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It always amazes me how much the subject of homeschooling polarizes people.... No child fits into a "one size fits all" education. Some thrive at home, some thrive in groups, some thrive in an "elite" environment, some thrive in a less than ideal situation. What works for me may not work for you, but we both have the freedom of choice.
I pulled my eldest from a "blue ribbon" school. She was a very shy child and even though we gave her an extra year (an August b-day, so we held her back a year) she couldn't deal with it. She did great academically, but just couldn't adjust to the group. Pulled her out and homeschooled her until 5th grade when she went back. She thrives in school now - academically and social/emotionally.
Do I know how this would have turned out had we left her in school? Nope, but my gut tells me we did right by her... Gave her time to mature and now she is a very self-assured young lady.
On the other hand, my 3rd grader started public school for the first time this year also. After half the year, she is back to homeschooling. We wrestled with the decision to give public school more time, but in the end, it is absolutely the right decision for her.
Public schools just move too slowly for her - she's the type of kid who can finish something in 5 mins that takes other kids 15 or 20 or even 30mins - the wasted time was driving her crazy. She can now finish her school day in about 90 minutes (and we do a heavy schedule - I expect more from her daily than she completed in public school... math, logic, reading, writing, spelling, science and history everyday). She then has the rest of the day to read and do projects. She is so much happier.
But I am lucky, I am able to be at home and have the desire/inclination to educate my children. What is a tragedy is a parent, who for whatever the circumstances, doesn't have the option to change a bad situation.
But I am lucky, I am able to be at home and have the desire/inclination to educate my children. What is a tragedy is a parent, who for whatever the circumstances, doesn't have the option to change a bad situation.
I could not agree more. No one solution -- home, public, or private -- is perfect for all families, all children, all situations, all the time.
No child fits into a "one size fits all" education. Some thrive at home, some thrive in groups, some thrive in an "elite" environment, some thrive in a less than ideal situation. What works for me may not work for you, but we both have the freedom of choice.
And I also agree 100% with this.... (I will add you to my "Favorite Homeschoolers on C-D" list. )
I'm sure "homeschooling" can also serve as a good venue for the lazy, drunk, TV- watching parents of 12 y.o. inner city street kids. At the beginning of every school year, the city of Chicago has to go on a million dollar campaign (complete w/TV ads) to get these type of "homeschool" kids to enroll in public school. I'm just saying it works both ways...
Truants and homeschoolers are two different things. As one would assume you know, but choose to ignore.
Truants and homeschoolers are two different things. As one would assume you know, but choose to ignore.
I know the difference (but there is sometimes a fine line). There have been quite a few court cases on this. I'll agree there are "lazy" parents in the public school venue. But do you not think there are also "lazy" parents claiming the "homeschool" card as their kids sit around and watch TV all day?
Since every homeschooler I know is against any type of homeschool regulation and vehemently protects their "right to homeschool" (which I understand), I'd like to know how you (or the other homeschoolers on this thread) propose that we protect (and properly educate) "homeschool" children whose parents do not have the skills to educate their children as you have. Or, do you feel that every parent has these skills? Or, do you feel that it is not a societal obligation to ensure that its' children are properly educated? I am interested in your opinion (without attacking public school) as this, to me, is one of the biggest risks of the homeschool movement.
I don't think it necessarily does, either, even from my POV as a homeschooler. I've seen almost no truly thuggy behavior, and a lot more tolerance of individual quirks, in homeschool groups. I think parental oversight does a lot-- and for the most part it's difficult to truly homeschool without a lot of parental oversight, and more difficult to oversee your child when s/he's gone a big part of the day. If you're going to be a lazy slob of a parent, it's easier to surrender the kids for several hours a day (and no, I'm not saying that all public school parents are lazy slobs, only that it's a good venue if you happen to already be one).
But...judging by an event we attended last fall when we were checking out different co-ops, where toddlers were putting half-chewed cookies back on the trays and middle-school-aged boys threatened to beat up my son, it's possible. The parents, of course, were chatting in a completely different part of the venue, assuming the big ones would watch the little ones (yeah, right). I will say most hs-ers I've met avoid that co-op like the plague, and now I know why, firsthand.
I have a shirt-tail relative who homeschooled all three of her kids, now all young adults. The oldest, almost 30, is still in "training" of some sort to be a non-denomiational minister, has no discernable source of income, yet has a wife and two kids. The middle one is also on that track, though unmarried. Both of these guys smoke; the middle one had a collapsed lung last yr and when he had surgery, it was reported his lung was entirely black. The youngest just had a baby outside of marriage. It's no guarantee of successful adulthood.
