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By Jonathen
As a second grader, I was looking forward to my third grade year at my public school. I was looking forward to seeing the friends that I made and starting fresh in a new class, with a new teacher. But before the next school year started, my parents told me that I was going to be home schooled. They explained to me that the school system in our area wasn’t great, and they couldn’t afford to send me to another school.
At the time, I didn’t know what home schooling was exactly, except that you would do school at home. I was a little disappointed that I wouldn’t be able to develop the friendships I made at my public school, but I was looking forward to giving home school a try.
In a report done by the U.S. Department of Education, there were approximately 1,770,000 students who were home schooled in 2007. And I became one of them. The transition from public school to home school wasn’t as bad as it seems. Instead of going to a building for school, I could work at home. My schoolwork is both offline and online, so I can take school with me wherever I go.
My schedule is not real different than it would be if I went to a public school. There are some differences, such as getting out of school at 1pm and not having any homework. I still have the normal quizzes, test, and assignments, but they’re all online. A lot of times, I work in my room or at the computer in the living room. I also go to my local library sometimes to work on my schoolwork.
One of the misconceptions that a lot of people have about home school students is lack of social skills. Because of being home schooled, it allows me to be here at youth radio, on Hyphy Soul Radio. I’ve already met some of the people here, and I have a lot of fun. My whole point is: I don’t miss being able to go to public school. But if I were going, I would’ve probably missed developing the interests that I hold dear to me now.