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Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

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Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#551

Post by Kubuxu »

portaouflop wrote: post #539
dijit wrote: post #389

OK I guess I’m going to go against the deluge of comments here; And give an appreciable reason instead of denigrating those who might choose this. The context, though, I am British. I grew up in Britain. I went to British school. I can’t speak universally about my experience, (even within all of Britain), because it’s my experience which is in one small area of the country. However, school, for me, was by far the sin…

I hated school as well but I would still disagree on almost all points with you. But I was lucky enough to go to a good public school, found many lifelong friends there, learned a ton of aside skills that help me now in my personal and professional life. I think it’s really sad that more and more people opt out of society, either in school or elsewhere. I can understand it to some extent but I think everyone will com…

A lot of people don’t opt-out themselves, but the society opts them out. Be it a bully or stigma in school, not fitting in high-school or uni.

Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#552

Post by dgfitz »

jamiedumont wrote: post #468
JohnCClarke wrote: post #463

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always assumed that the babies grown in test tubes and graded into alphas to epsilons in Huxley's "Brave New World" are simply a metaphor for children going throught the UK school system. In that case the homeschooled are akin to the "savage" in the story. EDIT: corrected spelling!

I've not encountered "Brave New World" but I love (and can see) the metaphor!

I read it when I was a kid… a homeschooled kid!

Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#553

Post by neilv »

> How do you expect to change the world for the better when you’ve been taught from an early age, subconsciously or not, to hold most of the people around you in contempt? 4

Not everyone would recognize this, and be willing to call it out.

I wonder whether that came from the writer's religious homeschooling, and if so, whether it came from learning from decent people who taught and embodied the better Christian values? Or from a reaction to the distancing that can kinda be implicit (e.g., hints that people not in the religious group are a less-enlightened Other)? Or both?

Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#554

Post by maxehmookau »

pie_flavor wrote: post #536
maxehmookau wrote: post #490

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because there's a good reason not to trust the experts I hate this. Where else do we get knowledge from if not experts and academics in their fields? That's how humans grow our collective knowledge. People learn, gather evidence, build knowledge and then share it. The people who have done the learning over many years are called "experts". Those are the people I want to learn from, no? > conservative "evidence based…

When the experts say that algebra should not be taught in 8th grade, and the experts say that guessing at words instead of sounding them out is a better way to learn to read, and the experts say that calc can be replaced with 'data science' which is actually just data literacy, and so on and so forth, I'm not really interested in how the precise definition of 'experts' actually refers to something about 'growing our…

> your best options for guaranteeing that you avoid it are homeschooling

Accepting your premise that "public schooling is fucked" (I disagree) there's absolutely zero guarantee that homeschooling is any better for any particular child. It's a completely random chance whether your parent, or whichever potentially untrained person, is going to provide you with an education that sets you up for society, work and the wider world.

Public schools at least have defined curricula, governance structures, complaints procedures, _accountability_ in some form.

Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#555

Post by strken »

Freak_NL wrote: post #534
zozbot234 wrote: post #524

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Worse, the punishment for being in a fight was the same whether you started it or you were just beaten up. If you made the fight get noticed, you got punished. I'm not saying that this is anything close to optimal , but it should be noted that under this system (which is reminiscent of the way ancient Chinese criminal law worked, per Legal Systems Very Different from Ours [0]) people who get beat up should still re…

> […] so it's highly unlikely that anyone will want to beat you up again. That is, unfortunately, not how this works. The only ways to stop bullying are to be able to stand up to the bullies, which usually is not a realistic proposition (you wouldn't get bullied in the first place if you could) and can lead to further escalation (right on up to shootings or stabbings); to have a very, very empathic teacher who will p…

From my experience with school bullying it was an entirely social problem. If the rest of the classroom agreed that you shouldn't be bullied then there were few ways for a handful of kids to go against that consensus, and most of them would backfire on the would-be bully.

Of course, if you're young and you have no friends, good luck getting your peers to think you're worth defending.

Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#556

Post by csa »

GrantMoyer wrote: post #189
daft_pink wrote: post #36

Personally, I have high functioning autism. I would do terrible at interpersonal relationships, but then get near perfect scores on all the tests. Teachers would anticipate that I would be terrible and then when I got perfect scores on all the tests, they would be pissed off. I think there are a lot of tech people that are neurodivergent and had terrible experiences in school and would love to avoid my child having t…

> Also, I’m not super happy about the extreme views on race, sex and religion that are going through the school system. Maybe I'm living under a rock; what extreme views are going through the school system?

