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Based on what I've seen of some people's parenting skills, it's entirely plausible regardless of religious belief or affiliation.
On that, we can agree.
I think the usual context in which it's brought up regarding people of the book, is that they are always claiming a superior morality, which one would expect to generally result in superior outcomes. Also, outcomes in keeping with the Biblical promise that if you raise up a child in the way that they should go, when they are old, they will NOT depart from it.
Random parents are not claiming any inherent special or better parenting chops; Christian parents often are. Up to an including personally educating their children, etc. -- in other words they even claim to be better educators than professional educators.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Vizio
My concern is that I believe it's simply tasteless to attack the guy on the message board in a seeming attempt to discredit his web site, or his knowledge of other religions. It's a red herring.
On that we can also agree. His web site and his knowledge stands or fall on the facts and merits presented therein. His character is only relevant to the extent he makes any public claims about it.
There is enough on the CARM site that is self-invalidating; we do not have to question the founder's morality to undermine it. It undermines itself.
Random parents are not claiming any inherent special or better parenting chops; Christian parents often are. Up to an including personally educating their children, etc. -- in other words they even claim to be better educators than professional
As a homeschooling parent, I have never claimed to be a better ANYthing. I only claim to believe it is the best choice for our family and our circumstances. We made the choice to do so when I was a Christian, which I obviously am no longer, but I haven't changed my position on home education for our family.
As a homeschooling parent, I have never claimed to be a better ANYthing. I only claim to believe it is the best choice for our family and our circumstances. We made the choice to do so when I was a Christian, which I obviously am no longer, but I haven't changed my position on home education for our family.
Just saying.
Fair enough. And you're talking to another former homeschooling parent and former Christian, whose daughter home schools her own children (though she is doing it for entirely secular reasons). If I had it to do over, I would not do it again, for a variety of reasons.
Anyone else is certainly entitled to make their own decisions about the matter. But the fact remains that it is not at all unheard of for homeschoolers to decry public education as a sham and far inferior to what most any parent can do on their own. I very much disagree with that, particularly beyond about the middle school level, and I have grave reservations about the advisability of mixing the roles of parent and teacher; in my experience it exposes the weaknesses of both without combining their strengths. Everyone's mileage varies, of course, and states differ in the levels of effective accountability they provide to home schoolers, etc. But I don't believe that in the main home schooling is the sort of no-brainer compared to public and other traditional education systems that some home schoolers (clearly not you) claim it to be.
To keep this on point, I will note that Rachel Slick has felt she has had to remedially educate herself in the science disciplines, that the science education she got under her father was that poor. This indicates that at least during her childhood and where she lived, something was fundamentally deficient in the regulation of her home schooling education.
To keep this on point, I will note that Rachel Slick has felt she has had to remedially educate herself in the science disciplines, that the science education she got under her father was that poor. This indicates that at least during her childhood and where she lived, something was fundamentally deficient in the regulation of her home schooling education.
Mordant, I went to public high schools (3 different ones), on a college prep track. I couldn't have told you boo about science when I graduated, and I was pretty much an A/B student. I knew how to learn what I needed to learn in order to pass and then promptly discharged everything from my brain. Some of that was likely the fault of the teachers who were sometimes anything but inspiring. But much of it was just me. We learn and retain what we want to when we are ready. And I wasn't ready. That doesn't mean anything was fundamentally deficient in the education I was offered. It means I wasn't prepared to make the most of it.
To keep this on point, I will note that Rachel Slick has felt she has had to remedially educate herself in the science disciplines, that the science education she got under her father was that poor. This indicates that at least during her childhood and where she lived, something was fundamentally deficient in the regulation of her home schooling education.
I'm definitely with you on homeschooling. Sure, parents can make their own choices regarding that - and hopefully whoever brings home the bacon in the family can bring enough of it home not to live impoverished in order to homeschool. In this economy today, very few families can really afford to live on only one income.
