veteranhomeschooler

Homeschooling is an addiction and homeschool support groups support the “habit.” For the uninitiated in the jargon of home education, a “homeschool support group” isn’t designed to help you avoid homeschooling or stay away from homeschoolers like other self help groups. Although, eventually you may feel as though you have joined a cult of believers and feel your life becoming consumed by home education!

No, homeschool support groups have become the natural outgrowth of the home education movement. What John Holt and those pioneering homeschooling families discovered was a simple truth about any cultural or psychosocial movement, we need other like minded thinkers to develop a support system for our newly forming agenda of living. And so gradually, very informally, groups of families joined with other groups of families into local support groups. And then fed by the huge enjoining of Christian conservative homeschool families, those families organized themselves into various networks around the country. And then those networks stabilized into more formal support structures, often led by a legal organization called HSLDA.

However, not all homeschool families were, or are, comfortable with the theories, viewpoints and control structures put in place by HSLDA or Christian conservative groups and so two new words entered the homeschool jargon vocabulary. Inclusive homeschool support groups and statement of faith homeschool support groups. Through the years, both have grown and developed and sometimes local homeschool groups are an amalagram of both movements. It just all depends upon the founders of local groups, their intent and their structure. Again, some are very loosely organized and some have very formal structures including by-laws, not for profit status, and structures almost like schools, with organized classes and activities for their children.

So, should you, the new to homeschooling family join a local support group? My personal opinion is yes, join all of them! And then sit back and see what fits and works for your family. However, I recommend a trial period for any support group and I often encourage support group leaders to think about offering such a trial membership to allow new families to see if that particular group would be helpful for them. Will their children find friends their age and of their liking in the group? There are many questions that each individual family would ask.

Why join a support group? Because homeschooling has had successful gains in acceptance by the larger culture due to the growth of such groups. It has allowed effective work to be done by legislative representatives to protect the rights of every family in the United States to homeschool their children. In homeschool support groups, you will meet and get advice from seasoned veterans and meet other “baby” homeschoolers. You’ll find friends, like minded thinkers, encouragement for success, and practical, helpful advice on curriculums, methodology, schedulings, rules, laws, book recommendations, organized activities, etc. etc. etc.

Much of the information you gain needs to be accessed for its appropriateness for your family and your children. What works well for one child, won’t necessarily work for your student. Home education is often very much a try it first practice. But when you have 10 families telling you how much their child enjoys learning to read by using “100 Easy Lessons for Reading”, then you can consider it to be a good program to check out.

It is the very existence of these home school support groups that have allowed homeschooling to flourish and grow. Families and leaders in these groups are dedicated to homeschooling on varying scales. Some are solely interested in their own personal needs and that of their group, some want to encourage the growth of the movement on a larger scale, desiring to share their message with many families. So the mission and work of each groups varies greatly.

It is most generally, the mission for the more experienced leaders to continue to mentor and encourage families that come their way. But there is no such thing as a “professional homeschooler or home educator”, even though there are varying degrees of educational experience within their ranks. In other words, while there is a huge wealth of books, articles, resources to help you, the new homeschooler, figure out this thing called home education; there is no one who can tell you exactly the steps you must take.

There are some commonalities however, and one of them is to find local support group or groups in your area. Join them or visit them. Attend some meetings, an activity, and begin the process of discovering what works for you and your family. In other words, come, drink the Kool-aid with us and join our cult…of families dedicated to finding the best educational practices and methods for their family and dedicated to encouraging you to discover your “inner homeschooler”.

Support groups links are available at many websites. Remember that some are open to any faith or secular thinker (inclusive groups) and some are more aimed at supporting faith based home education, whether that is Muslim, Christian, or Pagan religious groups. And then there are a variety of state organizations that fall in either the more inclusive pattern or sponsored by Christian support group leaders.

Googling Homeschool support groups in (your area) will result in lots of links. Good luck searching. Your library will also usually maintain a reference list of homeschool support groups in their service area, along with lots of homeschool support books!

Have fun meeting some new friends and beginning homeschooling with your

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