how do you explain school vs Homeschool to your child?

[Momma Aimee]

I mean the CHOICE?

DS1 goes to ST at school, and other things too.

the only family we are close with locally homeschhols so he to him "school time" at the kitchen table is totally normal.

However when we go to the school for his ST I tell him we need to be quiet adn respectful of the kids who are learning or "doing school".

He wants to know why they are doing school THERE and not at home.

I am at a loss on the best way to expalin to him that we (and Miss Julie's family) homeschool and other parents send their kdis to school -- i mean he knows THAT -- but he keeps asking WHY "why are they are school all day" "why don't they do school with their mom" or "when will they do school at home" or "when will I go to school"

Just wondering how you have addressed this with your little ones.

granted he is only 4 -- so he sees the world as black or white ... but he seems to be having a hard time getting his mind around it and i am unsure how to word it.

we home school for very specific reason ... we don't feel childing under 10 or 11 should be part of a large peer group, our local distrcit is poor, yadda ....but i am having a hard time explaining why we (and the family we know) homeschool without sounds "bad" about the kids / families that go to school.

thoughts?

[jake&zaxmom]

We differentiated between "homeschool" and "building school" (leaving home and going to a school in another building)

When my son was 4, I said something like,"Some mommies are able to stay with their children and do school with them and some mommies need to work or be away from their children for another reason. Those children go to building school."

I also had him involved in a homeschool playgroup from the time that he was 18 months, so to him, going to building school was unusual. Most of his friends were homeschooled.

[zjande]

I have a 4 yr old as well, & we live right next to a school so he sees the kids & the busses everyday. He hasn't been as inquisitive as your son yet though. When he asks about the school I just say "some kids get to stay home & do school & some kids have to go away to school" & that works for him. I keep up that simple explanation until the kids are old enough to understand more of our actual reasons for choosing homeschooling. I guess if my 4 yo son kept pressing about the reasons we hs, I might say something like "mama doesn't like the books they have at school so we school at home so you can have the books mama likes. Other kids' moms like the books they have at the school" or something like that. The PPs idea is good, too. I might try that one out as well.

[Momma Aimee]

Originally Posted by jake&zaxmom

We differentiated between "homeschool" and "building school" (leaving home and going to a school in another building)

When my son was 4, I said something like,"Some mommies are able to stay with their children and do school with them and some mommies need to work or be away from their children for another reason. Those children go to building school."

I also had him involved in a homeschool playgroup from the time that he was 18 months, so to him, going to building school was unusual. Most of his friends were homeschooled.

Theo doesn't have any real freinds that go to school -- in fact one family we used to play date with onec a month we haven't seen but 2x in the last year due to "growing apart" (she is a SAHM how has her DD in daycare 3 days a week "so DD can learn" and the mom was bigging me for my preschool research --- i am a known research nut -- when her dd was 18 months ...and so on ). so the only people Theo plays with are HS kids then he goes to SUnday School with kids who all go to pre-school / day care.

but we are at teh school 2 times a week for ST and stuff.

thanks

[Savoir Faire]

We say that people have three choices: You can go to public school, which everyone pays for, or you can go to private school (which you have to pay for) or you can do homeschool.

It is given as a choice...just like we all live in different neighborhoods or wear different clothes or like different things....

Some people think that a certain type of school is better than the others... but all parents are trying to do the best for their kids.

[zinemama]

Originally Posted by Savoir Faire

We say that people have three choices: You can go to public school, which everyone pays for, or you can go to private school (which you have to pay for) or you can do homeschool.

It is given as a choice...just like we all live in different neighborhoods or wear different clothes or like different things....

Some people think that a certain type of school is better than the others... but all parents are trying to do the best for their kids.

Our kids go to public school but we're in a big homeschool town and this is the way we have always explained it to our children.

[MyLittleWonders]

Originally Posted by Savoir Faire

We say that people have three choices: You can go to public school, which everyone pays for, or you can go to private school (which you have to pay for) or you can do homeschool.

It is given as a choice...just like we all live in different neighborhoods or wear different clothes or like different things....

Some people think that a certain type of school is better than the others... but all parents are trying to do the best for their kids.

This is basically what we do too. They have PS friends and HS friends. When it has come up in the past, we just made the point that some parents choose to hs (like some of their friends) and other parents/families choose to have their children attend school for various reasons; we all do what we feel is best for our individual families.

[eclipse]

Yeah, we just deal with it as a family choice issue. It helps that ds1 went to kindy and 1st before we brought him home, so both of my older kids have some experience with "school." (DD was 3 and 4 those years, and we spent a lot of time there, so she has memories of it.) DS1 in particular is very clear on why school didn't work for him, but he knows that other kids enjoy it and it works for their family.

[greenmamapagan]

Hmmm, we've tried both the "choice" and the "work/need to be away" approach and I don't think DD really gets it. She spends more time with homeschooled kids but she also knows schooled ones and I think perhaps that actually muddies the issue because she doesn't see them at school but with their parents, so although she knows that "school" is a physical building you go to (we have a ballet class in a school hall occasionaly) she doesn't get that you spend all day there without your parents. Whenever we are out in the afternoon and see older school kids walking home she asks where their parents are.
For a while she thought school was only for boys because the only child she had ever seen regularly in a uniform was a boy ops Then she thought all children, even homeschooled ones went eventually. Some just had to wait until they were older because one homeschooled girl we knew switched to school.

[MamaMonica]

We didn't call it homeschooling until dd was 5, and at that age she understood that that some kids went to a school building, some learned at home. When ds was in school, she volunteered with me in his classroom, and has friends in school so place of schooling is just another choice.

[Therese's Mommy]

I tell my dd that brick and mortar school is for those kids whose parents are unable to homeschool. I tell her that there are many reasons why a family is unable to homeschool. I try not to make b&m school look bad or the parents who send their children there look bad.

[elizawill]

i just explained that school has different options to meet each family's needs. there are public schools, private schools, charter schools, university model schools, homeschools, etc. it wasn't an issue. my little girl wanted to attend public school when starting K, but that's the only time she ever wanted too. i discovered it's because everyone was getting new stuff (clothes, book bag, lunchbox, etc) - so now we go shopping each year and she gets all of that too. school isn't a bad place at all in our house though. i don't avoid books or shows with school themes. homeschooling is just so normal to us though, that everything else is of little interest.

[Tjej]

My DD is 4 as well, and we have visited the local elementary school. I point out different kinds of schools and it seems to be fine. Some homeschool, churchschool, publicschool, private school, etc.

Tjej

[LuxPerpetua]

I think this is one of those questions in which it is helpful to know how to tailor the answer to your child. My dd (also 4) is very home-centric and very mom-centric (she will not even go to the nursery at our church for an hour!), so I've explained to her that we homeschool because we enjoy being together so much. She has two other little friends, both of whom go to preschool, so she knows about other schools and that some moms are not able to stay at home and homeschool like we do (I haven't yet told her that some moms CHOOSE not to because I think that would severely upset and worry her). It's funny--until a few months ago I didn't even know that dd knew we homeschooled, and then one day my mother (who is just freaked out by homeschooling) was talking about school to dd and dd told her that we homeschooled. I was really shocked she was even aware of that! All I can figure is that she's overheard me talking to other moms about it. I really can't for the life of me figure out how she knew! So, for us, for now, we say we homeschool because we love being together and as she gets older I want to deepen that understanding (like adding travel, no schedules, eat when we want, do more hands-on learning, etc.) just right now isn't that time for that. I think I'll know when that time is when the first answer I have given doesn't satisfy dd and she wants to know more.