Posted on 01/23/2017 8:32:01 AM PST by blam
Chris Weller
January 23,2017
Jessica Epting, a homeschool mother of four, with her kids in their home in the Bronx, New York
During Betsy DeVos' recent three-hour confirmation hearing to become President Donald Trump's education secretary, charter schools came up no fewer than 60 times. Homeschooling was mentioned once.
Charter schools have become a significant part of the US public-education system and now educate 2.5 million kids. But homeschooling has quietly experienced a surge in recent years too. Brian Ray, a homeschooling researcher at the National Home Education Research Institute, estimates the number of kids taught at home is growing by as much as 8% a year since the total hovered around 2 million in 2010, according to US Census figures.
That puts the upper estimate at approximately 3.5 million children, far surpassing charter schools.
Betsy DeVos Betsy DeVos testifies before the US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions during her confirmation hearing to be the next secretary of education, on January 17, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas
The homeschool myth
(IMO, teachers unions must go)
Teaching kids at home has long been controversial, with critics saying the instruction is uneven in subject and quality and makes kids asocial.
But in recent years, technology and changing attitudes have made homeschooling easier and more effective, helping boost its popularity. And research suggests homeschooled kids do better on tests and in college than their peers in public schools.
"Homeschooling really cultivates a trait of open-mindedness and [being] open to new experiences," says Claire Dickson, a Harvard sophomore who was homeschooled from kindergarten through her senior year of high school. Her mother, Milva McDonald, pulled her out of her Boston-area public school when she realized, for example,
(snip)
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
The mothers heard of a church about 30 miles away, that had a homeschool group, that would go skiing in Colorado every year.
So they started doing that.
After a few years, the homeschool group fizzled out, but the 2 families continued and added other family members' families.
Then, all these families started inviting friends.
I went on a few of the trips. There would be 30-60 of us. We'd get a block of rooms at a hotel. Group lift tickets. Group rates on rentals.
Each night, one family group would be in charge of dinner for the entire group. We'd all pile into 1 or 2 suites and eat together, recapping the days exploits.
There is nothing like spending time on a ski lift, for 5-10 minutes, talking with someone. Then skiing down in the sunshine, enjoying the beauty. Then doing it again.
Great time for family and friend bonding.
I was talking to the parents of the once jr high student. They hadn't learned to ski until their 40's.
They saw that there 2 kids LOVED it and saw the trips as an opportunity for the family as a family opportunity, so they took lessons themselves and learned to ski, to share the time with their kids.
One day, on one of the trips, Paul, the father, heard I was going to take a ski lesson for moguls. o he asked to join me.
Taking a class together is a great way to build a better friendship.
I was about 40 at the time. He was about 55.
55 taking a mogul class
After learning how to ski at 40.
Good for you both!! All well said.
Everything, the curriculum and activities and trips—even church on Sunday!—all meshes together into a really holistic approach to learning.
My 8-year old son is an nature nut. He’s learning Latin. He also got these for Christmas and is also learning electronics during his play time: http://www.snapcircuits.net/
I think it would be a good experiment to try encouraging parents on welfare to homeschool. If they are collecting public money and not working, they can spend time on their kids. At first this doesn’t sound good, because the parents probably don’t have the skills for teaching. But there are ways the communities could help. The benefit of this would be biulding stronger families in the poorest neighborhoods, and probably teach kids better than many crappy inner city schools.
The education system is not the reason those kids are the way they are - it's their home and their family, and I can't do anything about that.
All I could do was see that those kids did not influence my kids on a day-to-day basis.
My daughter socialized with other kids, kids at church, and kids in the neighborhood. She also socialized with young adults, and every other age group she was exposed to. Children in public school would fight over socializing with someone a year younger or older, and if forced, it would end in violence, usually on the younger person. My daughter is now able to relate to people twice her age and half her age seamlessly. She is a self starter and doesn't need to be forced to do beneficial things for herself. She is 32 now and lives on her own, has always worked, never was pregnant without a husband, no drugs, and is now a cop. Did I mention she's not in my basement?
The "asocial" complaint by many people is something we have heard all thirty-five years. It simply has never existed in any place that we have seen home schooling carried out.
Wherever we have worked in home schooling, parents get together. Fellowships of home schooling families tend to expand quite rapidly. Often the same families are active together either in one church, or in churches which are of like-faith. Activities and events are planned by parents and carried out: science fairs; music and art competitions (often churches with large facilities will offer space for this); field trips and road trips; games and some sports. . . . . none at taxpayer expense, by the way.
