When Homeschooling Gets Crunchy: Darcy S.’s Thoughts

“Alumni like me have a lot to offer to the conversation of ‘new wave homeschooling,’ but I feel that often our concerns are brushed aside since ‘oh, well, we aren’t religious so we won’t have the same problems you did.’ But they already are showing signs of the same problems the original homeschoolers had, just from a completely different point of view.”

Learning To Leave My Son With Others

“I have been able to overcome my deeply ingrained childhood perceptions for myself, and feel like a functioning and happy member of the big outside world. However, I am unexpectedly having to go through the same process again, now that I am in the role of a mother. All the progress I made for myself, I am having to do again, this time for my son.”

Growing Kids the Abusive Way: Auriel’s Story, Part Two — Isolation and Ideology

“Through HSLDA and my parents, I learned that foster homes are terrible places that abuse children by burning their hands on stoves, and more. Well, it worked. I didn’t call hotlines, tell the speech moms who cared about me, or beg my few friends for help. When CPS showed up at our doorstep, my siblings and I lied for fear of being separated from each other forever.”

Visualizing “The Myth of the Unsocialized Homeschooler”

“Socialization is a component that definitely can be ignored or accidentally left out and it has openly (and wrongly) been discounted as being unimportant by many prominent homeschool leaders. Because it has been ignored and dismissed as a necessary part of many homeschool curriculums is the main reason why homeschoolers have gotten the reputation for being unsocialized in the first place.”

Here’s To My Fellow Homeschool Alumni: Ruth’s Story

“My mom was so busy having and caring for my younger siblings that my high school courses consisted of me by myself plowing through one textbook after another. My mom was frequently unhappy with the amount of time I spent on my school work because she needed me to help with my siblings.”

Teaching My Son the Lessons I Didn’t Learn

“As a mother, I feel like all the kindness and love that I pour into my son’s life is somehow healing my own childhood wounds. I see him learning the lessons that I wish I had learned myself as a child, and I feel at peace. He is learning, right from the start, that his feelings are important.”