More than 2 million children are homeschooled in the United States every year. Generally parents choose to homeschool their children in an attempt to provide an education that is less expensive yet has more attention focused on the their child than private school. For those parents, it’s the only way to provide true one-on-one attention, guidance and assistance to the developing child. It’s their focus and dedication to education that drive the growing trend of homeschooling for families around the world.

“Homeschooling provides your children with the education they need at a price that most can afford in an environment that they are comfortable in,” says Lisa Booth, mother and educator of 11-year-old Jamie and 13-year-old Jared. Not to mention, it gives the families much more time to spend with one another. Booth believes, like thousands of other parents who homeschool, that the opportunity allows parents to know their children better than anyone - their strengths, their weaknesses and every aspect of their personality. Parents are therefore, in theory, a more influential part of their growth, maturity and decision making skills. “We are able to teach them how to make goo decisions instead of learning from peers who haven’t lived a life yet,” she says.

For parents who home school their children, it stops being just about parenting or academics; soon, you become an irreplaceable part of both aspects of the child’s life, says Booth: “Our job as their teachers is not just to teach them academics, but help them to become great people. ”

There is a wide range of resources available to homeschoolers today to make it feasible to school your children in any area. There are even extra-curricular activities and teams dedicated to children who do not attend an educational institution.

As far as the negative aspects of this parenting and educational choice, Booth says they are far and few between. “There really aren’t any negatives about it. If we’re having bad day we can just take a break,” she says. “Everyone has times when it is a struggle to be a home-schooling family, but we work through it and I don’t consider that a negative.”

Concerns have been debated on whether or not a child is missing out on key life experiences if not enrolled in a traditional school environment. “Classroom settings can’t offer anything that I’m not able to offer, in fact, I believe we can offer more,” contends Booth.

Homeschooling is a choice made as a family. It takes time and dedication that some parents don’t have, but this mother is very satisfied with her family’s choice. She says: “We are growing siblings, friends, a husband and father, wife and mother. We believe we have only one opportunity to do that and homeschooling is our choice.”

Article by Meagan Murphy