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"Tipping...lessons are reinforced with practical application..."
I suspect that the lessons are reinforced with Filet Mignon, with Au Gratin potatoes and asparagas tips, with a nice Caesar salad..
No hamburgers for my kid...
I can't speak on behalf of all homeschoolers - most of my friends don't live that rich though, and one family is vegetarian so no, no filet mignon for them.
Instead it's overseen and arranged by teachers, administrators and the state and federal government.
My child chooses her own friends and frequently plays at the local playground with kids from our neighborhood which is pretty diverse. I always give her as much space as she wants.
First exposure to bullies, drugs, violence and sex, including sexual harassment in the classroom with the teacher present all occurred in school. Good times!
Yes, there are adults but it's not parents and it's not those adults job to oversee socialization. School is their world. They step out of their family role and into another. One that requires them to figure out how to get along.
Wow, you waited until they were exposed to those things at school? I had these discussions with my kids long before they encountered any of them at at school. You don't keep your children innocent by not talking to them about things they will encounter in the real world. You set them up for a fall.
It's not a group of my choosing as would be if I homeschooled and the kids wouldn't have their own venue either. The kids my kids go to school with are the kids my kids go to school with. While I do pick our neighborhood, my children's school includes children from other neighborhoods as well.
The kids who homeschool are the kids who homeschool. Our group includes children from several towns. Some unschool, some do school-at-home, most are somewhere in between. I can not pick who homeschools and who does not, or who goes to the various activities. Contrary to popular belief, we're not all there in our matching denim jumpers while the kids play a mom-organized game of stickball. They play whatever they want with whomever they want, and there are LOTS of kids to choose from.
So, where is your children's meeting place where they hang out with all their homeschooled friends and how much time do they spend there? My kids spend about 40 hours a week between school and getting to and from school.
LOL Yes, your kids breathe the same air and are in the same physical place as other children for the equivalent of a full-time job each week. They are not socializing and interacting for more than a small fraction of that time. I'm pretty confident that my kids have a lot more time than the average schoolkid to hang out with friends, simply because they don't do school for 8 hours per day (counting the bus ride), so they have a lot of free time. Where? In the back yard, in other kids' backyards, at the playground, in the park after their co-op classes (are we counting actual classes as being "social" experiences, even though we both know that they're not?), at church, at the art class that I teach here at my house, at Bible study and at the park afterwards, at friends' houses. I guess I can try to time them next week if it's really important to you. Off the top of my head, they played with friends for probably 8 hours or so so far this week, and they're going to the fountains tomorrow for a couple of hours, then to another friend's house later... so for this week, figure 12-13 hours? Of pure socializing, I'm talking... not sitting in the same general vicinity but not talking or playing.
Wow, you waited until they were exposed to those things at school? I had these discussions with my kids long before they encountered any of them at at school. You don't keep your children innocent by not talking to them about things they will encounter in the real world. You set them up for a fall.
I was first exposed to these things at school. Sure my parents talked to me about drugs but I never had people offering me drugs or talking about them around me constantly until Jr High/High School. My parents talked to me about sex and I knew quite a bit but didn't have to deal with the peer pressure to become sexually active or hear about certain sex acts until I was in school (starting in elementary school). I had heard about sexual harassment but wasn't prepared to deal with it as a middle school or high schools student while sitting in the classroom trying to pay attention. I had seen violence on television and movies but had never seen real fistfights and girls getting fist fulls of hair pulled out until school (elementary, middle and high school) and on a very regular basis in High school. I witnessed bullying all of the time in school. It was so common that it almost seemed normal. It's funny how none of these experiences proved to be of any use once I became an adult.
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It's not a group of my choosing as would be if I homeschooled and the kids wouldn't have their own venue either. The kids my kids go to school with are the kids my kids go to school with. While I do pick our neighborhood, my children's school includes children from other neighborhoods as well.
The kids who homeschool are the kids who homeschool. Our group includes children from several towns. Some unschool, some do school-at-home, most are somewhere in between. I can not pick who homeschools and who does not, or who goes to the various activities. Contrary to popular belief, we're not all there in our matching denim jumpers while the kids play a mom-organized game of stickball. They play whatever they want with whomever they want, and there are LOTS of kids to choose from.
So, where is your children's meeting place where they hang out with all their homeschooled friends and how much time do they spend there? My kids spend about 40 hours a week between school and getting to and from school.
LOL Yes, your kids breathe the same air and are in the same physical place as other children for the equivalent of a full-time job each week. They are not socializing and interacting for more than a small fraction of that time. I'm pretty confident that my kids have a lot more time than the average schoolkid to hang out with friends, simply because they don't do school for 8 hours per day (counting the bus ride), so they have a lot of free time. Where? In the back yard, in other kids' backyards, at the playground, in the park after their co-op classes (are we counting actual classes as being "social" experiences, even though we both know that they're not?), at church, at the art class that I teach here at my house, at Bible study and at the park afterwards, at friends' houses. I guess I can try to time them next week if it's really important to you. Off the top of my head, they played with friends for probably 8 hours or so so far this week, and they're going to the fountains tomorrow for a couple of hours, then to another friend's house later... so for this week, figure 12-13 hours? Of pure socializing, I'm talking... not sitting in the same general vicinity but not talking or playing.
