Home School?

I was just curious as to how many on FC home school their children? We have been doing so for our three children for 6 years now and can't imagine their getting an education any other way. They score in the 99 percentile on the Iowa Skills test each year and are much more knowledgeable than their pubic(government) and private school playmates. We also like the fact that we can control their social life better by selecting the friends they make rather than them making friends with someone just because they are in the same zip code and in their class at school. And with church, their equestrian activities, piano and swimming they get a full social life.

 

I'm with Uro on this, and the above sentence scares the hell out of me.

Early socialization is one of the biggest aspects of regular schooling (unless, of course, you plan on 'controlling' every aspect of their social lives forever) and I always found that the weirdest cats in high school were home-schooled previously. They did great on tests, but they were also pretty fragile when it came to other people.

C.

 

Uro decided to not stir the pot and deleted.

 

"We also like the fact that we can control their social life better by selecting the friends they make rather than them making friends with someone just because they are in the same zip code and in their class at school."

 

It's just too easy.

 

cmy was home schooled and look how he turned out !! spends all his time on f chat checking out my wifes cans, and changing images [ jimmies head on diff bodies ] and drooloing in the bikini threads. but i think hes feeling much better now.

 

I was home schooled my 8th grade year during Middle School. My teachers were so bad that year when I started that my parents actually pulled me out. It was a good experience for me!

 

Why exactly do you do this?

 

My partner in my building does this with all 3 of his kids (they are 12-16 now). And they score in the 90 percentile range on the mandatory provincial tests. He says he does it to remove them from the low standards and negative social influences often found in our schools nowadays.....as well as the political slant that is surrepticiously imparted in classes nowadays (I never saw "ANY" media articles about a US school teacher saying Kerry was bad or Kerry should be killed or Kerry's policies about foreign affairs are wrong....but I did see lots of articles about teachers in the US saying this exact same crap about GWB during the last election for example).

They seem like great kids to me.....

Good for you Frank !!....I've always liked your posts here but this one speaks volumes about your character regardless of your political leanings (and I don't know or care what those are).

 

Is this a joke? Controlling all social influences?


You're in for a rude awakening when they go to college and you can't oversee and control everything they do-- and I'm sure they'll have the same rude awakening when they find that not everyone in this world are what mommy and daddy deam acceptable.


Sorry Frank but I feel bad for your kids.

hahahahahhahahahaahh!!!!

 

Is anyone surprised by this? Sadly, I'm not.

 

The Iowa isn't exactly the best test of achievement. Go to the Texas Education Agency website and give them a released TAKS test for their grade level. It's pretty well normed to national standards, given who's the current president and all.
It's pretty easy to teach lower levels, but starting about junior high you really need to have specific skills both in the material and how to teach it. Most teachers I know at those levels have at least some graduate work, if not masters or better.
We get kids all the time where I teach from home school (or small private school equivalent) and parents are always shocked that they are behind("but my testing says they're a genious!?), especially socially. My high school changed demographics in a big way my freshman year and my folks offered to let me go to private school. I stayed and the exposure to all kinds of people was just as important as what I learned in class.

 

I don't know the educational envirnoment where you are, but I hope you are not "teaching towards the test". And if you are, at least teach towards standardized tests that matter much more - the SATs. Hopefully you're doing/ or going to do that.

 

I've always wondered what happens to these kids when they are finally away from home in college. What happens when a bully picks on them or some peers offer them some liquor or some pot. The real world is in front of them and mom and dad aren't there to hold their hand. The parents say that "my kids know better". Get a clue.
Also, when the parents "select" their kids friends, what is the criteria? Black or white, income level of parents, religeous beliefs, fat or thin?

 

A lot of my friends were home schooled. Many were involved with many "social" things but when they got to college they still had bad social skills and many were unable to make decisions for themselves. I know a few that have made it very far in life at young ages and they are doing great but are still having problems being independent.

