Thread: Homeschooling pros and cons. Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.


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Posted by Emma Louise (# 3571) on :
 
I'm curious as to what people think the pros and cons of homeschooling are (particularly in the UK - I think its a slightly different issue in the USA, and more common?)

I always used to think we would homeschool for primary but I'm nearly 100% sure we will use the local primary school. However I can still see pros and cons to both....

Curious to know shippies views!
 
Posted by Zacchaeus (# 14454) on :
 
Depends on your children and your expertise. I had children with special educational needs, which I couldn't meet at home.

Also mine wouldn't do things for me that they would for others,so it was better all round to split the roles of educator and nose wiper.

AIUI if you homeschool you have to proove you are doing it properly though I don't know how it works in practice.

The children don't get pushed into the sausage machine, of being taught to pass exams, rather than taught to learn how to learn.

The children don't get to meet and socialise with lots of kids. OTOH they do not risk meeting children with problems or who are disruptive, though this may be more of an issue at secondary level.

I have made some liflong friends at the school gate.

They are not prepared for the shock of secondary education.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Zacchaeus:
...AIUI if you homeschool you have to proove you are doing it properly though I don't know how it works in practice.

You don't have to prove anything. The duty to ensure that a child is educated in acordance with age aptitude and ability, falls on the parents and they can choose to fulfil that duty by sending a child to school or 'otherwise'. A local education authority can enquire about any child not attending school to ascertain whether or not they are being home-educated but cannot question the education provided unless there are reasons to suspect that the parents are not fulfilling their duty.

From the Home Education Guidelines for Local Authorities:
quote:
2.15 As outlined above, local authorities have general duties to make arrangements to safeguard and promote the welfare of children (section 175 Education Act 2002 in relation to their functions as a local authority and for other functions in sections 10 and 11 of the Children Act 2004).

These powers allow local authorities to insist on seeing children in order to enquire about their welfare where there are grounds for concern (sections 17 and 47 of the Children Act 1989). However, such powers do not bestow on local authorities the ability to see and question children subject to elective home education in order to establish whether they are receiving a suitable education

quote:
The children don't get pushed into the sausage machine, of being taught to pass exams, rather than taught to learn how to learn.
Yes, the emphasis is on learning how to learn however home-educated children can enter for exams as private candidates. Also, FE colleges have a discretion to admit underage students for any course they consider suitable and some teenagers combine college courses with home-based learning.

quote:
The children don't get to meet and socialise with lots of kids. OTOH they do not risk meeting children with problems or who are disruptive, though this may be more of an issue at secondary level.
They can meet and socialise with as many other kids as they want. There are a number of networks offering support and social contact for home-educating families. Education Otherwise has been around for 35 years, growing from a small group of families to many thousands.

I'm an EO veteran and have many fond memories of national gatherings, including the 25 year reunion when a survey of our grown-up children showed that steady jobs and stable relationships were the outcome of their unconventional education.
 
Posted by Arethosemyfeet (# 17047) on :
 
quote:

I'm an EO veteran and have many fond memories of national gatherings, including the 25 year reunion when a survey of our grown-up children showed that steady jobs and stable relationships were the outcome of their unconventional education.

Is it not likely to be a result of having parents who were interested and involved in their upbringing and education, as well as having (at a guess) intelligent and well educated parents? I would hazard a guess that most of the kids would have had pretty much the same outcome if their parents had supported them in mainstream education.
 
Posted by Lyda*Rose (# 4544) on :
 
I hope Scot runs across this thread. He and Thumbprint at one point had been homeschooling their kids. (He has mentioned it on the Ship.) I don't know if they still are; the children would be quite a bit older from when I first met them. Sweet kids! [Smile]
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
quote:

I'm an EO veteran and have many fond memories of national gatherings, including the 25 year reunion when a survey of our grown-up children showed that steady jobs and stable relationships were the outcome of their unconventional education.

