Homeschooling, a Worthy Sacrifice

BRAIN LAUNCH applauds homeschooling parents for the commitment and sacrifice they make for their children. It may be the best gift that they ever give their children, especially in the early grades. It is not easy in today’s society with the cost of living so high and average wages being at the level they were three decades ago. In most families, both parents have to work just to make ends meet. One of the positives is that today homeschooling is made much easier because there are many quality tools and excellent guidance provided by homeschool organizations and companies.

There is a huge variation in children’s developmental readiness when they start school (a large percentage are not developmentally ready to start school in today’s society). Teachers in public schools must teach many children, all with different levels of development, and proceed at a pace that may be slow for some and too fast for others. When it is too fast is when it causes problems. Many of these children begin to dislike school and learning and eventually many have unnecessary labels placed upon them. There is no labeling by homeschoolers. It also can have a negative impact on their self-confidence and self-esteem, which are vital components of the learning and life performance equation. Following are a few major advantages of homeschooling in the early grades.

• Homeschoolers can advance their child at a pace that is right for their child’s developmental level. Some private schools like Montessori schools also try and do this. This keeps their love for learning and the child’s self-confidence and self-esteem intact.
• A homeschooling parent can learn their child’s learning style, and strengths and weaknesses over time and adjust their methods to make learning more productive and enjoyable.
• The parent/teacher will acquire a lot of knowledge from teaching the child. There is no better way to understand and remember subject matter than by teaching it to someone else. Once the child is in 3^rd grade or higher, the parent can have the child prepare the lesson and deliver it as the teacher.
• The parent and child can create a very special type of bond, because of the extra amount of quality time they spend together. In society today, there are many cases, due to technology, where parents are not creating certain bonds like they did in the past. Many young children are constantly on screens playing video games or watching TV and the teenagers are always on their phone. The parents are both working and very busy and some parents are also constantly on their phone talking, texting or using social media. It is becoming more common to see families out for dinner with members on their phone instead of interacting with one another. How sad.
• You can give a lot of feedback about the child’s behavior and teach the child important social skills like how to build relationships, conflict resolution, cooperation and teamwork, principles and integrity and the importance of altruism.
• If your child has specific interests, you can go into much more depth on these topics.

Today, because there are so many children ages 5 to 10 that are not developmentally ready to achieve what they are capable of, we feel that our Brain Launch Programs should be part of every homeschoolers curriculum in grades K – 4. Why not make sure your child’s” Foundational Processing System” is strong, without weaknesses. This will make teaching your child more productive, fun and efficient. Also, the programs are a nice change from academic content. Most children think the exercises are fun and challenging. We can honestly say that the programs will possibly be the most important part of your curriculum in the early grades. They will improve your child’s performance for the rest of their life.