 

Wow! I amazed at the harshness of some of the posts. I have experienced all three aspects of education (private, home, and public). I am now a senior in University and, as my professors and friends will attest, I do very well socially. The one thing I had to overcome was the immaturity of my peers. I was raised around adults, and thus acted like one. My teachers loved me. Even those who had biases against home-schoolers (I remember my freshman English teacher specifically) found that I was far beyond my peers in English, spelling, vocabulary, etc.... The one drawback I found to homeschooling is that the kid(s) gets more emphasis on what the parent is good at. That's why I was so good at spelling and vocab. That was my mom's strong suit. I did alright in Math...but that wasn't because of my parent's ability. That was because I picked it up well out of books. I was never "taught to the test" and I did well in both the ACT (28) and SAT (1200); not because of being guided by it, but by a good overall education.

I know I may be an odd case, but don't jump all over homeschoolers. With the right amount of socialization (and it IS up to the parents to control that), homeschoolers can turn out incredible. Its a challenge to homeschool, and I commend any parents who are willing to do so.

 

I hung out with Josh this evening, and I will attest to the fact that he very close to normal! Which is far better than the rest of us, who I would classify as "passing for normal."

 

You never know, maybe they will become the bully. The center of their world throughout their education, they were the "king" of their school. FWIW, I do think many kids may have difficulty adapting to college life after being home-schooled, although conventionally educated people do as well. Probably slightly different issues, but everyone is a little lost their first semester.

Now to "selecting" friends. All parents do it in one form or another. A parent that forbids contact based on the criteria you describe above (she's ugly, he's fat, he is Latino, she is a Mormon, etc) is performing a huge disservice to their child. Rather, the criteria should be whether the parents judge the friends to be "good" kids or not. Allowing children to run with the bad crowd, in time means that they become the bad crowd themselves.

 

Normal?? Huh? Uh...no. Don't quite think so. You just don't know me all that well. *evil chuckle here*

 

FYI, as far as socialization, the school environment is what is abnormal, not homeschooling. Where else is everyone herded together based solely on their age? It is not normal to group people together by age like the grade system in government and private schools do and cater their learning on that basis. Students should be grouped by their abilities instead, which is what is done at the college level anyway. Once they get to college and the work force they will be learning and working with people of all ages, not just people their own age. For example, we have attorneys in our office that are in their 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, and 60s, just as I had in college and law school. My children as well as most home schooled children I know are much better equipped to converse with adults in meaningful conversations than herd schooled children who often see adults as "the enemy". One of my children is working two grade levels ahead in math while another is two grade levels ahead in language arts...its up to their own abilitiy to move ahead at a pace they are capable of...unlike in schools whereas you only move ahead with the rest of the class, i.e., at the rate of the dumbest kid in class. Our second grader is reading at an 8th grade level. Since we home school our children for academic reasons, we are well pleased with their progress. We use a "classic" education method that includes great literature, language, art, music and mathmetics. And just when did our society buy into the theory that schools know how to best socialize our children anyway? I suppose it is because most in our society seem to care more about money which forces both parents to work which leaves the schools as day care for the parents. Sad, but true. Who else would you suggest control your own children's social life anyway? As a parent I am the one responsible for my childrens' well being, not some government or private school employee. I refuse to just give up the control of my children to teachers and administrators that I really know little about . And, we do not steer our children to certain friends because of race, family finances or creed, but rather based on the character of those friends...that's smart parenting...period. IMHO, that is much better than my child becoming best buddies with someone they sit next to at school and I know nothing about them or their parents who could be drug addicts or worst. Our children do have friends that go to government and private schools though. And, when our children have seen their school books that were suprised at what a low level they were tailored to. And those herd schooled friends were unable to even comprehend what our children were doing as school work compared to what they were doing. Yet another benefit of home schooling is "learning vacations". For example,, since all three of our children studied American History this past school year, we recently took an American History vacation that included Monticello, Ash Lawn, Washington, D.C., Mt. Vernon, Yorktown, Jamestown and Williamsburg. It was great seeing their minds "click" with the academic knowledge they gained during the school year becoming more concrete when they saw and touched some of the places and things they had studied over the year. In two years they will all be taking World History and we plan to take a World History vacation to Europe, Eygpt and Israel. FYI, most of the highest achievers in the world including our own founding fathers were home schooled up until the point they went to college. And,universities are now avid recruiters of home schoolers because they have found that they make the most successful students. Home schoolers have higher standardized test scores and graduate from college with higher GPAs with a higher graduation and advanced degree rate than herd schooled children...that is a statistical fact. And, for those who may not know, home schooling has grown by leaps and bounds over the last few years, mostly in families that have at least one parent with an advanced degree. As a result thereof, there have been numerous organizations that have started up to assist home school parents in areas they are not equipped to teaching. Here in the Atlanta area for example, there is a group of Ga. Tech. and GSU science and math professors that teach home schoolers subjects such as lab sciences, algebra, trig., ect... and that is how our children are being taught in those areas. That being said, home schooling is not for every child or parent. The child has to be a self starter who can work well on their own and be goal oriented. And, the parent must have the patience of Job and the ability to teach...and that would be my wife...not me. If you have been considering home schooling your children, give it a try; I suspect you will be well pleased with the results now and in the future.

