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Didn't know for sure where to put this so starting here. Had a conversation with my 52 yr old daughter and she has been in touch with an old friend who turns out to home schooled her 4 girls. This old friend is very religious and my daughter and I are not.
I can't come up with too many benefits of home schooling except that it keeps children from contact with others who are are not like them. Not religious etc.
I haven't looked up home schooling but am thinking it's from the very old days before public schools etc. I'm older and started my life in 1st grade in public school in the 40's. Public school for my total education.
My grandkids and daughter started in pre school as it was just the thing to do, early schooling.
My thinking is that home schooling is division, isolating, non socializing etc etc. I was raised strict religious and it took me YEARS to learn and embrace others not like me.
Homeschooling can be done well or poorly. Also, more non-religious people are currently homeschooling than was the case years ago. Many parents homeschool after having horrible experiences with public or private schools in terms of bullying, for example. People with special needs children sometimes cannot get the schools to provide the services that the child needs even though the law says they must.
As for isolation, that is not so true nowadays with all the homeschooling co-ops and outings that many homeschoolers do.
My children went to good public schools.
My grandchildren are in school and the schools they attend are good, but the younger one is struggling due to his autism.
Thanks for the more thorough explanation. My grandkids attend a higher quality school system and have done pretty well, with tutoring in the higher grades. My grandgirl was accepted at UCLA last year where they had like 90K applicants. Proud of her but it doesn't come easy, they work for their grades.
I am not at all religious, but my children go to online school, which means they do school at home. In our case, it's a regular public school with teachers and other students to interact with online. They have local activities and field trips.
My older daughter had problems at her elementary school. I've posted about them before. In her case, the problems were distracting and interfered with her ability to feel safe and focus on learning. We switched when she was starting 5th grade, and she's beginning high school now.
My younger daughter has OCD. She has trouble falling asleep at a set time (the harder she tries, the more likely it is that she'll be up roaming the house and weeping at 2 am), and she doesn't do well in a regular classroom because some of her behaviors are irritating to the teacher (like asking if something is okay over and over and over again) and distracting to other students. There are days when she's washing her hands six times an hour and changing her clothes six times a day. She only wants to use the bathroom at home and she wants to shower or wash her legs with a cloth every time she uses the bathroom. At home, her compulsions are more easily managed and we have some flexibility in her schedule, so that if she doesn't fall asleep until 2 am, she can start her lessons at 10 am and still get a good night's sleep. She's working hard on beating the OCD, but there are days that are just not good days for her. Learning at home means that she can actually focus on learning. She still has to take the state standardized tests and she had a lot of trouble with those before the OCD was diagnosed. Now she's allowed to bring a bottle of hand sanitizer with her to the tests and her test scores are more comparable to her daily grades, because she can focus on the test questions instead of the endless loop of "What if I fail? I need to wash my hands," that she'd get stuck on before.
A lot of people assume that we're very religious because we homeschool. We haven't had good luck with the various homeschool groups because we're not religious. I've tried to raise my kids to have an open and accepting attitude toward others' beliefs, but sometimes with teenagers that just doesn't work.
We have homeschooled mostly all along, with a one-year hiatus when the kids went to a small charter school. They're currently entering the 8th and 10th grades, respectively.
We are not religious homeschoolers. There are a LOT of homeschoolers around here... hundreds of families. It's hard to imagine if you're not part of the network, I suppose. Social opportunities abound, particularly for kids in the elementary grades. It gets a little harder around middle school, because many children end up going to school for middle or high school.
There are so, so many reasons to homeschool, and many different ways of doing it. I know a few very strict religious families who do it to keep their kids from "worldly" influences, but even of the religious homeschoolers I know, most are normal, everyday people who mix their kids in with others not of their belief system. It's definitely becoming pretty mainstream.
I know a couple people who have or are homeschooling due to disabilities or conditions that might not be obvious to the casual acquaintance. At least one of them gets help from a STEM type day camp for those subjects, and tutors in other areas. It can be done in a variety of ways and for a variety of reasons. I get it, if you've tried regular school and it just doesn't work for one reason or another. I don't agree with homeschooling in order to shelter the kids, or using that crazy curriculum that the Duggers use.
Homeschooling has become very popular around me. Parents who do it usually fall into a couple of categories, poor school quality, poor school environment, feeling their kid won't excel in traditional school, disabilities or gifted.
Today there are many more resources for parents who choose to home school, online work, home-school co-ops, non-school related extra activities, etc.. IMO even with the new resources, a traditional school is better all-around, which is why my kids go to public school.
We are not religious. I home schooled my kids when they were little. There were many benefits. Learning at their own pace and with their own style. Many more opportunities for learning to be engaging. My son was bored out of his MIND in kindergarten. The other kids were learning colors. He could read. But at the same time, he had problems with pencils and drawing and the like. So I could target him where he was at. My daughter just wanted to be home with us. She was able to read at 2nd grade level by the end of kindy year. So I guess it worked for us. They are now highly successful in middle and high school.
Homeschooling has progressed a lot. There are many curriculums available, targeted to those who are religious and those who are not, those who are gifted, and those with specific challenges. There are groups, outings, support from community establishments, online resources, the list goes on and on. It is becoming a viable option for a quality education, when it is done correctly and for the right reasons.
I have one gifted child, and one child with epilepsy and other challenges. Currently we are private schooling and doing a little home school in the evenings, but there may come a time where we transition to full home school, if we find that the private schools can no longer meet our needs.
We are not religious. It is a matter of who can provide the best education for my particular child, me or a school?
The best advantage I see to home schooling is the efficiency of it. Kids in public schools today spend ALL DAY in school and then come home with hours of additional home work (!) My home schooling friend's children are done with all subjects a 10 year old needs to study in a few hours, and then they are free to be kids and play. And they are in extra activities, they have horses and riding lessons and music and hobbies and other social outlets they enjoy.
And the home schoolers score better.
That's why I'd do it. I think elementary kids doing homework after being in school ALL DAY is a travesty.
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