Homeschooling goes boom in America - 74 percent increase in number of families teaching....

World Net Daily ^ | January 05, 2009 | By Chelsea Schilling

[GonzoII]

A homeschooling movement is sweeping the nation – with 1.5 million children now learning at home, an increase of 75 percent since 1999.

The Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics reported homeschooling has risen by 36 percent in just the last five years.

"There's no reason to believe it would not keep going up," NCES statistician Gail Mulligan told USA Today.

A 2007 survey asked parents why they choose to homeschool and allowed them to provide several reasons. The following are the most popular responses:

[MrB]

I’m sure their father and mentor will be informing them soon as to how to respond to this threat to his earthly kingdom.

[MrB]

Well, it really isn’t so much that public schoolers aren’t being educated in actual reading, writing and math...

it’s that they ARE being educated in secular humanist/socialist worldviews.

[Gabz]

That’s great!!!!!!!

I have asked very similar questions to folks who criticize homeschoolers and homeschooling, and my daughter attends public school.

[DaveyB]

iWouldn’t it be better to find religious school you believe in? It can’t be optimal to isolate kids.

I think you are missing some of the real reasons homeschooling works so well including:

• Children learn best in a loving environment
• The pace of learning can be tailored to each child's learning ability, style, health etc.
• The same teacher for every subject every year maximizes results
• Learning integrated into life
• Fewer distractions from peers including: wardrobe anxiety, discussing raunchy TV and who likes who
• What they don't learn from their peers is equally important as what instruction they do receive
• No wasted time on programing the sheeple to accept tyranny structure ie learning to form a line, raise hands, heads on desk
• The same character needed for academics is taught with chores, letters to grandma, dinner with strangers etc.

[MrB]

yeah, homeschooling is isolating kids...

*snicker*

[MrB]

“multigenerational legacy”

I like it.

[MrB]

The BEST answer for “the socialization question” is:

We’re not raising socialists, are you?

[samtheman]

Also. Don’t forget about homeschool networks, which are extensive. There are plenty of opportunities for kids to get together with other kids.

[Chances Are]

Yes, this sad tale is true.

Schools today teach kids what to think.

Not how to think.

There is a vast difference.

For the vast uber class that the school system is churning out, what I call Accuracy In Thinking will become a lost art, whose arcane and recondite lessons, though important, will reside mainly among members of the new Lord caste.

Not that that will help us - or the kids coming out of school.

Too bad....

CA....

[Tax-chick]

You’re right, it’s absolutely criminal that millions upon millions of children who haven’t done anything wrong other than being under 18 are incarcerated in institutions for thirteen years. All that productive time wasted.

[Boiling Pots]

Does anyone know how to reach the parents of K-4 homeschoolers? I am marketing a web-based language/articulation program.

[JenB]

Do you have any of your own to homeschool yet?

My husband (TalonDJ) and I were both homeschooled. It’s great to have someone who really really gets it as my partner. We’ve been discussing homeschool strategies and such since before we got married - and our first child is still three months from her due date. Poor thing, we’ll probably have her in calculus by eight.

[Tax-chick]

Advertise on HSLDA’s website or magazine and other homeschooling magazines. Contact your state homeschooling association to see if they have a publication in which you could advertise. Rent a booth at a state or local convention or book fair.

[bluegirl]

It can’t be optimal to isolate kids.

Home schooled kids are NOT isolated. There are homeschool groups everywhere. Many towns have numerous groups. They also take many classes, participate in sports, etc. I socialized more when I homeschooled than I do now that my kids are grown. We were always going somewhere.

[DungeonMaster]

In Germany they jail Christian parents for homeschooling.

I hate Germany for that.

[achilles2000]

“It can’t be optimal to isolate kids.”

I am sure you are sincere, but this comment indicates that you don’t have a clue about homeschooling. Before I’d offer advice about gardening, for example, I’d first learn something about it. While homeschooling isn’t very complicated, the same principle applies.

[Monterrosa-24]

Very few English teachers in the best private schools have the time and inclination to really red ink many compositions the way it was done in bygone days. But homeschool students usually have a teacher that will mark up their paper and then discuss it with them at length. This makes for a significant quality advantage in improving written compositions.

[Gabz]

Absolutely.

The “socialization” bit is one I find seriously offensive. A few of my daughter’s friends are homeschooled and there is nothing “isolated” about them at all.

[MrB]

All the homeschool kids that I know are very polite, and actually can and will talk to adults who speak to them.

[TalonDJ]

It can’t be optimal to isolate kids.

Exactly! Kids should be around other kids to develop their social normative construct. How else are they going to know the normal and acceptable modes of behavior if they are not around 20 or 30 other kids their age. After all NOTHING else can prepare a kid for real life accept to be around a large group like that. Nothing else will keep society strong. Why, I bet homeschoolers don't even get picked on and thereby learn what annoys other people. There just is not any way to learn what makes people not like you without getting picked last on the playground.

By the way if any of the above text sounded reasonable to you punch yourself in the face and then go read Lord of the Flies. Then study up on the communist reasoning behind separating kids from their parents at a young age and putting them in a government school. There is no weapon, technology, tactic, or institution considered more critical for the establishment of a communist state than the government run mandatory school system.