> Maybe I'm living under a rock; what extreme views are going through the school system?

Not op and not taking a stance on any of these here, but:

1. Critical race theory (CRT)

2. Gender fluidity

3. Endorsement and use of Christianity/Bible in public schools

These are all hot-button issues in education today, at least in some states and districts.

Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#557

Post by Foobar8568 »

pie_flavor wrote: post #536
maxehmookau wrote: post #490

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> because there's a good reason not to trust the experts I hate this. Where else do we get knowledge from if not experts and academics in their fields? That's how humans grow our collective knowledge. People learn, gather evidence, build knowledge and then share it. The people who have done the learning over many years are called "experts". Those are the people I want to learn from, no? > conservative "evidence based…

When the experts say that algebra should not be taught in 8th grade, and the experts say that guessing at words instead of sounding them out is a better way to learn to read, and the experts say that calc can be replaced with 'data science' which is actually just data literacy, and so on and so forth, I'm not really interested in how the precise definition of 'experts' actually refers to something about 'growing our…

Don't forget the we can't teach the 4 operations in first year of primary school. Meanwhile, all the books from 1950 have them by lesson 2 and school was mandatory at that time.

We homeschooled our kid for a few months due to her marvelous classmates, teacher and director, she wrote and learnt more than 4 years worth of study in Switzerland. Unfortunately she is highly sociable and we couldn't give her the constant "stream of kids" all day long.

Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#558

Post by ThatMedicIsASpy »

wccrawford wrote: post #495
dijit wrote: post #389

OK I guess I’m going to go against the deluge of comments here; And give an appreciable reason instead of denigrating those who might choose this. The context, though, I am British. I grew up in Britain. I went to British school. I can’t speak universally about my experience, (even within all of Britain), because it’s my experience which is in one small area of the country. However, school, for me, was by far the sin…

I went to a school that had a lot of good teachers, and I learned a lot from them. But when it came to bullies, the school was just as you described. Worse, the punishment for being in a fight was the same whether you started it or you were just beaten up. If you made the fight get noticed, you got punished. It was quite clear that they had no interest in stopping the fights, just in making sure they didn't get repor…

The only true advice I could give to a child with bullying issues is physical violence - as fast as possible. It is sad. It doesn't take many humans to make school/life/work miserable.

Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#559

Post by martindbp »

Nursie wrote: post #393
dijit wrote: post #389

OK I guess I’m going to go against the deluge of comments here; And give an appreciable reason instead of denigrating those who might choose this. The context, though, I am British. I grew up in Britain. I went to British school. I can’t speak universally about my experience, (even within all of Britain), because it’s my experience which is in one small area of the country. However, school, for me, was by far the sin…

I think you're right to start by saying this isn't universal worldwide, or even within Britain. You describe hell. But I don't believe that your experience is dominant or even that common in the UK. Which generation are you from?

Even if it's not hell, it could be so much better. It could be a place that kids actually look forward to going every day. Instead, we put them through 12 years of mandatory low grade torture where nothing they do is connected to the real world, their interest or curiosity, and when they're done they're launched into a world of AGI and ASI where none of what they learned is remotely enough for them to contribute to society in any way.

Re: Why is homeschooling becoming fashionable?

#560

Post by purplethinking »

Arainach wrote: post #274
pj_mukh wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a better question is: How did the median get so much better over 150 years, and why can't it keep getting better? 150 years ago, the average person was illiterate, poorer (in all senses of the word) and less connected to the world around them. Over a 100 year old grind, schooling fixed all that. Why can't it keep going? So the outlier, super special "phenom" today is the median of tomorrow.

>Why can't it keep going? Because an educated populace is harder for the ultrarich to control and abuse, because an educated populace with free time can revolt against those in power, and because as a consequence of those two things ultrarich conservatives have consolidated ownership of media and used it to defund education and convince the population that funding education is bad.

The fact that you believe the ultra rich conspire to control and abuse the uneducated shows that you are part of that group of average people parents want their kids to stay away from.
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