Home schooling:pros and cons

[rennigade]

I only know 4 kids who were home schooled. One of them is a misfit thug wannabe now. Works at a fast food joint, thinks he's a gangbanger...the other 3 are still being home schooled and really really bad in public. Meaning they scream and wont listen to their parents while at a restaurant, wedding, etc. Yep probably more of a parenting issue than a home schooling one...but maybe if they went to school someone would beat them up or tell them to stfu and make them think before they act.

You can only shelter your kids for so long. Send them to public/private school and get it over with.

[sam042013]

Homeschooling is great! You can concentrate learning because it's only you who is being taught but for me, I am more in favor in learning inside the school establishment because socialization is very important. This is where you establish your self. It helps you how to deal life independently. It helps you to gain friends, earn more knowledge and discover new things rather than just inside the house.

[Baby_nurse]

I only know 4 kids who were home schooled. One of them is a misfit thug wannabe now. Works at a fast food joint, thinks he's a gangbanger...the other 3 are still being home schooled and really really bad in public. Meaning they scream and wont listen to their parents while at a restaurant, wedding, etc. Yep probably more of a parenting issue than a home schooling one...but maybe if they went to school someone would beat them up or tell them to stfu and make them think before they act.

You can only shelter your kids for so long. Send them to public/private school and get it over with.

Just like saying that all homeschooling parents are superior, I believe it's unfair and untrue to say that all homeschool students lack social skills. I know some kids who have turned out horribly after being homeschooled, but I also know some pretty terrific ones as well. It all depends on the reasons the parents chose to homeschool, how invested the kids were and whether they also took the opportunity to interact with other students their age.

I truly believe that the kids who have done well would have succeeded no matter what the schooling situation while those who haven't would have failed no matter where/how they were schooled.

[LuckyRobin]

Bad parenting is usually the cause of bad homeschooling, just like bad teachers and administrators are the cause of bad schools. It goes both ways. And even in "good" schools bad things can happen. Like my child receiving a serious brain injury caused by another student and the failure of the office staff to seek immediate (or any) medical care. It took 8 months to heal. Or my daughter trying to get to her desk in her high school English class and getting knocked across the room by two boys who decided to start a fist fight. She came home with a fat lip. And these are two very highly rated schools that excel in many things, but not in the management of bullies or fighting or getting the kids to shut up so they can teach for that matter.

And sometimes, though I hate to say it, there are just bad kids...and they would be bad in any setting because no one ever taught them how to be good. Not parents, not teachers. And certainly not the people that are held up to be role models today.

[MoneyTips4U]

Homeschooling can or can't be a good thing. Among many things, it depends upon the motivation of the person being schooled. If they weren't motivated in regular school, it is unlikely they will be motivated in homeschool, and vice versa. Parents also play a large role in this endeavor.

[bones72]

Although my distaste for homeschooling is apparent, and yes, I did look, the Navy and Army will take GED's, but with a 'waiver'. The Air Force will take a GED, but only with 15 hours of community college. The Marines aren't saying what upfront is required. My concern, and observation is homeschooling stems from a parent's ego. That a parent decides that ultimately, they "know" better than a trained semi-professional or professional teacher. Also, if your local public school is that bad, then I guess my sense of civic duty would be to change that. Evidently, all those home-school parents don't think enough of our American society to positively act and become involved. For that, shame on you. This is your country too, even though you are hiding from it. Its still a free country, if you don't like the public institutions to that degree, then leave.

[MoneyTips4U]

I do agree that public schools be upheld for the benefit of the country in general.

However, note that some kids are homeschooled because they either do not fit in at school, or they find regular school boring. Many children in younger grades must follow the pace of other students. If they are exceptionally bright, then school is boring and not very helpful for them.

If that occurs, then you can say, have the bright kids skip a grade. Well, that can cause social problems due to age differences or teasing/bullying between children.

What do responsible parents do in this situation? They may choose to homeschool children, where the kids may learn at an accelerated pace, possibly graduate high school early, and attend college when and where they please.

I personally was homeschooled and attended public schools; there are definitely pros and cons for both situations; the family must just find what works for them.

The situations I described were for kids motivated to learn; kids who are homeschooled due to a lack of motivation need to have a talk with their parents about their future and how they plan on going about their future education.