Is it not likely to be a result of having parents who were interested and involved in their upbringing and education, as well as having (at a guess) intelligent and well educated parents? I would hazard a guess that most of the kids would have had pretty much the same outcome if their parents had supported them in mainstream education.
I don't think the outcome would have been the same in mainstream education because the children would not have had the same choices and opportunities for self-directed learning. The great value of home education is that children have time and freedom. They don't have to be ruled by timetables, spending an hour on one subject and then having to move to another. From my experience they also develop very good social skills. I recall an anti-consumerist ethos amongst the children and teenagers. They were kind to each other.

Professor Roland Meighan was a member of EO and conducted research into how home education worked. In summary his finding were that children learn successfully when they have three things: conversation, interested and supportive adults, and 'abundance of affection'. Conversation is the medium of learning and it isn't possible in most classroms.
 
Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :
 
I'm not happy with the sweeping generalisations from 'justlooking' and would tend to concur with 'arethosemyfeet' bout it depending largely on family support - schools often do encourage cooperative learning these days; I know several families who have tried to homeschool but it hasn't worked terribly well so they put their children into state education at varying stages along the way. So you really can't generalise, although I'm very happy for those who find it does work brilliantly, as I am for those who find conventional education works brilliantly (myself included).
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
You can generalise when you're speaking from several years' personal experience of home education and active involvement with the network. People educate their children outside the school system for all kinds of reasons but from my experience very many simply don't like the school system. I've always thought that our school system diminishes children. It's a system based on getting cost-effective returns, not on what's best for children.

I also have wide experience of school education and so can compare school-educated children with home-educated. Whatever schools might try to do to encourage self-directed learning there's no comparison with the genuine freedom of home education. One of the aims of EO is 'to establish the primary right of children to have full consideration given to their wishes and feelings about their education;'. Schools simply can't do this.

Many people feel uneasy about home education, threatened even, and in the early days of EO some families were subject to pressure from neighbours, other family members and sometimes from education authority personnel. EO had a legal group to provide support and advice and there were a few test cases. The legal situation is now established clearly and is similar to that of the US which recognises home education as a valid option and as a right.
 
Posted by Grits (# 4169) on :
 
Even more so than all the above factors is the child himself. You cannot make a blanket statement about the good/bad of homeschooling, as it will be a different experience for each child. Some children will thrive no matter what. However, once I determined that homeschooling (in general) WAS the right thing for my child, I would then proceed to find the very best set-up for him. That part of it is much more controllable than the response of the child himself.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
Are you speaking from experience as a home-schooler Grits? I know it's more prevalent in the US than the UK.
 
Posted by Arethosemyfeet (# 17047) on :
 
My point is that, by definition, those who home school are a self selecting group - chosen for their commitment to their kids, the value they place on education and the thought and care they put into it. That influence from parents will shine through almost regardless of the place of education. My siblings and my parents and their siblings have all managed to have "steady jobs and stable relationships", and yet we all attended mainstream schools, mostly state funded with a very conventional curriculum. The common factor is a stable home background, educated and intelligent parents and a commitment to education. None of which depend on the type of schooling or unschooling or anything in between that we experienced.

I have no doubt that home schooling can provide an excellent education for many young people, I just doubt that it is noticably superior to a decent mainstream school. It certainly doesn't seem to include a basic understanding of controlling for other factors when studying social phenomena; nor the understanding that data is not the plural of anecdote.
 
Posted by Grits (# 4169) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
Are you speaking from experience as a home-schooler Grits? I know it's more prevalent in the US than the UK.

Not personally, no, just from experience as a parent, teacher and general advocate for children.

My point is that some parents homeschool because it's what THEY want, not necessarily because it is the best thing for the child, which is sad. And some homeschool programs are just, well, crap. As I said, once you've determined that homeschooling is the right choice for your child, then I think it's the parent's obligation to find the very best program available for that child.

It's gotten to be a little too status-related for my tastes. It's like, "How can you call yourself a good parent if you don't homeschool?" I generally dislike anything that people do just because they think it makes them look good. It's all about the motivation, and that should always be the child's best interest.

