Home School Burnout: What It Is. What Causes It. and How to Overcome It

Although the home school movement in America is, by no means, a contemporary craze--Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt were all home schooled--there has been, in the past 10 years, a marked surge of the number of practicing home schooling families across North America. Tragically, however, what was intended to be the flexible, child-centered approach to early education at home has, in many cases, become a miniaturized replication of the formal, high-pressured learning in large, public classrooms most home schoolers decry. And the victims, in this case, are parents. Frazzled, guilt-ridden, and tired, these people--usually mothers--waken early to accomplish yesterdays's unfinished household chores, hurry husbands and children through pre-work or pre-school regimens, then settle down to the tasks of structured, home teaching. By day's end these parents find themselves frustrated and bone-tired, wondering if this self-sacrificing discipline is worth the effort. Soon those parents abandon their commitment to home education, opting for what they know to be second-rate learning for their children, but preserving their own sanity and self-esteem. This book has been written as a reassurance to all parents of the undeniable value of home-based education. By means of real-life examples and new, continually reaffirming research, the Moore's will take readers "back" to the indisputable "why's" of home schooling. Then they systematically guide parents through the reasons why many disassemble their home schools. Why they--and their kids--burn out. And in explaining this, the Moore's carefully escort parents back to their own sound reasons for deciding to home school, reassuring them to stay with it. For the good of both them and their children. The book is thoroughly documented, and at the same time, with compassion, it encourages parents back from desperation and frustration to sanity and realism.