Ask anybody involved in homeschooling why they opted to homeschool their children and you will see that there are almost as many answers to this particular question as there are parents undertaking homeschooling. Some parents want to take their children out of the public schools because they see the public school system as failing, or as being positively harmful for their children. Other parents want to teach their children at home for religious reasons, or because they wish to instill certain values into their children which they feel are missing from the public schools. Whatever the reason for teaching children at home, there can be little doubt that the majority of parents choose homeschooling because they see it as the best educational choice for their children. For the majority of parent there are two sides to to the homeschooling equation representing those positive things which it brings to the child and those negative things which it removes from the child's environment. Both peer pressure and bullying are rife throughout the public school system today and can place children under considerable pressure and, on occasions, can even place them in danger. Homeschooling your children allows you much more control over exactly who your children come into contact with and the influences they come under. As far as a child's growth and academic development are concerned there can be little question but that, in most cases, homeschooling leads to superior results and this is evidenced in such things as homeschooled children winning the National Spelling Bees and the number of homeschooled children gaining degrees (in many cases Master's degrees) at some of our finest universities and often at very young ages. Not surprisingly many people hold that these children are just gifted and that their achievements are the result of their natural genius rather than to any homeschooling. However, if this were to be the case then it is certainly true to say that we are blessed with more than our fair share of geniuses amongst our youth. The simple fact of the matter is that the numbers simply do not support this point of view. The statistics, which are produced not just by supporters of homeschooling but by bodies such as the US Department of Education, show quite clearly that homeschooled children do far better than their publicly schooled counterparts with homeschooled children a grade ahead by the age of 12 and as much as four grades ahead by the time they get to the equivalent of the 8th grade. Although most people think that homeschooling is a quite modern phenomenon it has actually been around for many hundreds of years and is a well tried and tested system which has more than stood the test of time. Homeschooling has of course changed considerably over the years and much of the philosophy behind homeschooling today stems from the work of advocates of the system during the 1960s. Homeschooling is undoubtedly not an easy choice and is extremely hard work for the majority of parents, especially during the early stages, but there is no doubt that it works and the rewards for both parents and children make it more than worth the effort.
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