Why Home School?

By Kurt Simmons, my daddy

When our children were first born we became conscious of the need to make a decision about their schooling. Being Christian and wanting the best Christian education for our children, we began exploring our options. Recognizing that government has historically been the enemy of Christ, the government school system was soon ruled out. Homeschool seemed the only reasonable choice for our children's eternal welfare. The following are some of the reasons whey we decided for homeschool.
1. Government education is political education.
The recent school board elections in Kansas prove this. The school board wanted to de-emphasize evolution; the liberals and unbelievers went bizzirk. The brave Christian board members who voted their conscious were vilified in the national media. Money came in from all over the U.S. to unseat them. The hue and cry against the board members was that they were trying to introduce unscientific religious dogma into the schools. This, of course, is a big lie. Nothing could be more unscientific than the theory of evolution. For example, according to Darwin's theory, there should be thousand of intermediate forms between the lowest most primitive forms of a species and its allegedly higher evolutionary cousin. In other words, the monkey's evolution into man should be demonstrated by the fossil record showing thousands of intermediate forms along the evolutionary road from monkey to man. Yet, not only are there not thousands of such intermediate forms, there are not any. Not one "missing link" has ever been discovered. After all these years, the whole theory has yet to ever be proved by one piece of hard evidence. Why would Christian parents consent to have the barrage of lies and propaganda that the government school system foists upon defenseless children? Evolution is not the only lie or distortion taught in the government schools, but it is among the most obvious. Our family chose homeschool because we did not want our children taught what was politically correct if it is scientifically and morally wrong.
2. Children deserve a Christian education.
Our children are our most precious possession. As fathers and mothers we must give account to God for the quality of their Christian training and education. The secular school system operates upon an entire set of values that are inimical to the Christian faith. The emphasis upon sports and drama, the encouragement to dating and other worldly endeavors should make this clear. In homeschooling our children, every subject is set in its proper Christian context and Christological world view. Our first grader has a nature reader that is part of her curriculum. This reader explores the wonders of nature, holding out before the child God's handiwork in creation. "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth." (Ps. 33:6) The marvelous sophistication everywhere present in nature cries out that it is the design of an intelligent Creator. By what process did the spider learn to spin a web? What clock causes cicadas to live underground for 17 years and then suddenly emerge to mate and begin anew the cycle of life? Who taught the bag worm to weave its home, or the caterpillar its cocoon? Who established the laws by which caterpillars change into butterflies? No thinking person can assign such regular, recurring wonders to pure evolutionary chance. But the government school system has a vested interest in obscuring and concealing these facts.
3. Shelter from harmful influences.
Anyone anyone committed to prison soon learns every thing there is to know about crime. Schools are similar. They are a fertile source of sin and vice. What your children do not already know they will quickly learn. Public schools are home to children from families that are broken, single mothers, live-in boyfriends, and numerous other influences harmful to children during their formative years. Experimentation with sex, alcohol and drugs is rife. Is it any wonder that virginity is a thing of the past? The public school system actually encourages dating and romantic involvement in teenagers through proms, dances, and a variety of similar activities. Coed sex education is the norm. Reproduction is taught in a morally neutral fashion. But there can be nothing neutral about man's sexual activity. Better not to teach it at all than to teach it in a morally neutral context. The time was that teachers had to be of the highest moral character. Today, lesbians and homosexuals and unwed mothers teach in the public schools. Are these the kind of role models we should be holding out for our children? True, children cannot be sheltered from all evil influences, nor can they be sheltered for ever. They must face these things some day, but not before their own value system has been set firmly in place.
4. Freedom from peer dependency.
Peer pressure is one of the most destructive influences in a child's life. Children by nature do not know right from wrong or how to make wise decisions. Grouping them together in an environment where teen experience enormous pressure to conform to immature and unchristian influences of their fellow teens is harmful. The public schools teach children about rock music, immodest clothing styles, fashion trends, dating, impure language and speech, and an host of other evils. I substitute teach and can speak from experience. There is no pure thing about the environment. Period.
5. Quality of education.
If despite all the other problems associated with government schools they were academically excellent, reason would that we might forebear. However, the schools are abysmal in their ability to produce a top notch product. As a home school family, our children, which are in kindergarten, are already learning Koine Greek. Soon they will begin Latin. The history they learn is not the politically correct version of secularized society, but the history of the world from a Christian frame of reference. They are more mature, polite, and self confident than children educated in the government system. Maybe you should consider educating your children at home.