However, my main objection is the lack of training inherent in an untrained person trying to be an educator. Granted, almost anyone can teach children the basic things like addition/subtraction, reading, how to tell time, how to use money, and vocabulary/spelling.
But once the kids hit the middle school years - and even more so in high school - the subjects become too advanced for someone who isn't educated in that field. This is the reason, I might add, that kids rotate around to different teachers after elementary school ... because schools can't expect one individual to know the ins and outs of everything from economics to calculus, history to literature, psychology to music to ethics to civics to biology to meteorology to astronomy to chemistry - all things that kids are taught through grade 12.
AND ... I often question the ability of parents to afford all of the needed "hands on" equipment needed for things like chemistry, biology, geology - not to mention various props, visualizations, etc. that teachers often use. Granted the internet makes all of this a bit easier ...
BUT ... many teachers have their masters degree in whatever subject they teach by their 5th year of teaching. One has to essentially take enough extended credits to keep their license - and those extended credits equal a masters degree.
A parent at home who might only have a high school education herself - 30 years ago - will almost certainly not have the specialized knowledge a teacher with a masters in chemistry would have. My 6th grade math class was actually taught by a full Ph.D. (though that was a 'special' school).
I really question how parents can teach a child a subject of which they only have cursory knowledge. It will essentially be book-learning, and if the child doesn't 'get it' for whatever reason, the parent can only bring his/her cursory knowledge to bear on it.
And that's not even mentioning the social aspect - how to play with others, being nice, sharing, problem resolution, team sports, etc. etc. so on and so forth. There were a number of kids in my small town who were homeschooled - and one thing that I remember about them is that they never hung out with us public school heathens. We'd see them around once in awhile, but they either wouldn't or couldn't associate with the rest of us. They were viewed as mysterious and "outside" the social circles of the public schools. In that sense, they were often considered pariahs, which might be a reason why they didn't hang out with us.
Location: In a little house on the prairie - literally
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Good post, Shrina.
My daughter IS a teacher, and a stay at home mom, at least until all the kids are going to school. Her and my son-in-law have restricted themselves of many "must have's" that most couple think they need... you know, like cable, a new vehicle, a large screen TV, the latest computer, clothes or whatever. Suffice it to say they feel it is important that the kids have a mother at home during the formative years. Teachers in my jurisdiction make extremely good money; she would earn more than her husband.
That being said, I have discussed the concept of home schooling with her. There is no way, no how that she would do that, for many reasons. She has two degrees, and her husband has his Masters, and they don't feel it is the right thing for their kids, nor does she feel qualified to teach in all subjects, as you outlined.
I have NO idea how Suzy with her high school diploma, or perhaps a two year college certificate, thinks she is going to better than public schools. If my daughter, who IS a professional sees that, why can't those that believe that the schools are not teaching their kids properly.
Or perhaps that is the answer. My daughter is a well educated professional. The others are wannabes.
But once the kids hit the middle school years - and even more so in high school - the subjects become too advanced for someone who isn't educated in that field.
Agreed; society, over the past 50 years or so, has become far too technological and specialized for education beyond (and arguably FROM) middle school to be anything but a group effort.
The other big objection home schooling is said to address: bad social influences. I actually like this argument, in the sense that in traditional educational settings, kids spend more time with their peers running in mindless packs and engaging in stupid social competition, than they do with their parents. This tends to render parents hapless spectators in a game in which they actually have minimal influence. But the corrective to this is not to dismantle public schooling but to restructure it as a collaborative effort between students rather than passively sitting and listening in a class setting. And to involve parents more in the process. We learned these things way back in the days of desegregation -- we just often haven't had the political will to approach education in a more intelligent fashion.
There is also the whole problem of the testing culture that has arisen since the well intentioned but misguided "no child left behind" initiative. You get what you measure for. Testing by itself only insures that children are taught how to pass tests.
