For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
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Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
#62> Home-schooled children have attended Ivy League schools and won national spelling bees. They have also been the victims of child abuse and severe neglect. Some are taught using the classics of ancient Greece, others with Nazi propaganda. So ... just like kids in public school? Somewhat orthogonal to the article: In my state a lot of people were forced to home-school during Covid, and a significant percentage of the…
> I've known homeschooled kids that are easily 2 grades ahead of where they would be at a typical public school - and with no social shortcomings whatsoever, but they may be outliers as the parents were brilliant themselves.
I've never met a single person like this. I have met quite a few whose parents were dumber than stumps and had weird religious reasons for homeschooling their kids. The result was extremely poorly socialized, super-dumb kids who never progressed past the education level of their parents. They mostly moved to public school for high school because they wanted to play varsity sports, and they got their heads handed to them in class because they were several years behind their classmates. It's hard to learn in a class when you don't understand anything that the class is being taught and everyone thinks you're stupid to boot. One of them moved out of state immediately out of high school because he was so embarrassed at people's perception of him.
Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
> If there is a subject where that is the case, I do not know what it would be. Once they're past the age of 7 or 8, most or all children are capable of what they would be at older ages. I don't think, for instance, that an 8 yr old learning to read is slower at it than one learning that for the first time at age 14. From personal experience: I first encountered differential equations in highschool, while preparing f…
It was the same for me with stochastic processes. Most likely has nothing to do with age, but simply the fact that it was the second time you’ve encountered it. Your brain spent 2 years subconsciously processing it.
Yes it’s going to be a lot easier for you than the people seeing it for the first time who have to spend a bunch of time cranking equations.
Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
#64We are in our ninth year of homeschooling. My wife and I attended private and public schools and grew up with typical biases against homeschooling, e.g. they lack social skills. When we got married, we always assumed we'd send our kids to traditional schools. What we learned, though, is that homeschooling has changed since we were in school. Back then, it was a niche, and the sort of parents who chose to homeschool u…
Just as a counterpoint... I was homeschooled from 2nd grade until sophomore year of high school. I played sports the entire time (was the captain of various teams), had plenty of friends, and was pretty social. Even still, I felt like my social skills were significantly stunted when compared to others my age. It took a long time for me to feel comfortable just hanging out with others because most of my social time was spent doing activities.
Was in high school ~10 years ago and the other homeschool families we knew were a mix of farm/ultra religious low social skill homeschoolers and fairly normal folks with decent social skills.
TLDR: I think there is a social aspect of being in school that homeschool kids miss out on, regardless of how many extracurricular or sports they may do.
Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
#65Why are people in the US so against public schools? I am someone who did not really enjoy “school” and found it anxiety inducing but I still see the benefits of it. In public school you are forced to mingle with the people of your generation. The ones who will inevitably go on to run the country in whatever big or small way. The objective of public school is to break down the regional identities of old and assimilate…
Do you think we should do the same with adults? Many of these arguments are also used by proponents of military service. The funny thing about school is that almost no adults would be willing to be subjected to it. Confined to a building every day for the best years of your life, required to study what the government decides should fill your head, and a persistent risk of being beaten up. Delightful. Ultimately the m…
Tell me you've never experienced manual labor without telling me you've never experience manual labor.
Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
The argument about lack of socialization from failure to attend public school might have some basis. But thinking back, I came out of the public schools with some pretty anti social behaviors and attitudes that I picked up there. Being cool is so important at that age in that setting. I often wonder what life would have been like had I been taken out say, age 12 or 13 and given a more solid education to match my natu…
Is public school really that cruel these days? I have a 10 year old, and everyone in her class seems so wholesome and... exceedingly tolerant for lack of a better phrase. Compared to when I was a 10 year old where public school was a Lord Of The Flies thunderdome with bullying, and shoving people into lockers, and fights, and in-groups and out-groups and nerds vs. jocks, all the cruel 80s stereotypes. Sure, there's t…
Still lots of problems (more in middle and high school) but it’s easier to today to discover and move to where the schools are better. Homeschooling in areas with poor public schools tends to be focused on academics and a better environment although the desire to provide religious education exists everywhere. An area where few homeschooling families exist would probably have high graduation rates and low crime rates in its public schools.
Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
#67We are in our ninth year of homeschooling. My wife and I attended private and public schools and grew up with typical biases against homeschooling, e.g. they lack social skills. When we got married, we always assumed we'd send our kids to traditional schools. What we learned, though, is that homeschooling has changed since we were in school. Back then, it was a niche, and the sort of parents who chose to homeschool u…
How much time does homeschooling take for you? Does it roughly equate to one full-time job? I have wanted to homeschool my kids but I am afraid I would have to quit my job or downshift to part-time. And since they are different ages, I worry that if I taught them all at the same time, the curriculum would average into something too challenging for the younger and not challenging enough for the elder. How do you manag…
> How much time does homeschooling take for you? Does it roughly equate to one full-time job?
It depends. I quit my job to homeschool my daughter so that she could practice and pursue her violin studies without the encumbrances of mainstream school. I suspect some could have done this and maintained some kind of a job; I couldn't. We spent much of the day either in school work, or practice, and then I'd prep tomorrow's material. Neither time nor energy was left at the end of the day.
Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
I say it so casually because I also find it disturbing. Don't worry, we share similar views. And yet, I went through public schooling, learned the "national" identity but I still retained my own unique identity and cultural practices taught at home by parents. And in the process, I forged a new identity, much like the settlers who immigrated to this country before me. Is it because my parents did not embed the great…
> Why are people in the US so against public schools? > Don't worry, we share similar views. No, we clearly do not. If you held similar views to mine, you would not have posed the question , nor followed it with a false dilemma between breaking down regional identities and, "everything sucks. And there is no cohesion between peoples." > And yet, I went through public schooling, learned the "national" identity but I s…
You read too much into my initial post. I would not have been so blunt if it wasn't to point out the great irony of public schooling and its inception coinciding with modern nation states. I pose the hyperbole question because I see the greatest opposition to public schooling from Americans and religious peoples.
"everything sucks. And there is no cohesion between peoples."
Because at the same time I understand the brutal truth. The nations of today where this process of state centralization did not occur, or occurred under coercion from colonial powers are much worse off. And there people viewed as backwards or uncivilized unable to compete in the modern world, even though they admirably continue to resist modernity.
>"Given that you believe you learned the American national identity in a public school..."
I'm not American. I'm Canadian. And no I did not learn the national identity strictly through school, it was through the people I met at school. My peers, friends, etc. It was those interactions that were facilitated through the public school system.
Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
#69A couple things to pull out… (1) sometimes alternative education is worse. There’s no question that, in some cases, alternative school is worse for a child’s development than standard public school. I’ve personally seen children who were falling behind because their parents were not equipped to teach them in high school. (2) it can sometimes be better. Alternative school is higher variance than public school - the ch…
First, we need major educational reform in this country. That said, the problem is that school must (in order to scale) by definition teach at the middle kid of any and all classrooms. This means some are always lagging behind and some are always somewhat bored. At home, a dedicated parent can teach any child more effectively because they are getting individual attention and level setting. However, I'd argue the point of school and college is far far greater than the acquisition of knowledge. I'm fine with parents having the right to choose but like most things in life there are pros and cons and one size doesn't fit all.
Re: For many home-schoolers, parents are no longer doing the teaching
#70This is giving me the worst of vibes:
- options for people who don't want to expose their children to out-of-family ideas, to perpetuate family biases
- a completely unregulated market for children to go to a "school" with a few other kids, giving them small classrooms, BUT, no teacher with specialization or educational background. Would be extremely hit or miss, with little resource if it isn't working out.
- only for those who can afford it.
It just feels... it feels like people have completely given up on society and said fuck it, we'll make our own.
This is sad. The real solution is not to homeschool. It is to force ALL kids, regardless of age, location, and income to be forced into the same school system. Want to improve things? gotta make it better for everyone.
Edit to those who say "but mah freedum" -- So far evidence shows that societies that force all people into the same system, regardless of income, end up having systemic positive changes because every member of the society is invested into it. Look at Finland, they only set one thing up: rules for how kids are allowed to be selected for schools. Everything else was because all the wealthy people wanted their kids to get benefits, so everyone benefited.
In the US school funding is dependent on local municipalities, so some places have excellent education, and everyone who can't afford it is stuck with crap. This is why I dislike it. You either buy your way into a solid life, or you're fucked. The audience here tends to be high earners, at least for middle-class. Most of America cannot afford 10k per year for schooling, much less the significantly higher cost required.