Nathan is a normal 18-year-old student.
Home schooled until 16-years-old, skipped two years of high school, and entered university. Currently in his third year at Western University for health science, he’s noticed a few misconceptions that people have about home school.
When Nathan did his first year in university, through the WISE program, he says that he wanted to carry a brochure around to answer people’s questions.
“I must have told my story fifty times during my first year.”
He says going to university was tough; because he went from being at home doing his work, to being in a classroom of a few hundred people. “It was definitely an adjustment.”
A common misconception he noticed was many thought he stayed in his room doing calculus all day. He says, that’s simply not true, “We have lives too.”
Although, Nathan did spend time in his home doing book work, his mother planned field trips with other parents to socialize and feed Nathan’s interests at the time. He also did karate for some time ‘after school.’
Nathan and his mother agree that socialization is a large misconception to the public. His mother, Darlene says, “No one ever questions the academic side,” they’re always concerned about socialization.
Nathan confirmed, he is social and does have friends.
An issue some may have, when it comes to home schooling, is what style of teaching will be best for the child.
There are two main styles of teaching, curriculum or interest based.
Curriculum is academic heavy, with exercise sheets and text book learning. Interest based is more free, basing the child’s education off of their interests. Darlene chose to teach Nathan with book work and his interests. She says, it was mainly book learning until he became older when she focused more on what he was into.
As Nathan got older his interests were more into the sciences and less in history and english.
He has a love to learn and credits his parent’s choice of home schooling for that. He says, if he had time off he would probably buy a text book to read for fun.
A question Nathan is often asked is, will he home school his child(ren)? He says, “I would ask myself, ‘how can I best serve their educational needs?’ Home schooling isn’t always the right thing and neither is the public school system. I think both have good and bad. As for my children, I would really base it off of my child, cause I think some people thrive in home schooling and some don’t.’
“I think it’s a personal choice. I don’t think it’s a one shoe fits all kind of solution. I think it’s an individual basis.”
*Nathan does not have any kids*