I know the difference (but there is sometimes a fine line). There have been quite a few court cases on this. I'll agree there are "lazy" parents in the public school venue. But do you not think there are also "lazy" parents claiming the "homeschool" card as their kids sit around and watch TV all day?
Since every homeschooler I know is against any type of homeschool regulation and vehemently protects their "right to homeschool" (which I understand), I'd like to know how you (or the other homeschoolers on this thread) propose that we protect (and properly educate) "homeschool" children whose parents do not have the skills to educate their children as you have. Or, do you feel that every parent has these skills? Or, do you feel that it is not a societal obligation to ensure that its' children are properly educated? I am interested in your opinion (without attacking public school) as this, to me, is one of the biggest risks of the homeschool movement.
Well, I'm not sure that you can regulate what goes on in private homes. Many, many parents don't feed their children well. Some feed them mostly junk like hotdogs and tator tots for every meal. Others don't offer any veggies. A lot of children in these homes have constantly running noses, stomachaches, and catch every cold that they come into contact with. There's really nothing that anyone can do about this, except to try to educate the parents. Social services is not going to step in when a kid eats hot dogs for dinner every night and peanut butter and sugar jelly on white bread every day for lunch.
Chances are, you are NOT feeding your kids crap. And chances are, you don't want a law dictating exactly what parents feed their kids simply because some parents don't feed their kids healthily. But let's say that nutritionists, hired by the state, show up at everyone's house to review their meal plans. Perhaps you are a vegetarian, and perhaps government officials don't like that. Or maybe you feed your kids food out of your garden, or buy raw milk and fresh eggs from a local farmer, and dont' want the government to tell you that those things are now considered "non-compliance." Or maybe they come on your six year old's birthday, and you are eating pizza, root beer, birthday cake, and ice cream for dinner, and now you are placed on probation. Perhaps it happens more than once and you are now forced to eat off of the new federally regulated menu plan, with visits scheduled monthly. Eeks!
Is it really worth all that, just to save the relatively few children whose parents feed them utter junk? Or is the freedom to feed your kids what you consider appropriate worth the non-regulation of menu plans, even though it might result in *some* kids not getting what they need nutritionally?
This is what it is like for homeschoolers when they hear that somebody wants to make more regulations. I know that my kids are learning and thriving. I have consciously NOT given that responsibility or priviledge to the State. Therefore, I do not want the State involved in our educational practices.
Truancy or neglect and homeschooling are very different things. If a child is out in the street all day without supervision, that is neglect, and should be dealt with accordingly. If a child goes to public school and then comes home to a parent who is sleeping on the couch or who will not turn away from the television for longer than the time it takes to hand the child a Crustables out of the freezer, that's something that I would consider neglect, but a court or social worker may not see it as such. It has nothing to do with the child's school status (or lack thereof).
Today, though, it was beautiful and sunny here in CT. After our two-hour Bible study class, several of the moms and I took our homeschooled children to the park for three hours. They ran around, played, negotiated about what to play next, built a Survivor-like "shelter" out of branches and leaves, made castles and train-tracks in the sandbox, played raquetball. If you drove by (and knew we were homeschooling), might you think "ugh, those "homeschoolers" are doing nothing but playing"? Would you know that we got quite a bit of "book work" done yesterday, and even plan to do schoolwork during the public school's spring break?
Illinois happens to be one of the least regulated states in the nation for homeschoolers. Although I loved that fact when I homeschooled there, I do think minimal reporting requirements are not a bad idea to eliminate abusing the system.
We then moved to FL and PA. FL has reasonable requirements - annual standardized tests or portfolio evaluation. PA on the other hand, in my opinion is too regulated... standardized testing, a daily log, a portfolio that is evaluated by a certified teacher and then has to be submitted to the superintendent with the teacher's evaluation.... I'm not sure public school teachers have to document so much!
But like anything else, the reason for the accountability needs to be examined. If a homeschool child can not "pass" a standardized test, people assume learning is not happening in the home. If a public school child fails the same test we assume the child has a learning disability. The double standard is one of the reasons many homeschool families oppose regulations.
I know the difference (but there is sometimes a fine line). There have been quite a few court cases on this. I'll agree there are "lazy" parents in the public school venue. But do you not think there are also "lazy" parents claiming the "homeschool" card as their kids sit around and watch TV all day?
