Throughout my teaching career, I have often heard some of my fellow teachers complaining about the lack of proper parenting that leads to the poor performance and behavior of the students. This is the teacher's best cop out when working with a difficult student; I've used it plenty of times. Yet, there is significant truth held here. We as parents are the greatest teachers our children will ever have. My greatest responsibility is to teach my children everything that they truly need to know about life. Now I am not talking about sentence structure, the alphabet, or the quadratic formula; I'm talking about real life skills. For example, some of the skills that I try to teach my boys include:
1. It's super important to love your mom especially on Mother's Day
2. Get back up when you fall down
3. Just dance, its good for the soul
4. Be curious
5. Hope is worthwhile
6. It's okay to fail if you keep on trying
7. There are things in life more important than winning or being right [my wife had to teach me this one first].
This blog is a tribute to all of us that truly take on the responsibility to train our children as best as we can. Claiming this responsibility is a choice. Teacherswhohomeschool.com recognizes that every parent is a teacher and that children learn so much at home whether they attend a brick-and-mortar school or not. It can be easy for us to give in to the thought that someone else can raise our children better than we can; as these individuals are trained teachers. Yet, our children are our responsibility; the buck stops with us as parents.
With my kids, I often feel inadequate, and I don't always know what to do, even with my teacher training (or should I say in spite of my teacher training). I wanted to create this blog as a forum for supporting each other as we vow to take this responsibility of teaching our children seriously. I want to see each moment with my children as a teachable moment. There have been many times that I could have been a better teacher to my children, yet I claim that responsibility for myself. If my kids are going to be messed up from what or how they are taught, I only want myself to blame.
So here's to all of us that choose to take up the good fight of choosing to teach, lead, and train our children. It is my hope that we can draw together a community of support as this is not always an easy choice, and one that must be made over and over again.
Written by Jay Melashenko
Dad and co-teacher of 3 rambunctiousness boys ages 2, 4 & 7
