Why we decided to homeschool

I've been receiving a lot of questions about homeschooling recently, from parents who are exploring options for the coming school year in this time of COVID19.

I am in no way an expert. But we've been homeschooling for five years now, and I've shed my share of tears over the years - tears of joy and of despair 😅 - so there might be a thing or two I can share about the experience. This is the first of a series of posts about homeschooling FAQs.

Why did we decide to homeschool?

I started searching for preschools around our area before my daughter turned 3. We lived in Pasig then.

What made me decide to homeschool was the disappointing quality of the preschools near us that time.

One school that was just walking distance claimed to be a "montessori", but when I toured the school and talked to the principal, I felt that they were very traditional, and the only montessori thing about them was the manipulatives in the classroom.

I didn't want a traditional setup for my soon-to-be preschooler. We believed that the best way for young kids to learn is through PLAY. So we did not want a school that gave homework to preschoolers, and placed a priority on academics, instead of teaching kids the love for learning.

We wanted an unhurried, developmentally-appopriate approach to early childhood education. We wanted a school that was more focused on character-building and life skills, than on academics at such an early age.

So this led me to a search for progressive preschools. I've read good things about a certain preschool in Mandaluyong, pero malayo, so mauubos lang oras namin sa traffic.

I found another progressive preschool in Ortigas which was really nice. But we felt turned off when they invited us to a fundraiser film showing of an animated film with rude humor and mild violence that we felt was inappropriate for 3 to 4-year-olds! We decided we weren't aligned with this school in the values and character department.

That's when I started to think of homeschooling!

So I read many blogs (Teach With Joy was really helpful!) and attended a homeschool conference before finally deciding to take the plunge and homeschool.

I wasn't really thinking of the long haul. I was thinking short-term - just the preschool years, and then I thought we would re-evaluate before Grade 1. I couldn't possibly teach Math for gradeschool, I thought to myself.

But here we are, 5 years later, still loving the homeschool lifestyle!

Come join us on this homeschool adventure as I post more about our homeschool life.

(This is a series of posts about homeschooling in the Philippines, originally posted on my personal Facebook account. )