We love homeschooling because we have the freedom to not only teach those subjects that the public schools deem necessary, but we also have the choice of being able to pursue areas of interest to our children. Living on a farm, and with our kids loving animals, we spend a lot of time on animal science.

We are free to do so many more field trips than the public schools. With all the state budget cuts, our local schools are down to 1, maybe 2 field trips a year. Last year, we went on more than a dozen educational field trips.

You will only get out of homeschooling what you are willing to put into it. Personally, we know our children's education - which will affect their future - is at stake. We are not an "unschooling" family. While the unschooling approach might work for some families, we think our kids need structure, rules, and books. We are not "religious fanatics" keeping our kids sequestered from the world. We do take our faith very seriously, though, and we do incorporate our beliefs and moral standards into our homeschooling experience. We obviously are not "holding school" like the public schools do, but we are investing more time and possibly more money into our children's educations. So, the next time you want to look down on us for homeschooling, or you give us "you're messing up your kid's life" comments, consider coming and spending a day with us in our homeschooling experience. The fact is, that you have absolutely no idea how our schooling is done. Rest assured that we are working overtime, literally, to provide our children with an education not only as well as the public school can offer, but we are going above and beyond what they can offer. Not because we think we are perfect. Not because we think we are smarter than all those "certified educational professionals". Not because we don't want our children hanging out with your kids (although we must admit there are a lot of habits out there that some parents totally ignore that we do not want our children picking up). But because we love our children and we like spending time with them. From the beginning of time, parents were their children's teachers. We think this is a good thing.

So, as we close our first week of our homeschooling experience with our kindergartener (4 year old) and our 1st grader (6 year old), we want you to know that we are very happy with the way our schooling experience is working out. And we are looking forward to a very productive year.

How many 4 & 6 year olds do you know that are regularly involved in community service projects? Ours are. They also have lots of friends, lots of play dates, lots of inter-generational relationships, and attend/host social events. They are active in their church. They are earning higher ranking belts in Tae Kwon Do and learning about respect and gaining confidence as they do. We do messy experiments. We watch newborn calves being born. We take the classroom outside. We do lots of crafts. We attend many "outside" classes offered in the surrounding area, classes deemed age-appropriate for our little ones. We have Bible study and are teaching our children to develop a personal relationship with God. We have 3 sit-down family meals together each day. We are learning math, science, language arts, social studies, and computer. We also have music and P.E. - something many schools have cut from their programs (sorry, I don't think recess should count as P.E.). We are learning Spanish...we want to begin American Sign Language. We are doing the same type things the public schools are doing, and more. We just choose to do these things together in a family setting rather than in an overcrowded, disruptive classroom.

So please. Before you bad mouth or look down on us as "those crazy people", think again. Because we are convinced that most parents, if they really thought about it, would like to be homeschooling their kids, too. Some of us were just more willing to "jump in" and "take a chance", sacrificing two paychecks to take care and educate the children we chose to have. Haven't you told your children the, "If all the kids were jumping off the bridge, would you?" Homeschooling is like that very question. Just because someone we never met decided that it was better for our kids to go to a public school, does not mean it's true. We are just one of the few who acted on that sentiment.

If you have never homeschooled, you should not knock it. If you ever decide to "grab the golden ring" and try it, we think you'll love it.

Here at Sisney H.O.U.S,E. (Home Oriented Unique Schooling Experience), we love it. We enjoy it. We cherish the time together. We are the Sisney family. We ARE a homeschooling family.