 

What does "taught to the test" mean?

I know kids of longtime friends who were intermittently home schooled and are doing fine in high school and college.

If I were doing it all over again and had kids I would probably be home schooling them, based upon:

--What I see when I drive past a public high school at 4 PM.

--Knowing that very heavy religious indoctrination is part of the curriculum in most of the private schools around here.

 

My 9 year old took this test a few weeks ago and only missed 1 question! 1! Not bad for a kid in public schools.

Both of my kids were in private school until the last year when I pulled them out. The reasons were many, but socialization had a lot to do with it. The private school class size was about 10, sounds great huh? Not so great when you realize that half the kids in the class are there because they have to be, they don't do so well in public schools. Also not so great when your kids best friend lives 20 miles away. It's kind of hard to set up afternoon play dates.

We are friends with a family that does home schooling, and some of the points brought up here apply to them. Their kids are not socially adept at all. They have 3 girls, and all three are so shy it's almost painful. They are very polite, and they speak when they're spoken to, but it's almost like they're not kids. It takes them an hour to warm up to my kids, even though they've known them their whole lives. Their social circle is so small, they don't do well when they get outside of it. At Easter all the neighborhood kids gathered for the annual egg hunt. My son was near one of this familys girls, waiting for the start. Another kid started bullying the girl, and she had no idea what to do. The bully wasn't even being that bad, but this poor girl froze. My son bailed her out and shooed the bully away. She's 10 years old and this looked like the first bully she'd ever seen.

 

I believe that some home schooled students do well because of it, some do well in spite of it. Some don't do well, just like in "regular schools".

The role of the parent is important, no matter which way you cut it

 

As to those shy three girls, they would have likely been just as shy in a herd school environment, only abused by so-called bullys more often. I went to government school and we had both shy and outspoken girls and boys that had never been home schooled...didn't you ? All of my children are too outspoken IMHO rather than shy! If the parents of home schoolers are active as my wife and I are, the children get more than enough outside contact. In our case, between Sunday school, the barn-Hunter/Jumper shows, music/piano, karate, and our own friends' kids they have interaction with 50 or more other children on a regular basis. The advantage we have is that we get to pick who they socialize who have parents that we trust. And I believe our own home schooled founding fathers created the best and so far longest lasting "pluralistic" society, i.e. the USA.. Putting a group of the same aged children together for six hours a day does not teach them how to get along with others anyway. In any event, I want my children to know my values and philosophy on life before they are taught those of others anyway. That way they can sift through the thrash and learn from the enlightened on their own without the thrash being pushed down their throats by teachers; especially in their younger years until 14 or 15 or so. And as far as that 1986 study, home schooling has changed A LOT since then. In 1986 a majority of people that home schooled did so for religious reasons. In 2005, while some still home school for that reason, a greater majority now do so for academic reasons . That is what has caused all of the "home school hangouts", which are like curriculum coffee shops with learning labs, lab science study halls and other home school "tudor" labs to spring up all over the USA. But, like I said, home schooling is not for everyone...it is for us though.