Is racism leading to homeschooling?

Apparently, yes. 

According to the Washington Post, "the reasons for black kids to be homeschooled may not be the same as for white kids. (Ama Mazama's research) shows that black parents homeschool their children due to white racism."

Problems include:

Covert Institutionalized racism
Eurocentric teachers' attitudes
Racial stereotypes of black children
Harsh school punishments

As a former public school parent who is black and has black children, I can attest to many of these problems. We certainly experienced them.  The worst for us was the racial stereotypes of my family in general. When we moved to GA, for example, there weren't many black families in our kids school, and it was abundantly clear that the staff had ideas about black people and just assumed that those things were true about us.  I had people purchase my kids' field trip shirts because they assumed we could not. ( I'm pretty sure we made more than those folks.)  I had teachers thank my husband for having lunch with his kids and ask him when was the last time he saw them (as if we were divorced).  I had teachers tell me how they "understood" how hard it was to be a single parent.  Since I was married, I  had no idea why they would say that to me.  

In short, I felt that they had low expectations about us as people, and so also had low expectations for our kids.  So while we may have not realized it at the time, racism may have had something to do with while we pulled the kids out of school. 

Checking in with Adult homeschooled kids

So how are they doing?

They are OK, and maybe a bit too evolved for other people their age.  Seriously, they are doing just fine navigating the real world, but they are not necessarily in sync with their age mates around them.  And they are OK with that. And I am OK with that too.

Let's see if I can explain.

My 21 year old, seems very much like a normal 21 year old male.  He keeps his personal life close to his chest because that's "private".  He is very close to his family members, such as his sister and cousins, and honestly, that's how I get the 911 on my son.  But that thing that is most clearly apparent about him is that he doesn't have any patience for nonsense... by nonsense I mean bad behavior in general.  Rule breaking, lack of consideration, rudeness, meanness.  He lives on a college campus.  These things happen around him all the time.  He typically just avoids it and will not participate. My guess is that he was not desensitized to either put up with or ignore this behavior because he was homeschooled, so as an adult, when he sees bad behavior, he can be a bit judgmental.  At least he's typically quiet about it. Typically.

My daughter is similar but different. She is a rule bender and a rule breaker, if she thinks a rule needs breaking. She especially has a distaste for arbitrary rules that might be made up by an instructor, boss, or friend. No-can-do. If the rule does not sit well with her she will challenge it, or she will find a way to opt out of the situation that involves the rule. They may also be a side effect of homeschooling because we would also say "this..... does not work for me", and then move on. Whatever the thing was, whether it was curriculum, an extracurricular, a group, or a club, if it did not serve us in a positive way, we would remove ourselves from it. And we were OK with it.  But as a young adult, others might see her as a quitter or noncommittal because she's not just jumping on anyone's bandwagon.

At the same time, she is also kind of annoyed with the majority of people her age. Words she uses are entitled, impatient, and negative. She says that her generation is quicker to complain about something than to come up with a solution.  That is draining... especially when you are surrounded by it on a college campus.

Am I saying that my kids are more adult and evolved because they were homeschooled?  Maybe. They are certainly different, and did not learn a lot of the negative behaviors that were enforced in school and they so they don't and won't participate in them.

Besides that, they are normal, everyday, young adults. Who, unless someone points it out, no one would even know they were homeschooled... however, they would probably volunteer that information.

Carnival of Homeschooling Oct 2015 still blogging!

At this point in my homeschooling career, I am 3 years post homeschooling. My youngest child is well into the swing of her Jr. Year in college.  Someone recently asked me why I continue to blog about homeschooling and stay involved.  My answer was, because there are children that would fare better with an individual education. My days of slamming public schooling is long past. I have seen kids do poorly on both sides the argument and I have seen children on both sides do exceedingly well.  But whether people homeschool all the way through, or transition in or out of homeschooling, we need to respect and support each persons decisions.  This carnival of homeschooling features families that utilize or have utilized both homeschooling and traditional schooling. 

With that said, Janine Cate writes A Homeschooler Trying out a Private School at Why Homeschool. In this post, the youngest daughter discusses her feelings about attending private school. 

Homeschooling doesn't just vary from family to family, but also from child to child, the Cate family is still also homeschooling younger children.  Read their post on  Homeschool Materials We Use for Third Grade also at at Why Homeschool. 

Another must-read homeschool family with children in school, homeschooling, and a couple graduated is Happy Elf Mom. She is the mom of autistic children, and autistic children who homeschool can escape a lot of the stressors that makes life difficult. Read Ask an Autism Expert

at Homeschool and Etc where Happy Elf Mom shares pointers on how to raise an autistic child.

