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Yeah, one of those topics that never gets anywhere and only pushes all engaging opinionated people closer to the edge of World War III. Where do you stand on it?
I'm for it, I was homeschooled and feel I benefited from it a great deal. There are those who say 'oh homeschooled kids never leave the house, never make any friends and have no idea how to function properly in the real world'. I disagree...I always had friends on the block who went to public school and we all got together...wait for it...AFTER school, just like 'normal' kids do. Besides, it's certainly not like you NEVER find any antisocial kids in public school.
Then there's the academic side of it, which is a big part of it. I have neighbor kids that are in public school, the teachers know they're working below their grade level, but nothing's done about it. They hear the kids read words wrong every day and tell them they're doing it right. What's going to happen when these kids get out into the real world? Oh well, I guess it's not the teachers' problems so long as they don't have to have the same students again next year.
I've been called on sometimes to help them with their homework and one thing I noticed was that they were given the same spelling words to type up every day for the whole school week. When I was in school, we went through a different list every day. And when I was in school, I usually averaged 3 grades ahead of other people my age. Nobody, not even my own friends could believe it when I told them I was in the 3rd grade at 7 years old, and I never got what the big deal was.
There are people who are against homeschooling all the way, and I wonder how much research these people have actually done on it. One person actually said to me that kids had to go to public school instead of homeschool so they wouldn't end up like Jim Jones. And that would be a good argument...EXCEPT for the fact that Jim Jones went to and graduated from PUBLIC school. Some people say that homeschooled kids never leave the house...maybe in their little narrow world, but the fact remains the majority of homeschooled kids are involved in social activities just like the 'normal' kids, such as Boy Scouts, dance classes, sports, field trips, etc., and that would certainly defeat the argument that homeschooled kids never meet any other kids and never make friends.
And as for the argument some use that homeschooled kids can never function in the real world? We have people in this country who went to public school and when they apply for a job as a dishwasher don't use any soap or anything to scrub the dishes with, and use cold water. And there are the little nightmares you read about in the advice columns in the newspaper, 13 years old and can't even get a glass of water for themselves, they need mommy to bring it to them.
Now, naturally I don't think homeschooling is for everybody, but then neither is public school. The way I see it is, if public school was REALLY as great as everybody says it is, then homeschooling would've died out long ago, instead the numbers just increase every year. Now, since it can be so expensive (my books were $1,000 for every grade year) and time consuming, if the parents didn't think there was anything wrong with public school, I can't really see why they would spend all that time and money doing it at home.
And then, there are the naysayers that say religious nuts keep kids at home to brainwash them. Well that may be true in some cases, but that can also happen when they go to public school, and not necessarily just religious, there are other kinds of nuts in the world. I seem to recall reading about a mother who had five kids, all who went to public school, but they weren't allowed to watch TV or eat any kind of sugary snacks, and they couldn't do this, and they couldn't do that, and any time they DID go to a friend's house and break one of her rules, they always confessed to it and got punished anyway, and then one day they just killed her. Homeschooling doesn't come into that psychotic equation anywhere.
In short (too late, I know), I liked homeschooling, and if I had kids, I'd do it with them. In my opinion there are many advantages to it. There is no exact schedule, we always worked the 8-3 schedule like the public schools did, but it's not the only time you can do your work. AND, after clocking out at 3 P.M., we were done for the day, no 'homework', which is especially good because today there are more and more stories of kids who do it right after school until dinner and then after dinner until bed and then have to finish it the next day to start all over again. Each student has their own set of books, which is more than can be said for the public school in my area, and you buy the books, you don't rent them for the semester, so at the end of the grade you still have them. And there is none of this 'well you failed but we'll pass you onto the next grade anyway'...when I was in school anyway, you didn't even need an F, a D alone would warrant a makeup test the teacher would be only too happy to send. Then you consider the amount of individual time that can be paid per student. In a public classroom you have, what? 30 kids or more...and then you separate them by the prodigies, the normal students and the slow students, if there's even enough time to figure out who's who, the teachers still don't have enough time to work with all the students that need the individual help, but at home there's no overcrowding.
That's my two bits on it anyway, how about everybody else?
