Yes, anyone can homeschool. But here's why I won't:
I've been teaching math for 30+ years. I have my Master's and state certification. I've taught everything from math 7 to Intro to Calculus. I'm good at it; my kids are glad to see my name on their schedules. They know that they'll understand he material I teach. Likewise, my husband teaches high school English. He, too, is well respected in his school, and qualified to teach anything from English 7 to English 12.
But Earth Science? Bio? Chem? Physics? World history? European history? US history? Civics? Economics? Health? Italian? Spanish? Art? Music? Nope.
My students are taught by certified, qualified professionals, and that's what I want for my own kids. I don't want some pre-fab syllabus downloaded from the internet. I want them taught by someone who knows their material the way I know my math. Someone who gets the nuances of the material without looking it up. I want my kids to know John Sirica from Oliver North, Apartheid from Glastnost, The Monroe Doctorine from the Marshall Plan. I want them to know Meitosis from Meiosis, and to be taught it by someone who can teach them how to keep them straight. I want them to understand the reactions that individulal drugs have with their bodies. I want them to understand global warming, and what it means when the dollar moves from "weak" to "strong." I want them to be able to conjugate those Spanish verbs, to know what causes the hurricanes that occasionally plague our shores. I want someone who can teach a topic they need for this year, but who can do it knowing what they'll need next year, and in what context.
I'm not that person. I know almost every one of those facts, but not well enough to adequately explain them. Their teachers do, but I don't. I am a very good Math teacher, but I'm not a history teacher, a Science teacher, an Art teacher or a Music teacher.
Another issue: in my experience, a teacher isn't really good with the material until about the 3rd time he or she teaches it. Adequate, yes, but not really good. It takes that long to really get the nuances, to find the explanations most likely to make sense, to be able to make connections between one topic an another. And that's OK; my kids get a combination of new, enthusiastic teachers and older, more experienced veterans. But I would be that new teacher with each of my kids. By the time I became what I consider to be a good teacher of the material, I would be out of kids. My oldest child would have gotten a brand new teacher for each and every course he took.
As far as working full time, I get home at 4 pm. I make dinner, prep my classes and grade a bit each night. I can't imagine starting to homeschool at 7 or 8 pm and going for hours into the evening. My kids deserve more than that.
Hats off to you if you can give your kids a quality education and still manage 12 days in WDW in December. And I mean that sincerely-- no snark. It takes lots of different people, different approaches to make the world go round. I'm glad homeschooling works well for your family, but it wouldn't work for my family.
So we'll put up with the heat and the crowds of WDW in July, and my kids will continue to learn in a traditional classroom setting.
I absolutely agree that not everyone can (edit: or should, or will want to) homeschool, for a variety of very legitimate reasons. And I think it sounds like you're doing a great job with your own young people.
However, I do want to point out that home education is WORLDS away from being educated in a traditional classroom setting.
I taught either one or both of my children at home from grade 1 through to the end of grade 4, in large part because one of my children is dyslexic. Both decided to go to public school in grade 5, graduated high school, and are now in university. These days I tutor other people's children, many of whom have learning disabilities.
My qualifications? None. I barely made it through grade eight math, and had a bit of a panic attack when I realized I'd be teaching my children a subject I barely grasped myself.
And here's what I discovered... I'm really darn good at teaching elementary math.
My daughter said that her biggest problem with public school was that, thanks to the solid grounding I gave her, she didn't encounter any challenging math until Grade 11 and consequently got rather lazy about it. I've had similar feedback from other students, several of whom have now graduated.
I'm also quite good at teaching reading, though I give most of the credit there to a solid curriculum I've been adapting and refining for the last several years. My style of teaching has no relation to what you do in the classroom. I work one-on-one with a student, following their lead, adapting the lesson on the fly and supplementing with whatever materials suit that particular student best. One of my reading students did many of her lessons hanging upside down from a tree in my front yard. It helped her focus!
I knew homeschoolers who worked 9-5, and I also knew homeschoolers who stayed home with their kids. The teenagers I knew who were homeschooling at the high school level were largely educating themselves during the day and checking in with their parents briefly at night. They'd taken full control of their own learning, by the upper grades. This obviously isn't going to work for every student, as it takes a level of drive, organization and motivation that many people lack. But, I did see some real success stories, and the positive results are supported by a number of studies:
Studies have also shown that on average home-schooled students have higher grade point averages in their freshman years and have higher graduation rates than their peers.
http://college.usatoday.com/2012/02...-better-in-college-than-traditional-students/
As for the many topics you listed... it really depends on what level you're teaching. You want to learn Earth Science at the elementary level? You don't need a degree! Go to the library, go to the museum, go the park, and then put together a report on what you've learned. And hey, you're learning English as well. And probably math and some history, too.
World History? That was one of our favourite subjects. We started with the Big Bang and had a blast working our way through dinosaurs, Egypt, Romans, Medieval Knights, the printing press, China, India, all sorts of fantastic topics. The library was again our best resource. I loved learning with my kids. Every day we were discovering new things, and it was exciting and fun. And, as a bonus, scholastic inquiry became very much a habit on our household, versus being something confined to a classroom setting. My daughter (20, health sciences) was actually commenting the other day how good it feels to be learning something just for the joy of learning, versus having to focus on memorizing details in case they come up on a test.
And ultimately, regardless of whether you homeschool or not, if you actually want your children to know, "John Sirica from Oliver North, Apartheid from Glasnost, The Monroe Doctrine from the Marshall Plan," you are going to HAVE to teach them yourself. Because I guarantee you that many, many young people graduate from public schools without the faintest clue what any of these things are.
If there is any subject you feel your children must know, don't blindly trust that someone else will teach them. Teach them yourself.
After all, I regularly find myself teaching eleven year olds whose parents have just realized that despite being taught by "certified, qualified professionals" for the past several years of their life, they still haven't learned to read.
