Image is American, but relevant. From:
Link.
Yes, I know a lot of people will groan at this thought but many parents are deciding that
homeschooling is how they want to raise their kids. One of my
favourite career blogs has a whole
section on how she is homeschooling her children. Because I don't have kids yet I don't read those entries. I read the ones about how to choose a
husband if you want to have kids (I already have a husband) and
napping. The Nova Scotia government has pdf's of the
curriculum requirements. There is no junior kindergarten in Nova Scotia, which I find strange as 5 years old seems old to be starting school.
The homeschooling trend is extremely apparent on
Pinterest with multitudes of activities. And many
bloggers focus on this activity. I think it is an extension of scrap-booking, the conservative family trend (women taking their husbands names and being homemakers), and the disillusionment associated with funding cuts to public schools. The internet itself is a boon to those who decide to home-school, as resources are easily available to those with internet access. Though of course
religious institutions play big roles in providing resources as well, it is not simply a religious or family dynamic issue. Economic reasons might have determined that a parent stays home with the children, which could be because the single parent income is big enough to support a stay at home parent, or because
childcare would cost more than the lower of the two parents incomes. For those of you with no children - yes childcare costs can be enormous (unless you are
lucky enough to live in Quebec, which also offers IVF treatment as part of
standard health-care).
Homeschooling is polarizing and is definitely not for everyone, nor is it a cure-all for holes in our education system. But it is a wave of the future, at least for the next five years, at that point it will either become quite standard and common or the voting public will insist on beginning a re-haul of and investment in the public school system.
