Homeschooling the gifted: A parent’s perspective

Homeschooling has witnessed a dramatic growth over the past decade. Included in this population are gifted and talented students, yet despite this growth there has been no appreciable increase in the research literature. To better understand the gifted homeschooling family, researchers interviewed 13 parents of homeschooled children their parents identified as being gifted. Four major themes emerged from the data: (a) parents know best, (b) isolation, (c) challenges, and (d) family roles. Findings reveal that these parents decided to homeschool only after numerous attempts to work in collaboration with the public school and that the mothers bore the primary burden of responsibility for homeschooling in these families. Though the move to homeschooling alleviated many of the issues experienced in public school, it brought a different set of challenges to these families. This exploratory study establishes a better understanding of why parents of gifted children ultimately decide to homeschool. Copyright © 2012 National Association for Gifted Children.