For deeper insight, you will also want to read Homeschooling Woodjie and Horizons Phonics and Reading Review, also at Homeschool and Etc.

If you've ever read Tara's bog, and you should, you will find out that her children used to attend traditional school and decided to homeschool.  Her oldest child is also in college with my youngest (where I met them).  I promise you will enjoy her writing which includes First Day of School at I Might need a nap where she discusses the beginning of her homeschool journey. 

Then, there's A little Writing Assignment where she discuses something that I can especially relate to. (When we were homeschooling we also enjoyed the freedom to take a piano break and play away stress at any point of the day.)  

In his own words is a post that especially touched Tara's heart, and will bring a smile to your face because moments like this are truly a part of the joys of homeschooling. All of these will be found at her blog  I Might need a nap.

For those homeschoolers still in the beginning stages, and deep in the trenches of homeschooling, you will want to check out Leah's blog as she shares lots of homeschool resources as well as encouragement at As We walk along the road. She has shared 31 Days of Literature Unit Study Ideas

which is a series sharing thirty-one great children's books along with activities to extend the learning as you read.

She continues with Keep Kids Reading All Year Long With a Reading Incentive Program which gives suggestions of reading incentive programs that you can use all year long to keep kids reading.

And she also ponders, Should Christian Kids Read Books From a NonChristian Worldview sharing "A look at the types of books that we allow our children to read".  All of these are found at As We walk along the road

Finally, I would like to share some of my own post-homeschool blog posts. Let's start with 

8 Things I would do differently if I was to homeschool all over again is not so much a post lamenting what I got wrong and celebrating what I got right, but instead it is about changes I would make if I happened to have another kid  to homeschool. I hope it helps someone. 

I also added a post to get more ethic people like me to consider the alternative of homeschooling with 
Maybe black parents should really, really consider homeschooling their black sons because it pains me to see these kids failing in school from what I often see as a symptom of low expectations and an overall lack of sensitivity, AND a bad habit of jumping to conclusions.

Finally, I feel like we should not ignore those who were homeschooled and in retrospect are not too happy about it. Homeschooled and Illiterate might anger some... it will definitely anger some, but 

while unhappy post-homeschool graduates may be extreme cases, it behooves us to read some of these accounts and to remember that homeschooling is a task that must be done with due diligence in all areas for the sake of our children's future.  You can find these and more at my blog Notes from a Homeschooled Mom

Please keep in mind that The Carnival of Homeschooling is currently being published every month, but you don't have to wait until the last minute to enter your post.  You can send in up to three posts about homeschooling via an email to: CarnivalOfHomeschooling@gmail.com

 Please include:

  Title of Post(s)
  URL of Post(s)
  Name of Blog
  URL of Blog
  Brief summary of the post(s)

Or you can submit via Google Forms:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1hlNgl8A0FDFBdc0O0QdzzB5jja5civEVac6u4zkVTzQ/viewform#start=openform

Maybe black parents should really, really consider homeschooling their black sons

Do I even need to say why?

We could start with this suspension that just happened because a 12 year old boy was accused of staring at a young white girl.  The case makes me sick to my stomach because this same girl was able to dump milk in someone's lunch and get a way with it.  She sounds like a little tyrant, but a black boy "stares at her" and he gets suspension. No kid needs this!

It is no secret that black boys are unevenly disciplined in school.  Let's look at my own son before we started homeschooling.  The kid sitting behind him who was not black was allowed to smack him in the back of his head all.day.long.  But, the second he spoke up or yelled at the boy, or touched the boy, he was threatened by the teacher.  I'm sorry, that's just crap.

But if that's not enough for you, lets look at the facts as a whole.  By fourth grade many African American boys are already falling behind in the classroom.    This tells me that black boys should skip at least elementary school, maybe middle school too.  They need time to become independent boys, assured of their value and place in the world, before joining any formal education institution.
But you can't homeschool?  You are a single parent? Do you need two salaries?  That's not really a problem.  There are dozens of homeschool academies in every major city your kid can attend... but do your due diligence and be careful.  Make sure it is being run by people who will make your kids a priority. 

I guess that is all I have to say for now.  I try to stay away from race for the most part, in my life, and in my blog, but this is one of those straws-that-broke-the-camels-back type of moments.  fur-real.
These kids need to be given a chance, and if the school are not going to do it, then it is the job of the parents to figure it out.