Hear from three homeschool moms about why they homeschool, and why they chose CHESS. May it encourage you as you walk the sometimes challenging but rewarding road of homeschooling! As Marie shares—“The journey is difficult but worth it!”

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Marie Pinney’s Story 

My first child was three years old and all my friends were enrolling their children in preschool when we decided to homeschool. My plan was to do what my friends were doing and enroll my son in the church’s preschool program. The night before enrollment, I could not sleep. I knew God was asking me not to enroll my child, and instead to teach him at home. I wrestled with that thought for several hours that night. 

As soon as I submitted, I felt a great peace wash over me and I knew that homeschooling was God’s plan for our family. In the morning I told my husband, and he was fully supportive of the idea, so I began to research what it would take to homeschool my son. Since then, God has blessed our family with three more children, and we have homeschooled them all. My then three-year-old son graduated with a homeschool diploma in May 2019. 

As soon as I submitted, I felt a great peace wash over me and I knew that homeschooling was God’s plan for our family.

Each homeschooling family has its own unique challenges. For my family, it has been learning how to educate children with executive function challenges, and dyslexia. Most of my children “learn differently.” (A phrase I have used many times since reading Kathy Khul’s book with that title.) 

I feel very blessed that God called me to homeschool my children. The journey is difficult but worth it.  

Homeschooling has helped me know my children very well. Our family is not perfect, but we do life together and that is such a blessing. It is also rewarding for me personally because I learn so much as I teach. In addition, the homeschool community in our area is robust. I feel very blessed that we are able to homeschool alongside so many wonderful families, and have the opportunity to participate in organizations like CHESS.

J. Hall’s Story 

We have tried just about everything, from homeschool, to private school, to regular public school, to online public school, trying to figure out what works best for our three boys. We finally gave up on finding any one thing that would work for any one of them and settled on officially homeschooling all three of them during the same school year for the first time this year, while trying hard to find classes in person or online that are appropriate for them. 

It’s rewarding for us to help them learn and to know that they are learning from curriculum that we choose, that addresses topics that we believe are important, at a challenging level, not something that a bureaucrat selected for a generic child of a certain age. It’s also rewarding to have time to spend with them when most other children are at school. I wish that we hadn’t waited so long to make this decision. I would encourage all parents to consider homeschooling!

S. Tyler’s Story  

We decided to home school our daughter because we felt it would be a better atmosphere, the class sizes are much smaller, and the overall experience is much more positive.  Trying to keep up with the homework if you are sick can be the most difficult task. We have found it to be very rewarding because our daughter has made some great friends and she really likes her teachers. The independence of keeping up with her schedule and the homework is preparing her for college, since CHESS classes only meet once or twice per week. 

If we were to make the decision to homeschool again, we would have started this years ago with our older two daughters. This has been a wonderful experience and our daughter has much more freedom to work or do other things while not at CHESS.

If we were to make the decision to homeschool again, we would have started this years ago with our older two daughters.

Want to hear more testimonies of CHESS students and families? Visit our testimonials page!