[Petunia 100]

Although my distaste for homeschooling is apparent, and yes, I did look, the Navy and Army will take GED's, but with a 'waiver'. The Air Force will take a GED, but only with 15 hours of community college. The Marines aren't saying what upfront is required. My concern, and observation is homeschooling stems from a parent's ego. That a parent decides that ultimately, they "know" better than a trained semi-professional or professional teacher. Also, if your local public school is that bad, then I guess my sense of civic duty would be to change that. Evidently, all those home-school parents don't think enough of our American society to positively act and become involved. For that, shame on you. This is your country too, even though you are hiding from it. Its still a free country, if you don't like the public institutions to that degree, then leave.

This is so interesting. If someone thinks outside of the box, you are filled with "distaste", want to shame them, and would prefer they leave the country! Their motivation can only be their own ego. Your statements say a lot about you.

[LuckyRobin]

Although my distaste for homeschooling is apparent, and yes, I did look, the Navy and Army will take GED's, but with a 'waiver'. The Air Force will take a GED, but only with 15 hours of community college. The Marines aren't saying what upfront is required. My concern, and observation is homeschooling stems from a parent's ego. That a parent decides that ultimately, they "know" better than a trained semi-professional or professional teacher. Also, if your local public school is that bad, then I guess my sense of civic duty would be to change that. Evidently, all those home-school parents don't think enough of our American society to positively act and become involved. For that, shame on you. This is your country too, even though you are hiding from it. Its still a free country, if you don't like the public institutions to that degree, then leave.

Oh, yes, bones72, I totally agree that taking my son out of public school because of the severe brain injury he received there is ALL about my ego. Yeah, he was almost in a coma by the end of that school day, and the school didn't ever call for medical care while fluid swelled up around his brain. They didn't even call us for over an hour while they got their ducks in a row and went on the offensive, but that has nothing to do with why he's home this year. It's just about me and what I want. /sarcasm If I didn’t know you were a regular contributor to the forums, I’d think you were trolling.

I totally would have him in public school this year if all of this hadn't happened and the other middle school didn't have a rampant drug problem. I don't particularly like having to homeschool, but we needed to do it because his ability to focus and his retention had been destroyed and he could only study for 20 minutes at a time, followed by 20 minutes of rest. It wasn't until February that he no longer had symptoms of his injury that occurred last June and if you think the school would have dealt with that, than you've obviously never had to fill out and then fight for an IEP for a child. And I didn't expect any teacher to have to deal with that. They have lots of other kids. This situation called for one on one and patience.

I have always been involved with my kids' education and their schools and it is ridiculous for you to say that people like me don't try to work within the system to change it when we have and that we should just leave the country if we don't like it. I did work with my son's school for almost a full school year trying to get things to change, but the kicker is they didn't want to work with me and they certainly did not want to change. You know what finally made them change things? My son's brain injury. Not the black eye, or the bruised ribcage, mind you, but the head trauma. And only because they were afraid they might get sued (never my intention) and only after the proof of three medical doctors and some x-rays. You want to talk egos, there is a principal with the biggest ego and the worst bullying attitude of his own in charge of that school. And a couple of teachers that were helpless to stand up to him.

You make a lot of assumptions about homeschooling that are so far behind the times it's not even funny. Homeschooled kids can get high school diplomas. If my son continues he will get one from an accredited high school in our state, as our curriculum meets all public school standards in this state and quite often exceeds them. In our program he must have a mastery of every subject at 80% before moving on. In every lesson. That's a B average. His average is 98% and he's on honor role. Public school kids can graduate with a 65% average although they likely can't get in to college.

We have a teacher that we check in with every week who follows our progress and grades his semester mid-terms and finals, as well as two essay length writing samples in the fall and spring. The computer grades his daily assignments. We follow the government's required hours of chair time each month and percentage of the monthly required amount of work per each subject. In addition my mother was and my niece is a teacher and they both believe he is getting a better education at home. Believe me, my kiddo is learning far more now than when he was trying to defend himself on a daily basis from a group of bullies. We are not an exception to the rule, either. Actually talk to a few homeschooling parents who are really doing it and you will discover this to be true.

Do you seriously believe that parents don't know what is best for their children? Do you have children? If you do, do you think you know what is best for them or should the government have more say in it than you do? Because that's called communism and last time I checked America was a Republic. Have you ever had a child get attacked at school? Have you ever had a child's classmate put something they were allergic to in your child's food or on your child's body to purposely cause a severe attack? Have you ever had a principal roll his eyes at you because no one called you when your kid got a black eye at school and you didn't find out about it until he or she got home from school and then you bothered to call the school on it? Did you never have a bad teacher? Or a drunk teacher? Or a stoned teacher? Or one who used their authority to make every kid in the class feel small and belittled on a daily basis because they liked the power trip?

