In Part 1, I wrote about how I ended up being homeschooled, and the homeschool philosophy we followed. This post will be more personal, and focus on how I feel like I was impacted by being homeschooled, both positively and negatively.
Ups and Downs
This is challenging for me to write, because when I think of homeschooling, I think of pretty much everything that happened in my childhood. When school happens at the kitchen table, and the lines between fieldtrips and family activities blur, and when your classmates are your siblings and your teacher is your mom, it's hard to say what exactly is "school."
The reason this is important is that I have a lot of somewhat negative feelings about homeschooling that aren't really about homeschooling. They're really a negative reaction to other things happening in my life at that time, but the two get very blurred. Up through 6th grade, homeschooling was wonderful. I loved it, I thrived in it.
Seventh grade and on are a whole different story. At the end of 6th grade (when I was 11, turning 12), my parents got divorced and we moved from my childhood home. This sparked a series of events that went on for years, and effected me greatly. My anxiety really flared up around this time, and I was very intensely depressed from that point until I was about 16.
This is where I become very conflicted about homeschooling. I believe that educationally, I had a better experience than I would have in public school. However, to be entirely honest, I didn't really do much school at all for several years. I read a lot, and I kept up with some things okay, but I did the bare minimum (honestly, less that that even) to convince my mom that things were going okay, and put no real effort into anything. 8th-10th grades were a total wash, and I did very little actual school work.
I struggled very much during this time. My anxiety was debilitating, and my depression meant that I had little motivation for anything. There isn't one easy thing or person to blame for this. While it is easy to want to place blame on someone else, it was a conglomeration of many circumstances and situations that led to me being in the situation I was.
There are ways in which I know I would have been happier and more successful had I been in public school during those years. And it was considered - I almost went to school for 9th grade, but eventually decided not to. I'm conflicted about that decision now. In a lot of ways I am glad I didn't go to school, because my friends and support I have in the homeschooling community mean so much to me.
Educationally, I didn't suffer. When I started Running Start in 11th grade, I went into my classes without an issue and have done well my whole two years here. I finished my time at Whatcom Community College with a 3.9 GPA, something I am very proud of.
But, and I don't want this to sound like I'm dissing on homeschooling here, I don't think that my homeschool background had much of an impact, positive or negative, on how I did in college classes. The factors that decided that were, I believe, my personal love of learning and my love of reading, both of which are the aspects of my personality that I strongly believe are the deciding factor in my academic success.
I am glad I was homeschooled, because I would be a very different person were I not homeschooled. At the same time, I am not sure if I would want to homeschool children I may have someday. For me, that decision would depend on the social situation we had as a family, the personality of the child, and many other factors. I can't say that I would absolutely homeschool my children, but I wouldn't rule it out either.
