wore a similar pair of pants that were way too small and every time she bent over her pants came down and her shirt went up to expose her bare backside (she looked like a plumber, KWIM?). Yes, these were public school teachers of 8 ½-11 year olds.

I guess I could look past that, but the thing that really struck me was the manners that the teachers displayed, yes these are the people that are entrusted with most American children for 7+ hours each day, 30+ hours each week, 5 days per week, 180 days per year and nearly 1,300 hours per school year. I saw teachers not sitting properly in chairs (ya know one of the things that drives us parents crazy at the dinner table is when our kids don’t sit properly, slouching down in the chair with the rear on the edge of the seat and their neck on the back of the chair), teachers talking to each other during the presentations (ya, know it drives us crazy when our kids do this), teachers yawning like roaring lions (ya know how many times you have been trying to teach your child to yawn with their hand over their mouths?). I saw so many kids being grabbed by the arm and yanked around like dogs on a leash and teachers yelling in the face of the kids and the blank looks on the children’s faces while they have an adult standing over them yelling. This must go on often because the other teachers never even looked over to see what was going on. Think about where your kids bad habits are coming from, those things that drive you crazy when your kids do them.

The icing on the cake was the way that the teachers spoke to the children. Every time there was an instruction of “Throw your trash away, PLEASE & THANK YOU!” I thought to my self that “PLEASE & THANK YOU!” really comes out sounding snide and rude no matter how you say it. That phrase seems to be up and coming. We were eating out about a month ago and the waitress said that to us when she gave us our check. The Homeschooled Young Man commented how rude that sounded, even though he knew she was not meaning for it to be rude. 

Now mind you this is NOT a representation of all public school teachers, I happen to know some fine teachers. But this was a peek into the system and I do think this was a typical day in many school systems.

As we drove home I was thinking about all this and here was my take away. Hey Homeschool Momma, are there things that you are doing during your homeschool day that might be negatively effecting your children? Are there things that you are unknowingly passing on to your children?

This brought to light a few things I need to work on in my homeschool. Take some time to assess things that you think of and then improve your homeschool for you and your children.