I think you need to educate yourself on current homeschooling methods and curricula before you form such vitriolic opinions of it and of other people who choose to do it. I mean, sure, you're free to spout off on homeschooling even if you don't know much about it. It's called the First Amendment (which, by the way, they don't teach you about in our public schools until 12th grade civics classes, we're learning it this year in grade 7). You're even free to name call to a certain extent until it proves libelous. You're free to believe whatever you want. But it doesn't make you right. And when you say things that are flat out incorrect or tell people to leave the country if they don't agree with your view of things, it just makes you look like the only thing backing you up is bluster. Because it sure isn't the facts. It's a statement people fall back on when they don't have the facts or any valid information to back themselves up. I find it the ultimate in irony that you think leaving the country is a good solution to not liking the institutions, but leaving the institution itself is not.

We do live in a free country and I have the right to educate my child as I see fit so long as I meet or exceed government standards. Right now I see fit to homeschool. When high school starts I will give public school in another school district a fair shake. But I will not EVER put him back into a school where his safety is threatened on a daily basis, or might cause a permanent physical or mental disability, because that WOULD make me a bad parent. Nor will I allow anyone to tell me that doing this makes me a bad person or a bad citizen or an egomaniac without standing up for myself. I don't like what that school allowed, but that won't make me leave the country and it is foolish to tell people like me to do so because we are exercising our rights and you disagree with them. That will make me strive to make things better, first as a parent and then as a citizen, because my priority is and always will be my family, and then my country, in that order. And lucky me, I was born in a country where I'm allowed to believe that.

[Redraidernurse]

Although my distaste for homeschooling is apparent, and yes, I did look, the Navy and Army will take GED's, but with a 'waiver'. The Air Force will take a GED, but only with 15 hours of community college. The Marines aren't saying what upfront is required. My concern, and observation is homeschooling stems from a parent's ego. That a parent decides that ultimately, they "know" better than a trained semi-professional or professional teacher. Also, if your local public school is that bad, then I guess my sense of civic duty would be to change that. Evidently, all those home-school parents don't think enough of our American society to positively act and become involved. For that, shame on you. This is your country too, even though you are hiding from it. Its still a free country, if you don't like the public institutions to that degree, then leave.

I'd love to hear how I can become involved enough to change the school system in my town in time for it to be worthwhile to send my child there.

When our school district was compared with 40 other similar school districts, it rank #39 on test scores. The government has repeatedly, year after year threatened to shut down the entire school district and bus all the kids to neighboring cities to be educated.

My desire to home school has nothing to do with the fact that I think I'm a stellar scholar. It has to do with the fact that I know that I sure can do a better job than they obviously are.

[Baby_nurse]

Aaaannnddd... There's the sticking point.

Schools don't do well without involved parents. Involved parents throw up their hands and say "the school is the problem" and pull their kids out. The kids left at the schools further suffer. It's a vicious cycle.

Like it or not, there are some crap-tastic parents out there. It doesn't matter the district or the neighborhood. When my oldest was starting kindergarten, her teacher made me extremely sad when she told me that many of the kids in her class had never so much as held a crayon, let alone a book. This was in a fairly affluent area of a college town. Schools end up teaching to the lowest common denominator. As a parent volunteer, I viewed it as my job to help raise that level. The kids I worked with 2 times a week thrived, by the end of the school year they were at or above grade level in reading. It reinforced to me that it could be done, but not with one teacher to 25 kids.

I fully understand why some involved parents pull their kids out to homeschool. It just makes me sad to think of what could have been accomplished if these same parents had put to mind helping other students, too. In the long run, the educational success of every student affects us all. And by success, I don't mean test scores. I mean the love of learning, the ability and willingness to take on tougher courses. Heck, even the ability to put together a complete sentence.

[Petunia 100]

Aaaannnddd... There's the sticking point.

Schools don't do well without involved parents. Involved parents throw up their hands and say "the school is the problem" and pull their kids out. The kids left at the schools further suffer. It's a vicious cycle.

