Bad Advice Column: Why you should definitely homeschool your kids
Do you have a problem that you need really terrible advice for? Tell Collin all about it by sending him an email at badadvice@citybeat.com. You will probably regret it.
Dear Collin,
This year, my partner and I made the difficult decision to homeschool our kindergartner. There were questions as to what it was our child would be learning and the types of ideas they might be exposed to when everything including education seems to be the target of extreme partisan politics. There was also the matter of bullying, as well as the disturbing notion of (god forbid) weapons being brought into the school. As society becomes more violent and dangerous, it begins to seem irresponsible not to keep children at home and have their own parents teach them. This decision has created a rift with my in-laws who seem to believe they know what’s best for my child, and that my partner and I are doing more harm than good by having full autonomy over our child’s education. How do we convince them we’ve made the right choice?
Sincerely,
Stay-at-Home Teacher
Dear Stay-at-Home Teacher,
As a parent myself, I understand how strange it is to spend half a decade being present with your child for pretty much every waking moment of their life, just to one day suddenly watch them disappear on a bus for eight hours every day. The world can be a dangerous place, and when you can’t see your child directly in front of you, it can be worrying. But if I were to guess what your in-laws are more concerned about, it’s that they may think you are less qualified to teach a kid how to read and write than, say, someone who teaches kids how to read and write as their profession.
There’s also probably some concerns about your kid’s social development because, let’s face it, homeschooled kids have a reputation of being kind of weird. And that reputation isn’t unearned. We’ve ALL heard stories about homeschooled kids snatching European starlings out of the air, announcing that they’re an invasive species, and then karate chopping their heads off without a single ounce of remorse.
And the reason these kids are publicly decapitating birds is because they don’t spend the entirety of their day being told what not to do by other people’s kids. They’ll never learn the skill of navigating the politics of where to sit in the lunchroom, or the thrill of being made fun of for having a pulsating, oozing pimple on their eyelid. These are situations that teach children very important life skills, like not believing in themselves and always conforming to the crowd. But in a technology-driven world that requires almost zero human interaction, you may find these skills aren’t important for your child to have anyway. When you can just get everything you need on the internet without once talking to a human, who needs social skills? Homeschooling them won’t make a difference in that regard.
If your sole concern is losing the relationship with your in-laws, there is a compromise you could try. You could just start your own school. That’s essentially what you’re doing anyways— you’re starting a school in your home catered specifically to your kid. You could even have open enrollment, but just make the criteria to get into your school so narrow that only your son or daughter could make the cut. Like, if I was starting my own school I would call it “Collin’s School For Kids Whose Legs Are Backwards Like Chickens And Also Named Chauncey.” Only my son would be able to get into a school like that. And that way you wouldn’t be lying when you tell your in-laws things like “it’s very exclusive and very difficult to get into” and also “his teacher is very handsome.” And who knows, maybe there is a second kid out there who somehow also meets the criteria for your new school, and your kid could have an actual classmate to practice normal human interactions with.
Dear Collin,
Why the hell do kids keep saying “six seven” and how do I make it stop?
Sincerely,
Annoyed Person
Dear I-Don’t-Know-How-Google-Works,
“Six Seven” is a lot like this column: it’s childish, it has no meaning, and its entire purpose is to irritate everyone it possibly can. It’s also a rejection of the seriousness adults are giving to the present moment. At this point in their lives, the youths who are regularly repeating this nonsensical phrase have been programmed to believe that either the planet is soon going to spontaneously burst into flames, or that computers are about to take away all of our jobs and money. We’ve repeatedly signaled to them that the future doesn’t matter, and in response, they have begun chanting a nihilistic slogan that purposefully strips quantitative concepts of any meaning.
If you’re looking to stop the cultural outlook itself, you’re too late. That train left a long time ago. But if all you’re trying to do is get rid of the “six seven” phrase, I’ve got good news. If you (a person who writes into a magazine for advice) have heard about some random wacky shenanigans the kids (not the homeschooled ones of course) are getting up to these days, there’s a good chance they have already not been doing that thing for a very long time. Youth culture used to define decades, and now fads go away in a matter of hours. This phrase is probably already profoundly outdated and is making you and me look like a couple of tools for even continuing the discourse, so thanks.
Collin Preciado is a humorist who has written for such publications as The Hard Times, Polygon, St. Louis Magazine, The Pitch, The Riverfront Times, Cincinnati CityBeat, and others. His latest book, “How to be a Really Bad Person,” has received universal condemnation as well as the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