I'm for it, I was homeschooled and feel I benefited from it a great deal. There are those who say 'oh homeschooled kids never leave the house, never make any friends and have no idea how to function properly in the real world'. I disagree...I always had friends on the block who went to public school and we all got together...wait for it...AFTER school, just like 'normal' kids do. Besides, it's certainly not like you NEVER find any antisocial kids in public school.
Then there's the academic side of it, which is a big part of it. I have neighbor kids that are in public school, the teachers know they're working below their grade level, but nothing's done about it. They hear the kids read words wrong every day and tell them they're doing it right. What's going to happen when these kids get out into the real world? Oh well, I guess it's not the teachers' problems so long as they don't have to have the same students again next year.
I've been called on sometimes to help them with their homework and one thing I noticed was that they were given the same spelling words to type up every day for the whole school week. When I was in school, we went through a different list every day. And when I was in school, I usually averaged 3 grades ahead of other people my age. Nobody, not even my own friends could believe it when I told them I was in the 3rd grade at 7 years old, and I never got what the big deal was.
There are people who are against homeschooling all the way, and I wonder how much research these people have actually done on it. One person actually said to me that kids had to go to public school instead of homeschool so they wouldn't end up like Jim Jones. And that would be a good argument...EXCEPT for the fact that Jim Jones went to and graduated from PUBLIC school. Some people say that homeschooled kids never leave the house...maybe in their little narrow world, but the fact remains the majority of homeschooled kids are involved in social activities just like the 'normal' kids, such as Boy Scouts, dance classes, sports, field trips, etc., and that would certainly defeat the argument that homeschooled kids never meet any other kids and never make friends.
And as for the argument some use that homeschooled kids can never function in the real world? We have people in this country who went to public school and when they apply for a job as a dishwasher don't use any soap or anything to scrub the dishes with, and use cold water. And there are the little nightmares you read about in the advice columns in the newspaper, 13 years old and can't even get a glass of water for themselves, they need mommy to bring it to them.
Now, naturally I don't think homeschooling is for everybody, but then neither is public school. The way I see it is, if public school was REALLY as great as everybody says it is, then homeschooling would've died out long ago, instead the numbers just increase every year. Now, since it can be so expensive (my books were $1,000 for every grade year) and time consuming, if the parents didn't think there was anything wrong with public school, I can't really see why they would spend all that time and money doing it at home.
And then, there are the naysayers that say religious nuts keep kids at home to brainwash them. Well that may be true in some cases, but that can also happen when they go to public school, and not necessarily just religious, there are other kinds of nuts in the world. I seem to recall reading about a mother who had five kids, all who went to public school, but they weren't allowed to watch TV or eat any kind of sugary snacks, and they couldn't do this, and they couldn't do that, and any time they DID go to a friend's house and break one of her rules, they always confessed to it and got punished anyway, and then one day they just killed her. Homeschooling doesn't come into that psychotic equation anywhere.
In short (too late, I know), I liked homeschooling, and if I had kids, I'd do it with them. In my opinion there are many advantages to it. There is no exact schedule, we always worked the 8-3 schedule like the public schools did, but it's not the only time you can do your work. AND, after clocking out at 3 P.M., we were done for the day, no 'homework', which is especially good because today there are more and more stories of kids who do it right after school until dinner and then after dinner until bed and then have to finish it the next day to start all over again. Each student has their own set of books, which is more than can be said for the public school in my area, and you buy the books, you don't rent them for the semester, so at the end of the grade you still have them. And there is none of this 'well you failed but we'll pass you onto the next grade anyway'...when I was in school anyway, you didn't even need an F, a D alone would warrant a makeup test the teacher would be only too happy to send. Then you consider the amount of individual time that can be paid per student. In a public classroom you have, what? 30 kids or more...and then you separate them by the prodigies, the normal students and the slow students, if there's even enough time to figure out who's who, the teachers still don't have enough time to work with all the students that need the individual help, but at home there's no overcrowding.
That's my two bits on it anyway, how about everybody else?
). Education and socialization do not need to be integrated. School is a place to be educated and it seems since that has failed, people are contriving all of these other reasons to go there. Well, if I wanted those reasons, I'd have my kid join a club. Group schooling, IMO, is just a failed experiment. Sure, if a parent can't homeschool, it's understandable that they need regular school. But I can't recommend homeschooling enough. IMO, it teaches you everything that "regular school" teaches you, and more, without the distractions. 
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