Wednesday, September 14, 2005

Quote

I love this quote...everytime I read it...and there will be months and months between me seeing it again, yet each time it strikes me deeply. I suppose if someone were to ask "Why homeschool? Why be a stay-at-home mom?", well, I'll just have to remember to refer to Chesterton here.


"When domesticity, for instance, is called drudgery...the difficulty arises
from a double meaning in the word. If drudgery only means dreadfully hard
work, I admit the woman drudges in the home. But if it means that the hard
work is more heavy because it is trifling, colorless and of small import to
the soul, then, as I say, I give it up; I do not know what the words
mean.... I can understand how this might exhaust the mind, but I cannot
imagine how it could narrow it. How can it be a large career to tell other
people's children about the Rule of Three, and a small career to tell one's
own children about the universe? How can it be broad to be the same thing to
everyone, and narrow to be everything to someone? No, a woman's function is
laborious; but because it is gigantic, not because it is minute. I will pity
Mrs. Jones for the hugeness of her task; I will never pity her for its
smallness." G.K. Chesterton in What's Wrong With the World

Friday, September 02, 2005

Why do we home educate?

It is interesting that every day it seems there are more and more reasons to home educate. Violence in schools. Constantly shifting curricula. Drugs in school, including over-emphasis on Ritalin, et al. And now?

Gas prices.

Heavens, $4 a gallon for gas? School districts across the country are freaking out, pulling hair to try to find sufficient funds for buses. Home school? No need to transport the kids miles away from home to educate. Field trips? We can do some fine field trips within walking distance or using the internet and streaming video and we can visit numerous aquariums, zoos and animal parks throughout the world.

Yet again, home education rocks!