Do Your Children Know Why You Homeschool?

When we had the opportunity to get away for a couple of nights for my 40th {!} birthday, my sister-in-law was sweet enough to have Jonah for part of the time.  Her oldest boy and Jonah are close in age and they always enjoy spending time together.  When my nephew arrived home from school {he attends a Catholic school}, the boys started chatting.  

     Jonah: “How was your day?”

     Nephew: “Why don’t you go to school?”

     Jonah: “I’m homeschooled”

     Nephew: “Why are you homeschooled? Can’t your parents afford school?”

At that point apparently the conversation dissolved into not- so-kind little boy conversation and Jonah feeling like he had to defend our honor.  When Jonah was relaying the incident to me later, he asked “actually Mom, why do we homeschool?”

An excellent question and one he should be able to answer.  I felt badly that it never occurred to me before to lay it out to the kids in sort of an “elevator pitch” fashion.  Why exactly do we do what we do?

While we may spend a great deal of time thinking about our “why”, so we can respond quickly to a family member or to the checkout lady at the grocery store, chances are pretty darn good that our {younger} kids don’t give it much thought at all.

Here’s what I shared with Jonah and the other older children:

“We homeschool so we have time together as a family to learn about the things we feel are important”

Short, sweet, and to the point, perfect for those kid conversations.

So what about you and your children, do your children know why you homeschool?