I know one of the things that attracted my daughter to home schooling was that she has a special needs child who was getting short shrift and not thriving in the system. She feels she can do better working with him herself, with less effort. Arguably this is true in her case, it's one of those "if you want something done right, you'll have to do it yourself" situations -- if you don't have the $ for a private school.
As a practical matter I would rather invest in a private school that did a better job, if the public schools in my area were not up to snuff, but this is not something everyone can afford.
As to the cost of equipment, etc., home schoolers typically overcome this through educational cooperatives where parents with special expertise or outside hires can provide certain kinds of educational experiences, especially ones that are inherently group experiences such as field trips, drama classes, etc.
I give kudos to my daughter for having her boys independently tested each year to make sure she's hitting all the required markers, although of course as I said, testing doesn't tell the whole story.
I feel for home schooling parents and what they are trying to do, particularly if they aren't interested in religious indoctrination and isolation from free thought. But I am not convinced it's the best answer.
The biggest reason I would not do it again is one I seldom hear advanced, but it's very real and practical: should the role of parent and teacher be combined? Kids know how to manipulate their parents, and some parents don't know how to hold their own with their kids as it is. Confuse that situation by trying to take on the rather different role of instructor, and in my view you often combine the weaknesses of both roles without synergizing their strengths. I can tell you from personal experience it's exhausting on so many levels -- including levels most people seem not to consider at all -- that it's just not feasible. My daughter and her husband work full time ... how the HECK can they possibly do an adequate job of home schooling two (soon three) boys??? It's just nuts, and not sustainable. If she would listen to me my advice would be, at most, home school the special needs kid, send the others off to public school.
It was, once upon a time, a romantic ideal for parents to guide and teach their children in all aspects of life, when it involved things like herding goats in a homogenous society. In the modern world, it just ain't that simple.
Hey, I've had bad karma in my life too (multiple times even), and so have many many others here on this forum and elsewhere throughout the ages. Everything doesn't turn out in life the way we want it in life. Everything doesn't always play by the script we wrote out for our lives as to how everything would or should turn out. One's child or children are not always going to turn out to be a knock-off of their parents' rearing and inputs in their lives. That's just the way life works sometimes. Hey, I had become a Christian for years over the resistance and objections of my Jewish rearing and background. And I'm sure that the Christians here would be cheering me on for that (i.e., encouraging me and everyone else to defy their parents and their roots and rearing). Well, my Christian friends, sometimes the shoe falls from the other foot whereby a person reared in strong Christianity decides to take on another identity or character. That's life. And he or she might change once again in the future to something else again from what they had previously changed to. That's how free-spirited autonomous beings operate (or sometimes operate).
Rachael Slick, daughter of Matt Slick, the founder of Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry, wrote a guest post on the Friendly Atheist blog.
I found it a fascinating account of a harrowing upbringing in an ultra-religious, fundamentalist Christian family.
From the piece:
What struck me about this young woman, aside from her intelligence and courage, was the lack of rancor when discussing her father and her upbringing. She exhibits a rather curious detachment. At first reading, I considered it a very mature, forgiving stance but upon further thought, I wonder if she might be suffering from Stockholm Syndrome.
What's important though, is she left a terrible situation and is happy today. I would hope that all children trapped in such a situation fare as well.
This young lady was not saved to begin with. Thus she had no love for God, The Lord Jesus Christ. Her example is very cleary defined for us in the Bible
(1John 2:9)They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.
The power of Gods word makes manifest false profits, false converts and wolves in sheeps clothing.
(1John 4:1)Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.
When you are saved by faith you are a new creature(2Cor 5:17).
When you're saved you have a love for God.
(Rom 5:5)And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
This young lady was not saved to begin with. Thus she had no love for God, The Lord Jesus Christ. Her example is very cleary defined for us in the Bible
(1John 2:9)They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.
The power of Gods word makes manifest false profits, false converts and wolves in sheeps clothing.
(1John 4:1)Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.
When you are saved by faith you are a new creature(2Cor 5:17).
When you're saved you have a love for God.
(Rom 5:5)And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
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