More U.S. families are choosing to home school their children. The latest information shows more than 1.5 million children learn at home, and the trend's increase is keeping up in KELOLAND.

At five years old, Bellana Nankivel reads better than many kids her age. She's still working on the finer points, but so far she's getting the hang of it.

"I do journals.  I so spelling words.  Sometimes I do tests," Bellana said.

Bellana and her two-year-old brother, Eland, are home schooled by their parents, and soon enough, baby Quinn will be, too. Wednesday, the family has taken the daily lesson to the library.

"Eland's pretty good at his letter identification, but we're still working on that, and Bellana's starting on reading, so we're getting the first reader books that she reads to us every night," father Thor Nankivel said.

Even though the kids are just getting to be school-age, Thor and Becky Nankivel know they'll continue to teach their kids themselves. More than 2,000 South Dakota children are home schooled.

"Not that the public schools have failed in any way; I went to public school and got a good education. But they teach toward the middle of the class, and those above or below get left behind or get bored," Thor said.

The couple shares the responsibilities. When he's not working overnights, Thor teaches the kids about math and science, and Becky takes the lead on reading and spelling. They do it because they want their kids to learn at their own pace and in their own way.

"It's definitely not for everybody, but for our family, it definitely works," Thor said.

And more and more families are seeing the same benefits.

The group the Nankivels belong to, the South Dakota Homeschool Association, has registered between 30 and 40 families just in the Sioux Falls area.