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Three of the other factors that Omaha Rocks alludes to (I am guessing here) are:
1. Personality of the child
2. Personality of the child
3. Personality of the child
My wife homeschooled our three children for their entire school careers with the exception that one son finished high school (Year 12) in the USA. It was my wife's choice to homeschool, and it worked out very well considering our circumstances: 1 year living in China, 13 years living in Malaysia. She worked very hard at obtaining good curriculum and planning out programs for them, including outside activities.
One child went back to the USA and enrolled in a public university (very good SAT scores). She made many friends and graduated with an AA degree (her choice). She also made the Dean's list for two of her four semesters. Now she is working to finish a full degree with her husband paying for it (yeah!).
One child went back to the USA and enrolled in an engineering degree program at a public university. Now, with one year remaining, he has won several scholarships for his academic and extra-curricular activities (student clubs, sports). In my opinion, he has TOO many friends. But, he will get a good job with his degree and his Dad will be happy. We helped with two years of tuition, but he has been paying for his final two years with scholarship money, a loan, and money earned from work.
The final child decided he was not interested in university and is working a job that he chose for himself.
All three children have different personalities. All three have different degrees of interest and ability in making friends. It had little to do with homeschooling, and most to do with personality.
This socialization issue is the most overused and ridiculous argument against homeschooling. Public schools are notorious for the wrong kind of socialization. But many kids go through public school and do just fine. I have nieces and nephews that went this route and they are really no different from my children. But their parents (my siblings) are very involved in the lives of their children and that makes a big difference.
A wise man said once: "Before my wife and I had children, I had four theories on how to raise children. Now, I have four children, and NO theories."
Last edited by Teak; 08-04-2009 at 05:00 PM..
Reason: addition
The "socialization Issue," only comes up as a question, do those educated in the public realm understand the class/economic structure of their world better than those who are being educated in the comparitive isolation of their home? Not to argue against home schooling, but, there is some question as to the kind of fraternizing home schoolers are accepting as the norm.
The "socialization Issue," only comes up as a question, do those educated in the public realm understand the class/economic structure of their world better than those who are being educated in the comparitive isolation of their home? Not to argue against home schooling, but, there is some question as to the kind of fraternizing home schoolers are accepting as the norm.
No, the socialization argument has always been put to me in "how are they going to relate to their peers (same age group) if they don't spend time in public school". My children spent more time with adults than with peers for a good part of their homeschool years, which probably made them more mature in outlook at an earlier age than their peers back in the USA. Still, they also had playtime with neighbor children (Malay, Chinese, Tamil) and had one set of American friends who lived nearby.
Judging by how well my children fit back into American culture, I don't think that they missed out by not being socialized in a public school setting; in fact, they tell me that they are glad to have had the experience of homeschool and living overseas.
Do you really think that pre-teens and teens think about their social and economic structures? I was in public school and it was mostly dating and breaking-up as the primary concern, or else sports and extracurricular activities (some sanctioned, some legal, some illegal). If you mean socialization as in learning how to deal with drug dealers or gangs, then yeah, we gave a pass on those lessons.
Personally, I think that personality and parental involvement (especially the indoctrination of a love for reading) are the two most important factors in academic success. With both of those a student will succeed no matter where they are schooled. And I speak as one with 8 years experience teaching in high school, and 13 years teaching college-level.
I've had some ultra-religious folks be flagrantly insulting to me for having our 3 kids in public school. They pull out statistics about ACTs and SATs, Standardized Tests, etc.
It's almost inevitable that homeschooled kids score higher. But there are multiple factors involved.
First, homeschooled kids tend to come from upper-middle class two-parent homes, where mom & dad heavily invest themselves in their kids' educations. That's a great thing! But if all public-school kids were also from those kinds of homes, public school scores would rise drastically.
Second, public schools have to admit all kids in their district. In many high schools, this includes a high number of developmentally challenged kids, as well as kids with every behavioral disorder imaginable. Not only do those kids' scores bring down the average of the school, they can sometimes prove to be very distracting.
There are other factors that I'm aware of, but those are the two most obvious ones.
I've known several mothers that home-schooled their children until some point in grade school, and the kids seemed to phase into the public system just fine (which, I'll admit, always surprised me).
One of them ~ a Mormon ~ home-schooled all EIGHT of her children, I believe right through high school. Most went right on to college, are very bright. I don't know how in hell their mother did it. Patience of a saint (pun not intended).
Personally, I liked the idea of my daughter having the social inter-action of public school structure. But I wouldn't have the patience or finesse to be a "teacher", anyway.
It's interesting to read the comments from people who have never homeschooled, but think they know all about it. Many rely on stereotypes to form their opinions.
On socialization, I'm with Teak. It's a horribly overused argument against homeschooling, and generally speaking, totally baseless. There are exceptions, of course, just as there are people in public schools or any other social setting that have a difficult time interacting with other people.
Home-schooling would have been an absolute disaster for me. I was an only-child, so the need to be around peers was very important to me. I was also raised in the house by an overly-protective mother and didn't like it. Had she forced home-schooling I would have made life Hell for both of us.
I've been wondering how the home schooling student compares with the public educated children, are the home schoolers prepared socially as opposed to Public Ed?
I've been wondering how the home schooling student compares with the public educated children, are the home schoolers prepared socially as opposed to Public Ed?
Depends a lot on who's doing the home schooling, doesn't it? If a truly ignorant person is "schooling" his or her child at home, that's probably not going to be better than public education.
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