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Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

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Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#21

Post by johngalt »

If you are involved parents, it is difficult to make a wrong choice.

There is nothing wrong with homeschooling and it works best when you have a network of people who are doing the same to add-in social opportunities. The only thing that I would be a little concerned about in your specific situation is the timelines. Transitions are the hard part. Setting up the homeschooling methods/practices/habits, and then switching back to traditional school methods/practices/habits. Homeschooling for just 1-2 years eats up a lot of time in transition.

If you have a decent public school option. Consider participating in it. Get involved, volunteer, give feedback in the school board meetings. Take however much time you planned to spend on homeschooling and invest it there. Both your child and others will benefit significantly. However, don't sacrifice yourself or your kids to try and save a bad situation. It also means that socially there will be some pre-existing friends for that first year of high school.

Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#22

Post by spondylosaurus »

samsin wrote: post #16
aristofun wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know why people downvote this. Am I missing something or everyone agrees that there are no gender related or ideology issues in modern schools at all?

There are ideology issues in every stream of education. I went to a religious high school where the majority of students came out of it as atheist/agnostic despite their parents or teachers intentions. I think that’s more valuable than reaching the same conclusion because your parents told you to.

Nearly every LGBT person I know (myself included!) was raised by straight, cisgender parents.

You can only impose so many opinions on kids; they grow up and become their own people.

Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#23

Post by marssaxman »

MrDrMcCoy wrote: post #18

I don't have kids of my own, but was homeschooled all the way through and it was a great experience for me. My parents barely needed to be involved for the high school years except to get me resources I needed or to check my work. For subjects that my parents couldn't teach, they either enrolled me in co-op classes that I would attend a couple times a week or a video-led course that was offered by an instructor that…

My experience was similar. I could complain about the amount of time wasted on religious topics, but even there, the practice in reading, synthesizing, and writing was ultimately valuable.

Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#24

Post by contingencies »

The school makes a huge difference. We tried two, and the difference was like night and day. I learned about the superior option from a friend who was a school principal on her long service leave (year off). She previously did inspection of trouble students, so had her finger on the pulse. She let me know where to look, and it was a great help. So maybe call up the local education office and have an off the record chat with the people who inspect/resolve issues with home school children's learning, those people will know where the best programs are. In our case, out of state.

Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#25

Post by olliej »

aristofun wrote: post #10
ClassyJacket wrote: post #5

[flagged]

I don't know why people downvote this. Am I missing something or everyone agrees that there are no gender related or ideology issues in modern schools at all?

I assume the downvotes are because that phrasing is dog whistling for “I am homo/transphobic”.

Consider other variations along the same lines: “gender equality ideology” or “race equality ideology”.

The inference is “I am opposed to this thing existing”. Generally people who bring up this topic, or bring it up in this way have no problem with the topics at hand if they don’t disagree with their world view.

For example none of the “lgbt books are sexual and children need to be protected from them” have any problem with straight relationships in children’s books, yet an non-straight relationship is presented as if it were inherently pornographic.

Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#26

Post by eqvinox »

For the sake of perspective/completeness: No — homeschooling is illegal in my country. (Though I wouldn't do it even if it was legal.)

(The thread title is "Do You Homeschool?", as opposed to "How Do You Homeschool?" or "What are your experiences homeschooling?")

Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#27

Post by fiftyacorn »

We home-school my autistic daughter as school never worked and affected her mental health, and is going ok. We adopt the unschooling approach - the structure of formal learning doesnt work and she blitzes thru topics

Ive seen an increase in home schooling in the UK since Covid - especially amongst ND kids. I think online schooling showed them they can learn without the aspects of school that they found really hard.

There was a discussion on HN a few weeks ago on home schooling and it descended into criticism due to its association with religion and a path to teach creationism, or not educated women. This doesnt happen as much in the UK and i felt the discussion didnt cover the positives of home ed

Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#28

Post by chrispop »

johngalt wrote: post #21

If you are involved parents, it is difficult to make a wrong choice. There is nothing wrong with homeschooling and it works best when you have a network of people who are doing the same to add-in social opportunities. The only thing that I would be a little concerned about in your specific situation is the timelines. Transitions are the hard part. Setting up the homeschooling methods/practices/habits, and then switch…

> If you are involved parents, it is difficult to make a wrong choice.

I think this is true for so many other areas of parenting. I might print that out.

Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#29

Post by bitlax »

Yup. My kids are ahead of their peers academically and socially, and it's been a lot of fun. My advice to start would be to start by compiling as many resources as possible. Look at different schools and school systems and look for their grade-level objectives. Learn about high-achieving students and take a look at the resources they use. Brainstorm about what school can be, and what you can do with the tremendous flexibility you've afforded yourself. Set up goals to track your progress. Acknowledge that your child will have strengths and weaknesses. I have a lot to say on the subject that won't fit here, but I think it's hard to do worse than the alternatives if you have an ambitious plan going in.

Re: Ask HN: Do you homeschool?

#30

Post by loehnsberg »

We homeschool our two kids for two years now, because both had made bad experiences in the conventional school system.

It took us a while to find our pace, but it is going very well so far. There is plenty of homeschooling material out there plus a rising number of distance learning curricula that you can pick from.

I recommend that you take a look at the school curriculum of the high school that your child will potentially join and work backwards from there. For the most part, prerequisites will boil down to language comprehension, as well as science and math :)

You as instructor will have to prepare though. We have workbooks for grammar and math, but we let them choose what books they want to read. We also have science material, like electronics kits, geologic samples, microscope, models of the human body, a few apps for geography, etc. Once a week, they meet with a private tutor.

We do not have a fixed schedule, because both kids do a lot of sports and we want to let them play and roam when they're in the mood. We usually let them chose when to work on something but require school work before screen time. We also use a point system where they receive a sticker for each completed task. When they're done with a month worth of stickers, they can pick something small from the toy store, but the stickers also help them to see what they've accomplished.

This is what worked for us, but I recommend that you try out different strategies and see what works best for you and your child. Becoming a home teacher can be a challenge, because you'll have to help your kid cross that motivational barrier quite so often and that will naturally result in conflict. Just keep in mind that the relationship to your child is more important than whether you achieved all of your daily schooling targets.

Good luck!

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