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Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education

#161

Post by brightball »

MadcapJake wrote: post #154
brightball wrote: post #7

When I moved into my current house about 10 years ago, the family next door home schooled. I'd never known any home schoolers before and definitely had some notions about how terrible it must be until I learned about it. This family was part of a home school group with other families. The kids went to different houses every day and had an instructor focus on 1 subject for half of the day, mixed in with free time, dep…

It's like people are reinventing all the same stuff schools do at scale. Can't we be more efficient as a society? Not to mention the privilege that is draped over every detail of this setup.

Are big efficient schools better than lots of small schools?

Re: Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education

#162

Post by giantg2 »

MadcapJake wrote: post #154
brightball wrote: post #7

When I moved into my current house about 10 years ago, the family next door home schooled. I'd never known any home schoolers before and definitely had some notions about how terrible it must be until I learned about it. This family was part of a home school group with other families. The kids went to different houses every day and had an instructor focus on 1 subject for half of the day, mixed in with free time, dep…

It's like people are reinventing all the same stuff schools do at scale. Can't we be more efficient as a society? Not to mention the privilege that is draped over every detail of this setup.

"Can't we be more efficient as a society?"

Not the way government tends to work in US.

Re: Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education

#163

Post by fundad »

throwaway1777 wrote: post #46
outside1234 wrote: post #36

The problem with home schooling is that it is a solution for the rich and leaves all of the poor kids behind.

Yes it is. People forget this because they live in a bubble. It’s like remote work, nice for the laptop class, but not possible for the person growing your food and manufacturing your tesla.

Always nice to see a silly Elon quote

Re: Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education

#166

Post by doktrin »

akira2501 wrote: post #120
burcs wrote: post #27

We're homeschooling our kids. I was pretty against it at first, but seeing our education system degrade to the state it is today, and being honest about my schooling experience definitely opened me up to it. I think the biggest argument for schooling is the socialization aspect of it. I don't know about the rest of you but I was bullied pretty relentlessly throughout grade school and it completely changed my personal…

> That's not the socialization that I want for my kids. On the other hand, I'd definitely want my children to be familiar with it. Bullying is not something isolated to schools. I've seen it in nearly every social and political situation that exists at nearly every age group. In my estimation people are getting worse at identifying it and collectively we're getting worse at punishing it.

> Bullying is not something isolated to schools. I've seen it in nearly every social and political situation that exists at nearly every age group.

Unless you live in prison or a war zone I highly doubt you've witnessed "adult" bullying that remotely approaches the ferocity and cruelty some kids have to endure on a daily basis.

Re: Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education

#167

Post by ejb999 »

elil17 wrote: post #121
tivert wrote: post #15

> Many of America’s new home-schooled children have entered a world where no government official will ever check on what, or how well, they are being taught. Isn't escaping from those officials the whole point? Either because they're failing at their job or doing things that are disagreeable to some subset of the population?

But should you be able to totally escape from scrutiny? To me it seems very wrong to deny a child the opportunity to learn the things they'd need to function in society like reading, math, and science. Most homeschooling parents are teaching these things to there kids, but there are some who aren't. That ought to be stopped.

there are plenty of public schools, despite spending 10-15-$20K per student are also not teaching those things. THAT ought to be stopped.

Re: Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education

#168

Post by brightball »

arrowsmith wrote: post #153
lapetitejort wrote: post #137

I was home-schooled until high school. Long story short, it was a disaster. I bordered on having no education at all, on top of no socialization. I'm so fortunate I got at least four years of public school. I still think I suffer to this day. For parents who are thinking of home schooling your kids: best of luck to you. If you succeed, maybe your kids will be smarter. If you fail, you could be setting your kids up fo…

> a lifetime of stunted socialization skills and poor work habits. The joke's on you, I wasn't home-schooled and I still got both of those.

Is your username related to the actual program out of Toronto?

Re: Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education

#169

Post by plussed_reader »

burcs wrote: post #27

We're homeschooling our kids. I was pretty against it at first, but seeing our education system degrade to the state it is today, and being honest about my schooling experience definitely opened me up to it. I think the biggest argument for schooling is the socialization aspect of it. I don't know about the rest of you but I was bullied pretty relentlessly throughout grade school and it completely changed my personal…

Care to name the region of your 'degrading system' with your anecdote?

Re: Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education

#170

Post by biomcgary »

lapetitejort wrote: post #137

I was home-schooled until high school. Long story short, it was a disaster. I bordered on having no education at all, on top of no socialization. I'm so fortunate I got at least four years of public school. I still think I suffer to this day. For parents who are thinking of home schooling your kids: best of luck to you. If you succeed, maybe your kids will be smarter. If you fail, you could be setting your kids up fo…

Did you notice that the article highlights the rise of homeschooling co-ops? This is intentional on the part of the homeschooling movement. It improves both socialization and educational opportunities (e.g., shared lab equipment).

Rather than pearl clutching about individual anecdotes or doubling down on government control, I think states should provide direct funding to homeschool co-ops in addition to direct funding to families. That money and its positive effects on socialization and educational development will only work if governments keep their noses out of the details (i.e., parallels arguments for UBI).

My son is autistic and non-verbal. The local public school program that he would be in is overwhelmed. We hire a speech language pathologist to tutor him 3-4 hours a day in our home. That is only possible because of Arizona's support for homeschooling families. Homeschooling is a great outlet when standardization fails.

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