In the Christian environment in which we labor, families tend to be larger, often considerable larger, than the average American family these days. So when families get together it often turns into quite a crowd.
There is a higher degree of respect for adults and others in authority. There is a higher degree of politeness. The home school pupils admire and respect one another. There is great interest in science and technology, requiring math, and even in civics and government. More critical thinking and more Constitutional understanding as well.
In the State of Indiana there are at least a half dozen large well organized membership home school organizations that help with resources and activities.
It won't be long now before the youngest of our seven children will be finished and graduate. But we will be involved right on helping others learn how to do it conscientiously and do it well.
We homeschooled back in the 80’s. We took a lot of heat for it from the education establishment, church, friends, and family and it was completely worth it.
An anecdote...I made a purchase the other day at a local drugstore. The young lady at the cash register actually counted out my change to me.
I asked her, “You were homeschooled, weren’t you?”
She replied, “Yes, how did you know?”
Thanks for being the pioneers to use second generation folks.
This is our last year with our youngest graduating. I think it’s our 21st year and while tough, at the same tie completely worthwhile.
My goodness, Arlis. Such a good outcome for your family, and so smart too. Congratulations.
Of course, I am recalling that the more educated voters voted for Hillary Clinton. I guess you are what is called a troglodyte? / lol!
My family was all well educated too and we went to Catholic schools - but you know after hearing the words intolerant, racist, homophobic and Islamophobic thrown at believers in Christianity, even the well-educated are willing to vote against the secular order.
Yes.
They get home and are schooled there by their parents and then sent to special after school classes.
Most American children are not tutored unless their grades are very far down. Asian students are tutored as a matter of course.
All of this is home schooling.
This ping list is for articles of interest to homeschoolers. I hold both the Homeschool Ping List and the Another Reason to Homeschool Ping List. Please freepmail me to let me know if you would like to be added or removed from either list, or both.
The keyword for the FREE REPUBLIC HOMESCHOOLERS’ FORUM is frhf.
It's no myth, but homeschoolers already know that.
What was your source/site for the high school curriculum — would be interested in looking into it.
I homeschooled all three of mine and all three entered private, big name universities being accepted in their honors programs.
They also all had stellar SAT/ACT scores and GRE scores.
That 7 hours a day is mostly wasted.
Aside from class changing, lunch, and gym, I’ve had several public school teachers tell me that in your average classroom time, between 50% and 90% is spend on discipline issues.
I could accomplish more in a couple hours per kid than what took a a full day in public education.
A friend of mine homeschooled for a while after her son was out for medical reasons and the teacher sent home the work for the next 2-3 weeks. He went into his room and came out a couple hours later with it all done and correct.
That did it for her.
And when I went to public schools, you know what we heard from the teachers ALL THE TIME?
"You're not here to socialize!"
Well, homeschooling works and it works well.
You just have to do it.
It’s not the homeschooling that’s the problem, it’s the lazy parents who won’t teach and who give homeschooling a bad name.
Basically, yes.
With the parents demanding that much work in homework after school each day, then yes, the kids we're doing well because they were inherently smart or because of the public education. it was because of the parental involvement and the time spent at home learning.
The public schools are just a technicality at that point.
Nope, because the public schools fail kids by the droves and nobody holds them accountable or criticizes them for where the kids are as they do with homeschoolers.
Homeschoolers are held to much higher standards and accountability and criticism of failure than public schools are.
If homeschooling is to be condemned because some parents fail their children, then public schools ought to be condemned when the hundreds of thousands of kids graduate each year, barely literate even though they were given basically, a participation diploma.
So public schools are *checked* and what difference has that ever made?
Asocial, in other words they are not having sex with multiple other students and the occasional teacher.
Find a co op of homeschoolers. Ask to interview any of them (with parents permissionof course) go as young as 3rd grade. Ask what they are learning. What they like to do when they arent in school... ask how they get along with their siblings. Pick another kid do the same thing. You will find they are smart, respectful, approachable, thoughtful, caring, funny. etc. We have friends that she dropped out of school in tennesee when she was 13. She wanted to homeschool their daughter. Daughter was given free ride to a top west coast school, double majored in business and finance. Was recruited in her Junior year to work at Deloit. Now 5 years later is earning 250,000K all from this mom that dropped out of school in 8th grade. Dont pick the person that is the worst at something to define a movement.
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