But the kids who are homeschooled are HOME being schooled, lol. They're not out hanging out together in one large group where they are jockeying for position and dealing with each other on a daily basis. They get together when the moms decide they get together and they get together in whatever group the moms decide to get together. It's a, totally, parent controled set up.
I like that school puts my kids out there for 40 hours a week. That's long enough for them to need to figure out, on their own, how to get along. School does a lot of things I can't do with visits to friends houses. Friends houses are parent run venues as well. Schools are not. Schools, for the most part, observe student behavior and encourage them to work thingt out on their own without reporting back to mom unless it becomes serious.
I want my children to be strong and independent. I want them to be able to deal with people who don't like them that they have to be around because it's a good life skill to have. I want them to learn that not everything goes their way. That, sometimes, you just have to do what is expected of you whether you like it or not or see value in it. I want them to face teachers they don't like and learn that they will not always like their boss or the person they need to work with to get a job done. And I want them to get their feelings hurt and learn how to bounce back. My job is to train them for life and life is a lot like school when you think about it.
You have to jockey for position, work your way up, prove yourself, deal with failure, deal with success, deal with people you don't like, deal with people who don't like you, work in teams, work independently, compete, deal with situations you don't like, etc, etc, etc... For all it's faults, school's not a bad training ground for life, provided it's a decent school. There are some I wouldn't send my dog to but, fortunately, there are alternatives like moving, charter schools and private schools in such cases.
This reminds me of a song. I don't know the title but it's about how life is like high school. In a lot of ways it is. And a lot of what my kids needed to succeed in high shcool, they learned in elementary school. There's a lot I can't do for my kids that school can.
Last edited by Ivorytickler; 08-20-2010 at 05:03 AM..
I was first exposed to these things at school. Sure my parents talked to me about drugs but I never had people offering me drugs or talking about them around me constantly until Jr High/High School. My parents talked to me about sex and I knew quite a bit but didn't have to deal with the peer pressure to become sexually active or hear about certain sex acts until I was in school (starting in elementary school). I had heard about sexual harassment but wasn't prepared to deal with it as a middle school or high schools student while sitting in the classroom trying to pay attention. I had seen violence on television and movies but had never seen real fistfights and girls getting fist fulls of hair pulled out until school (elementary, middle and high school) and on a very regular basis in High school. I witnessed bullying all of the time in school. It was so common that it almost seemed normal. It's funny how none of these experiences proved to be of any use once I became an adult.
My kids too. There are some things about this society I don't like but I don't get to choose and I don't think sheltering my kids is the answer. IMO, teaching them to deal with them is. That's what my mom did with me and my brothers and sisters and that's what I do with my kids. Mom managed to get 4 out of 6 of out through high school without trying drugs (one only tried them and the other kind of got in trouble with them but he had a bad childhood). Well, really 4 out of 5. She died before the youngest was in high school and he was kind of a mess to begin with because of her death.
Fights are things that adminstrators get involved in. I wish they did not happen but they do. They happen in life too. Only later it's running someone off the road if you don't get it under control when you're younger. IMO, sheltering kids only delays when they will have to deal with these things and as they say in love and logic land, the price tag goes up. I don't like it but I know that my kids need to learn to deal with people who aren't so nice. They need to learn how to deal with them when they have to and walk away when they don't.
My dd tells me there's a fight just about every week at her school. She's not in them and neiter are the friends she runs with but they are learning that not everyone behaves by the rules they have. Yes, it's different seeing it first hand than on television. Some people act like jerks and they walk among us. As my mom used to say "Consider the source and walk away". Not a bad life skill to learn.
I'm very nervous about teaching in the same school my kids attend next year. I'm wondering how much my presence will impact my kids. I don't want them to think of school as an environment where their teachers report back to me on their behavior. I want them to feel free to figure out things on their own and that includes the freedom to make mistakes and fix them themselves without mom or mom's friends knowing about it.
A diploma and a $1 will get you a cup of coffee, anywhere
Here's to all of the teachers out there like 10th grade English teacher, Donna Bryan, who found ways to get students 'to think.' How very sad -- that in four years of a HS education, the valedictorian could think of only one teacher to mention. Thank God, she had that one. They make all of the difference.
I used to enjoy asking each of my classes, at the beginning of every academic year, what they thought I wanted them to learn, and was seldom surprised by their responses. My favorite, one of the years I taught American Lit, came from a smiling face at the front of the room, waving his hand wildly after I posed the question. He knew he had the right answer, and so wanted to share it.
"So, what do you think I want you to learn this semester?," I repeated.
He beamed at me, turned to the class, and announced, "You'll want us to be able to name every American author and what he wrote."
What I thought was what in the hell for?, but what I said was, "That would be admirable, but I couldn't do that, myself, and I am teaching this course."
Several others tried responding, but in the end, I shook my head, and simply said, "I want you TO THINK." By the end of the semester, I was proud that many of them could do it.
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A diploma and a $1 will get you a cup of coffee, anywhere
