Dumb Kids

This may seem harsh…but apparently kids are stupid. Now I shouldn’t say all kids are stupid (that’s still up for debate), but I met a couple of amazing, homeschool graduates who are…stupid.

A couple of week’s ago, I was speaking at a homeschool family camp and after one of the sessions, a  mom stopped me. She was sitting in her chair next to her husband and an early twenty-something girl was standing next to her.

The mom smiled and started the conversation. “My daughter thinks we did a bad job homeschooling her,” she said looking up to the daughter standing beside her. “She thinks we didn’t push her hard enough and that we limited her because we cared more about her character and protecting her from all the bad influences than we did about teaching her Chemistry and Calculus.” Her voice cracked and she was about to cry. “She thinks we did a bad job.”

The girl/daughter smiled, and full of confidence and self-assurance began to talk. “They didn’t do a bad job, “she began, “it’s just that I wish they had pushed me harder in certain subjects…”

“So did you make it through college?” I asked. “Yes, and I teach in a public school right now,” she answered. She was about to continue but her mother interrupted, “And she graduated with honors.” I was starting to feel my pulse quicken.

“So you graduated from college with honors,” I asked the daughter, “and now you teach in a school?” she smiled and nodded. “You seem like an articulate person and seem to have done very well in college and in life…but you’re saying to me and to your parents, that you think your homeschooling had NOTHING to do with that?”

I wasn’t about to let her answer. I turned to her parents and said, “It sounds to me like you’ve done an amazing job with your daughter. I think her success can be attributed to the fact that you taught your daughter at home, kept her from bad influences, and cared more about her character than chemistry and calculus.

Then I learned that her son was also homeschooled and feels like he didn’t get as good an education as he might have received from a public school.

I was dumbfounded and told the parents, “You have done a great job with your kids, and they should fall down and beg your forgiveness and thank you for helping them to become such amazing people….although they’re obviously a lot dumber than they look!

BUT wait, there’s more. Shortly after that, I had another conversation with a mom and dad who came up to me after the same session. I knew the mom was at the end of her homeschooling rope. She was tired of dealing with kids of all ages, and I could tell that she was on the verge of tears and her husband wanted me to say something…brilliant and ‘fix’ her.

She said, “My daughter, who always said we did a terrible job homeschooling her, but graduated with honors and a 4.0 GPA…was in the room listening to you speak just now.” She paused and held out her phone. “She just sent me this text: “Thanks for doing such a great job homeschooling me.””

Both parents were basking in the message of the email. I didn’t have the heart to tell them their daughter was dumb, dumb for ever thinking that she had received a bad education, especially when considering her performance in post homeschool education. And it was all do to the fact that she was educated at HOME.

I’m afraid our kids are dumber than we think, and left to their own means, would actually choose something that’s not as good for them as being educated at home. The truth is that our kids are going to do great…because home is a great place to learn and parents are the best teachers for their children. Homeschooling works even if our kids are too dumb to realize it.

That means you should NEVER let your children make the decision regarding how they should be educated. I would never let my dumb kid sway my decision to homeschool because he said to me, “I don’t want to be homeschooled anymore.”

So Mom and Dad, you’re doing a great job with your kids. They may not appreciate it and may even say mean, hurtful things, but cling to the facts that homeschooling works, your’e doing a great job, and that your kids are too dumb to know what’s good for them, even if it is staring them in the face. And maybe, just maybe, they’ll even thank you some day when they’re a little older and wiser.