How Homeschoolers Can Boost Logic, Understanding, and Confidence
Mastering writing skills in your homeschool is the key to raising clear thinkiers in an AI-driven world.
Philosopher René Descartes didn’t say, “I write, therefore I am.” But perhaps he should have.
To write, after all, is to think.
Learning how to write and how to write well is essential to any homeschool. That’s because writing is more than just putting words on a page. Writing organizes our thoughts, challenges assumptions, and sharpens ideas. To write is to think—and doubt—and that is the basis of intellectual existence.
But when we stop writing, we risk stopping thinking too.
Larry McEnerney, Director of the University of Chicago’s Writing Program, pointed out how writing is thinking during an excellent lecture for PHD students on how to write. He recalls how his teachers taught him to do his thinking first, and then write. One teacher even told McEnerney, “You are not ready to write your first word until you are finished thinking. To prove this to you, whenever you turn in a paper, I’m going to have you turn in the outline you used to write it.”
“This was not a problem for me,” says McEnerney. “First, I wrote the paper, then I wrote the outline.”
He concludes, “You are using your writing process to help you think.”
McEnerney admits that he thought he was alone in this process. He was taught that people do their thinking first and only write when they’re all done thinking. But that never worked for McEnerney. He was incapable of separating the two.
That’s because thinking doesn’t stop when the writing starts. In fact, the thinking has only just begun. Writing isn’t merely recording a finished product. Rather, writing is a process, one that allows the writer to interact with their thoughts in a more organic and concrete way.
Human beings are unique amongst the animal kingdom as creatures of reason. We’re intellectual beings, sure. But we still require physicality. We require that our ideas have substance for them to take hold. We need thoughts that we can sink our teeth into and chew on. Writing extracts our ideas from the ether of our minds and gives them form. Even if it only exists on a screen, by writing our thoughts down, we give them a presence in the world. Only then can we fully grasp onto them.
Once the words are on the page, then the real work begins. Now’s the time that we can grapple with our thoughts, writing and rewriting until they are hardened and refined. It’s through this revision process that the real thinking really happens.
Rather than teach homeschoolers to think first, and then write, we should teach our students how to write, and then how to rewrite. In doing so, thinking becomes not merely a tool for writing but also an end in itself. As we improve our writing, we improve ourselves.
But if writing equals thinking, then what about large language models like ChatGPT? How are they able to write without a brain? In fact, they can’t write, not really. Play around long enough with any AI tool, and you’ll start to notice a pattern. These models are very good at spelling, grammar, and emulating human text, but they lack logic. They quickly forget things, and they hallucinate—filling in gaps in their knowledge with fabrications that are incorrect or nonsensical.
The simple fact is, while AI can imitate the appearance of human text, it can’t think like a human.
But what if it could? Accordingly to AI advocates, the technology will only improve at an exponential rate, eventually eclipsing human ingenuity completely. But even AI is subject to the law of diminishing returns, and more and more computing power and financial cost will likely be required for diminishing improvements.
Pretend, however, that AI can write better than any human being ever could. Should we outsource all our writing to AI?
No. Why? Because writing is thinking. To rely on AI to do our writing for us means relying on AI to do our thinking for us. In other words, even if AI is a superior writer, overreliance on it will make you stupider.
Using AI to expedite the writing process might save brain power, but it comes at the cost of understanding, authenticity, and personal growth.
So can you use AI at all? Of course. It’s a tool like any other. Just don’t expect it to do the heavy lifting for you. Because when using AI, we all come to the same fork, and then we must choose: convenience, or comprehension.
Ultimately, the act of writing is inseparable from the act of thinking. For homeschoolers, embracing the writing process—especially the crucial stage of revision—isn’t just about crafting coherent sentences. It’s about developing intellectual rigor, challenging assumptions, and solidifying understanding. While AI tools offer tempting shortcuts, true comprehension and personal growth stem from the cognitive heavy lifting only human writing can provide. By prioritizing genuine engagement with their thoughts through writing, homeschoolers will not only become better communicators but also deeper, more independent thinkers, leaving them better equipped to shape the world around them.
Editor’s Note: Learn about the homeschool writing program voted #1 in the i-Learn Awards three years in a row: Aquinas Writing Advantage.
