What do you think of homeschooling?

[Artiste]

Shasta, since you are a teacher, do you need to be a qualified teacher to home school your own kids in your state ?

[Kerry]

Like David, I too was brutalised by the bullies at school. Unlike David, however, I didn't have any avenging jocks at my school, to protect me. I'd like to think I wasn't necessarily an overtly effeminate child, but I was certainly gentle, delicate and artistic. For that reason, I was literally kicked around the school yard at every opportunity, sometimes within sight of teachers, who I remember turning away and pretending not to see what was happening (it was a long time ago).

Home schooling was unheard of when I was a child. If it had been available, I would have pleaded with my parents to home school me. Alas, however, it would have been to no avail, because neither of my parents would have had the qualifications to teach me.

[Jeff Wrangler]

Well, I don't see any option that really matches my opinion, so I'm not voting per se. And I feel, of course, I have to issue the caveat that I'm not raising children in a location with poor public schools.

Having said that, in general I'm against homeschooling because I believe going to school has an important role in socializing children to deal with the world outside the safety of the home. They have to learn to share the world with people of very different backgrounds and very different opinions than their parents. And I guess being away from home and parents all day in school probably helps in separating from the parents and developing an independent identity.

Of course these opinions were shaped by my own public school experience many years ago. While I received a good education, especially in language and literature, it wasn't a bed of rose petals even then.

[Clyde-B]

Does anybody understand why teachers look the other way as people get bullied?  Especially when the kids are little.  How are we doing the bullies any good if we let them believe these tactics work beyond the few years they are on the playground?  Shouldn't we start teaching them other options as early as possible?  Especially since Columbine and other school murders seem to be the revenge of the bullied.  We could nip two problems early.  And if we are truly going to socialize kids, then let's do it and not just talk about it.

[Marge_Innavera]

IMO homeschooling is sometimes the best choice, for reasons such as geography and the child's mental and physical health.

However, I worked for 7 years at a museum where we did formal school tours as a big part of the museum's income, and these tours included small groups of homeschoolers as well as homeschool groups just visiting on an informal basis. I saw somewhere around 10,000 schoolkids a year and probably more homeschoolers than parents of homeschoolers see.  And one thing that we all noticed was that overall, the homeschooled children were the worst behaved and had the least socialization.  The problems that repeated themselves most often involved children who couldn't stand not being the center of attention every minute and children as old as 8 or 9 who were suspicious and fearful of adults outside their families and kids whom you'd describe as "13 going on 7."

I'm not saying it's impossible to homeschool successfully but IMO parents consistently underestimate the impact of not having the kind of day-in-day-out socialization you get in even the most restrictive private or religious school. So I voted to keep it legal but have problems with it.

[Jeff Wrangler]

However, I worked for 7 years at a museum where we did formal school tours as a big part of the museum's income, and these tours included small groups of homeschoolers as well as homeschool groups just visiting on an informal basis. I saw somewhere around 10,000 schoolkids a year and probably more homeschoolers than parents of homeschoolers see.  And one thing that we all noticed was that overall, the homeschooled children were the worst behaved and had the least socialization.  The problems that repeated themselves most often involved children who couldn't stand not being the center of attention every minute and children as old as 8 or 9 who were suspicious and fearful of adults outside their families and kids whom you'd describe as "13 going on 7."

Thanks for that insight, Marge. You've demonstrated from experience what I only suspected.

Does anybody understand why teachers look the other way as people get bullied?  Especially when the kids are little.  How are we doing the bullies any good if we let them believe these tactics work beyond the few years they are on the playground?  Shouldn't we start teaching them other options as early as possible?  Especially since Columbine and other school murders seem to be the revenge of the bullied.  We could nip two problems early.  And if we are truly going to socialize kids, then let's do it and not just talk about it.

That's a good point, too, Clyde, and one about which I should ask a friend who teaches first grade. I can understand a reluctance in the upper or high school grades. A year or so ago we had a teacher here in Philadelphia who had to retire because he was badly hurt when a kid who was bigger than he was threw him against a wall. As for the primary grades, I'd be interested on some input into how teachers may be circumscribed in what they can and cannot do.

[serious crayons]

I believe homeschooling should be an option, and I can understand why some parents choose it.

I have often been dismayed by the negative things I've seen my kids absorb from their peers in school: the commercialism, materialism, homophobia, shallow celebrity culture, disrespect for authority, etc. Not that my sons are innocent little angels corrupted by the other kids -- heck, they probably exert it on the other kids at least as much as the other way around -- just that those are elements in the society we live in that run rampant in schools and that I wish I could shield them from.

But I can't. I'm not sure I even want to, because they have to live in that society eventually, anyway, and I'm not sure they can fully deal with it if they haven't any first-hand experience with it. And while I have often been dismayed at the negative aspects of their peer interaction, I think it has at least as many -- well, more, actually -- positive effects.

And I wouldn't have homeschooled my kids in a million years. We would not all have made it through alive. My sons are academically gifted and I have often been disappointed in their schools' abilities to nurture those skills, but on a full-time basis I don't think I could have done it well myself. Without the teaching skills, and without the example of other, more obedient kids, it would have been really, really hard.

But if my kids were bullied, or if I wanted to try to take on the monumental task of raising a child who does not subscribe to cultural values I
oppose, I'd like to have it as an option.

[Clyde-B]

I believe homeschooling should be an option, and I can understand why some parents choose it.

I have often been dismayed by the negative things I've seen my kids absorb from their peers in school: the commercialism, materialism, homophobia, shallow celebrity culture, disrespect for authority, etc. Not that my sons are innocent little angels corrupted by the other kids -- heck, they probably exert it on the other kids at least as much as the other way around -- just that those are elements in the society we live in that run rampant in schools and that I wish I could shield them from.

But I can't. I'm not sure I even want to, because they have to live in that society eventually, anyway, and I'm not sure they can fully deal with it if they haven't any first-hand experience with it. And while I have often been dismayed at the negative aspects of their peer interaction, I think it has at least as many -- well, more, actually -- positive effects.

And I wouldn't have homeschooled my kids in a million years. We would not all have made it through alive. My sons are academically gifted and I have often been disappointed in their schools' abilities to nurture those skills, but on a full-time basis I don't think I could have done it well myself. Without the teaching skills, and without the example of other, more obedient kids, it would have been really, really hard.

But if my kids were bullied, or if I wanted to try to take on the monumental task of raising a child who does not subscribe to cultural values I
oppose, I'd like to have it as an option.

How do homeschooled kids learn to think for themselves?  Running into those negative aspects and discussing them back and forth with parents would seem to me to be good training for evaluating opinions different from their own.  I wonder if home schooled kids wind up with similar attitudes to their parents and how they deal with it the first time somebody says, "You're full of shit!"

[serious crayons]

How do homeschooled kids learn to think for themselves?  Running into those negative aspects and discussing them back and forth with parents would seem to me to be good training for evaluating opinions different from their own.  I wonder if home schooled kids wind up with similar attitudes to their parents and how they deal with it the first time somebody says, "You're full of shit!"

I don't know. I know when I try to impart my own values to my kids, they often respond with "You're full of shit!" Not in those exact words, but still.

[Jeff Wrangler]

I don't know. I know when I try to impart my own values to my kids, they often respond with "You're full of shit!" Not in those exact words, but still.

Fresh kids. ...