Since every homeschooler I know is against any type of homeschool regulation and vehemently protects their "right to homeschool" (which I understand), I'd like to know how you (or the other homeschoolers on this thread) propose that we protect (and properly educate) "homeschool" children whose parents do not have the skills to educate their children as you have. Or, do you feel that every parent has these skills? Or, do you feel that it is not a societal obligation to ensure that its' children are properly educated? I am interested in your opinion (without attacking public school) as this, to me, is one of the biggest risks of the homeschool movement.
These are just and right questions to ask -- and they should be asked (and debated).
Let me give you at least my preliminary answers, and I'm curious to see what others say.
You said, I'd like to know how you (or the other homeschoolers on this thread) propose that we protect (and properly educate) "homeschool" children whose parents do not have the skills to educate their children as you have.
As you asked this, I thought of several issues -- the fact that many public schoolers leave school with minimal education, the fact that we're probably talking about an exceedingly small number of homeschoolers who get what amounts to no education -- but those are essentially red-herring issues that don't do your question any justice, so I'm trying to knock those out of the running right away so we can get down to business.
About the only way that society can attempt to "protect and properly educate" millions of children is through standardized testing. In public schools, high-stakes standardized testing raises its own huge set of issues and regrettably is no guarantee that students leave school educated. I'm hoping Informed Consent chimes in with another helpful ed-link to validate my hypothesis here, but I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that standardized testing hasn't really raised student achievement all that much. I'm going to guess, therefore, that it wouldn't do much to help homeschoolers either.
Let's say that we do decide to have some kind of testing for homeschoolers anyway. What would be the penalty? To send them to public school? Well, what should be the penalty if public schoolers fail the testing? To send them home?
Bottom line, I just don't think standardized testing is the answer, and I can't see any other way -- well, any other relatively efficient, unbiased, and cost-effective way -- to assess student progress.
I also have what I hope are legitimate concerns about other forms of assessment or (let's say) "guidance" from the school district. For example, our family is educating our child partly because my spouse and I believe we can provide our child a better education than the one she would receive through our local school district.
To be specific about one issue, our state history standards are, to be kind, very unchallenging, ignoring most of world history and focusing mostly on our home state -- which, to be honest, is not a very relevant state, all things considered. Personally, we think that Mesopotamia, Egypt, Europe, Asia, Greece, Rome, and several other countries are of greater importance than our state, to say nothing of the fundamental history and documents of our own country, which students in our state also do not learn. Should our child (in our opinion) waste her time studying our relatively unimportant state when she could be learning the Bill of Rights? Should she do so only to pass a mandated state test? We don't really think so -- though of course, others may certainly feel free to disagree.
Bottom line, therefore, I'm not precisely sure what kind of mechanism the state could use in order to ensure that homeschooled children are being educated, and I'm not sure that even if they put one in place that it would do anything significant to improve the quality of homeschooled children's education.
You asked whether it is a societal obligation to ensure that its children are properly educated. I'm going to be bold here and say no. No, it's not. On the other hand, I do believe it is a societal obligation to ensure that children have free and equal access to an appropriate education, but this is different from ensuring that they are properly educated. I think it is absolutely crucial to open the doors, to allow access, to make it possible for students to attend and stay, but I am far less comfortable with the idea of compulsory education, an idea that has certainly helped many people, but has, at the same time, hurt many others -- and has certainly turned many people away from education at an early age, which I find to be a harmful and destructive (if unintended) consequence.
I'll be bold here again and say that bottom line, I do not feel there should be any but the most minimal laws governing homeschoolers or homeschooling provided that in all other regards, the parents raise their children in accordance with local, state, and federal laws. Will there be homeschoolers who don't receive a traditional "book and worksheet" education? Yes. Yes, there will. I'm not convinced this means they are receiving no education, however. Are there some people who will, invariably, use the homeschool laws as a cover for their own parental laziness and neglect? Yes, unfortunately there will be, just as there will be people who take advantage of any law or system. Ultimately, though, I think the effort to plug those loopholes would do more damage than good.
Does this help? These are preliminary answers, of course -- I'm eager to hear what others have to say.
The trials and tribulations that go along with high school life are a real growing experience for many. I think homeschooled children lack socialization to a large degree. I'm sure some parents do a much better job than others. But I think it is almost impossible for a parent to provide a child opportunities to interact with people who are poor, rich, white, black, asian, smart, dumb, rude, friendly, athletic, lazy... You know, the kind of people that you have to deal with in REAL LIFE in college, at work, at the grocery store...
This was posted a long time ago, but I have to say something. Every softball team I ever played on had most of the categories you listed. The only one that wasn't on almost every team was black. However, we didn't get exposed to that in school, either. There weren't many blacks where I came from. It was Hispanic, white, and Asian. You don't have to go to school to be exposed to these people.
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