Like it or not, there are some crap-tastic parents out there. It doesn't matter the district or the neighborhood. When my oldest was starting kindergarten, her teacher made me extremely sad when she told me that many of the kids in her class had never so much as held a crayon, let alone a book. This was in a fairly affluent area of a college town. Schools end up teaching to the lowest common denominator. As a parent volunteer, I viewed it as my job to help raise that level. The kids I worked with 2 times a week thrived, by the end of the school year they were at or above grade level in reading. It reinforced to me that it could be done, but not with one teacher to 25 kids.

I fully understand why some involved parents pull their kids out to homeschool. It just makes me sad to think of what could have been accomplished if these same parents had put to mind helping other students, too. In the long run, the educational success of every student affects us all. And by success, I don't mean test scores. I mean the love of learning, the ability and willingness to take on tougher courses. Heck, even the ability to put together a complete sentence.

This assumes homeschoolers were once public schoolers who were dissatisfied with public school. Certainly, some are. But people choose to homeschool for all sorts of different reasons. It isn't necessarily a condemnation of public schools.

[dawnwes]

I am a trained and experienced teacher. I taught in a public high school for 12 years and was a School Counselor for another 4.5 years.

I now homeschool my children.

Even though I am a teacher, I know my limitations. I can teach English and History all day long. I can do science up through Biology and math up through Pre-Algebra without needing some assistance in explaining theories and/or concepts. Because of that, we do get help when we need it.

We have one child with some severe learning delays and the one on one of homeschooling has been fantastic for him. Putting him in the PS system would have been like throwing him to the wolves.

Check my last post. Be glad there are people like me who are open to good reasons that may challenge my current beliefs. The umbrella reason of "what I choose is best for my family" is backed up by faulty logic. Just in this thread I've backed off on the socialization issue, because its clear that its not a hurdle. Waste of time in traditional schools is another good argument.

I'm big on professionals doing any job. Not sure someone who is not a qualified teacher can pull it off. I coach soccer which is exponentially simpler than being a school teacher. I've win vested considerable amount of time and money to get good--I've yet to see committed volunteers or even pros who just "get by"

[Joan.of.the.Arch]

Elessar78, may I ask a question of you? You said your relative was thinking of homeschooling because she is on an "all-natural, über-catholic path and this is the latest extension of that mindset." Do you understand why she connects homeschooling with being über-catholic? The Catholics have long had so many grade schools and high schools in the US that I sure don't think of homeschooling when I think of Catholism. (In my city for a long time the parochial school system had more students than the public schools.)

And was it bones72 who is angry at homeschool parents for abandoning public schools? Well now that makes me think of all the parents who sent their kids to those Catholic schools as well as all the other religious and private schools. Do you feel angry or disgusted with them, too?

Could you say, "Evidently, all those private-school parents don't think enough of our American society to positively act and become involved. For that, shame on you. This is your country too, even though you are hiding from it. Its still a free country, if you don't like the public institutions to that degree, then leave."

I think that around here, many families do actively choose against the city's public schools. The most common way that choice is expressed is in buying a house to move to in another public school system. I don't think anyone insists they should fix the bad school instead of doing what they can to get a better education.

[elessar78]

Elessar78, may I ask a question of you? You said your relative was thinking of homeschooling because she is on an "all-natural, über-catholic path and this is the latest extension of that mindset." Do you understand why she connects homeschooling with being über-catholic?

I believe there's a segment that no longer feel that even Parochial schools are Catholic enough. I think it's a pervasive feeling with her that the worldview she wants to impart to her kids, whether it be dietary or academic, can only be imparted by her. Fair enough.

Could you say, "Evidently, all those private-school parents don't think enough of our American society to positively act and become involved. For that, shame on you. This is your country too, even though you are hiding from it. Its still a free country, if you don't like the public institutions to that degree, then leave."

Sadly/Annoyingly, I think the "opting-out" is what IT IS all about. To me, it's a too good for you attitude, "because I know better". IF i'm opting out then I MUST know something that everyone else doesn't—but, to me, so far it's not really the case.

I think that around here, many families do actively choose against the city's public schools. The most common way that choice is expressed is in buying a house to move to in another public school system. I don't think anyone insists they should fix the bad school instead of doing what they can to get a better education.

This is everywhere. I don't think that's the case here or in general, that it's a protest against the quality of public schools. Frankly, I don't believe that it's about the quality of the academics—more about indoctrinating the kids.