How American Homeschoolers Measure Up

Re: College Educated Parents and educationally committed parents

My question is, “Does institutional schooling teach anything at all?”

Really, this is a serious question. No studies have ever been done to see where the student is learning ( home or classroom) and who is doing the teaching ( teacher, parent, or child by reading texts and doing projects in the home). Unless, this is studied it is impossible to know if the thousands spent on each children every year in government school is actually producing a functional service.

I ask this because it is my anecdotal observation that the home lives of academically successful children, whether home or institutionally schooled, are remarkable similar to that of the home I provided for my homeschoolers. Academically successful institutionalized children are doing the **same** amount of homework as my homeschoolers did all day They have parents who stated reading to them daily as infants, took frequent education field trips, had steady and predicable meal and sleep schedules, and rational disciplining.

My conclusion: The learning of academically successful institutionalized children is happening in the home and not much in the school. They are literally homeschooling after school! This is sometimes called “after schooling”.

Finally,....When parents buy a home in a so-called “good” school district they should ask, “ How many of the children are going to private tutoring and/or being “after schooled” by their parents? “ And....It is entirely possible that we spend thousands upon thousands of dollars on each children for government schooling that is possibly entirely ineffective!

After my 15yr old Granddaughter was bullied at school my Daughter pulled her out for home schooling. I bought the textbooks, but after a year it was obvious that my Daughter was not home schooling her in any way and my Grandaughter just fell into a do nothing gamehead mode with no parental supervision by either my Daughter or her stepfather. Well eventually a big family problem brewed up and I ended up bringing my Grandaughter to live with me and her Grandmother. In about 8 months with just some help and nudging she studied up and passed her GED tests and received her diploma at 16 yrs old. She went into the community college on her 17th birthday and today is in her last 2 months of her freshman year studying pre-nursing to get into the nursing school. By age 18 this summer, just after this semester she will have accumulated 25 credit hours of her Nursing pre-requisites, she already passed her certification tests and has her Nursing Assistant state certification. Public schools just don’t help the flounderers and lazy parents who pull their kids out and don’t push and help them just let them flounder further. It can be done, it’s not easy for the parents/guardians or the kids, but it can be done and achieves results that the kids never thought they could achieve.

My 13 year old son was animatedly telling me yesterday how much he hates pigs. Why? Because he’s reading Animal Farm. He was able to draw parallels between that book and what he knows is going on today in our world. Daughter is in Toastmasters and today is giving a speech about the differences between extroverts and introverts. She herself is an introvert but now feels comfortable speaking in public thanks to this group.

I’ve never regretted for one moment that we chose to homeschool our kids from the beginning, but I fear that my children won’t be given that opportunity. Too many dark clouds of fascism and communism on our horizon with a government intent on having total control of each and every individual from cradle to grave. Homeschoolers are far too independent minded for their liking.

my anecdotal observation that the home lives of academically successful children, whether home or institutionally schooled, are remarkable similar to that of the home I provided for my homeschoolers. Academically successful institutionalized children are doing the **same** amount of homework as my homeschoolers did all day They have parents who stated reading to them daily as infants, took frequent education field trips, had steady and predicable meal and sleep schedules, and rational disciplining.

It is entirely possible that we spend thousands upon thousands of dollars on each children for government schooling that is possibly entirely ineffective!

Continually changing teaching methods so clearly have the tendency, that conceivably they have the intent, of making it difficult for parents to “after school” their children.

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