Oh, and our older son did beg us to homeschool him on more than one occasion. It would not have been the right choice for him. [Smile]

[ 08. June 2012, 20:38: Message edited by: Grits ]
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
In the UK status doesn't seem to have much to do with it. Most EO families were relatively poor when I was involved. The national gatherings, usually two or three a year, were held in very cheap venues with communal catering. I remember a glorious Victorian 'castle' whose only other regular booking was from Borstal. The owner liked us because we left the place cleaner than how found it.

The people who regularly went to national gatherings were on the whole more left-wing and 'alternative' than perhaps the general membership but judging from local gatherings and from the newsletter there wasn't much school-type education going on even among the more conventional. But it didn't make any difference. I recall one young girl who seemed to do nothing but dancing and reading. She took no exams other than those for dancing. She found work as a care assistant and then decided she'd like to be a nurse. She studied for the necessary exams to gain entrance to a nursing course and passed them all within a year while also working full time.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Arethosemyfeet:
.....I have no doubt that home schooling can provide an excellent education for many young people, I just doubt that it is noticably superior to a decent mainstream school. It certainly doesn't seem to include a basic understanding of controlling for other factors when studying social phenomena; nor the understanding that data is not the plural of anecdote.

Have a look at the EO website and the research. Research comparing home educated children with those educated at school shows home educated children as two years ahead on average and when those from working class backgrounds are compared it's three years ahead.
 
Posted by Think² (# 1984) on :
 
I think a consideration would be whether you intend to home school permanently or transition into the state system at some point. The transition from home school to standard school is likely to be challenging for the child.

I suppose the other thing I would worry about is the risk of a child - especially if they are an only child - growing with the world arranged around them. Because then adult life is going to come as more of a shock.

It is rather the way I worry about children more generally being led to believe that if you want something enough you will get it.
 
Posted by Think² (# 1984) on :
 
There are some interesting contrasts in the research - see here and here.
 
Posted by Think² (# 1984) on :
 
And here is a more recent report.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Think²:
I think a consideration would be whether you intend to home school permanently or transition into the state system at some point. The transition from home school to standard school is likely to be challenging for the child.

From the cases I know of I'd say it's more challenging for the school.

quote:
I suppose the other thing I would worry about is the risk of a child - especially if they are an only child - growing with the world arranged around them. Because then adult life is going to come as more of a shock.
But the world isn't arranged around them. It isn't arranged at all. That's the point. It isn't an artificial way of educating, which is what the school system is, it's learning within a natural pattern of family, friends and community. Home educated children grow up relating to adults and learning from and with them. They can grow up at their own pace and in their own way.

I'm interested in why home education seems threatening to some people. Being told that your child won't gain any qualifications, won't get a job, won't be properly 'socialised' was a common experience. When these predictions proved to be false those who'd made them sometimes had problems coming to terms with it. I had some quite aggressive reactions from some people. I recall another EOer saying "people will forgive you anything, except being right".

Lots of successful people have been home educated including the Queen.

[ 08. June 2012, 21:54: Message edited by: justlooking ]
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Think²:
And here is a more recent report.

There has been a move to try to bring in local education authority monitoring for home education, however it has been successfully argued that school education inspectors are only qualified to judge school education. They have no understanding or experience of autonomous education and cannot make any valid assessment.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
Actually Local Education Authorities now have to provide information to parents considering home education and also provide ongoing support and advice if it is requested. LEA's relationships with home educating families are assessed by Ofsted.

Looking at the Guidelines (which can be downloaded from the EO link) I'm impressed by the positive and helpful tone. A great contrast to the attitudes of some LEA's in the earlier days of EO when some families were lied to and threatened with having their children taken into care.
 
Posted by North East Quine (# 13049) on :
 
Origina
 
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :
 
I so much wanted to home school, as I thought it would be awesome to explore so many cool subjects and topics with my geeky kid. Unfortunately (fortunately?) he turns out to be his father's son and would happily live in the middle of a shopping mall--the more people the better for him. So I bowed to the inevitable and sent him off to enjoy the crowds in school.
 
Posted by chive (# 208) on :
 
My sisters and I were home schooled til we were ten and it was bloody awful. My main problem with it was the idiosyncracies my parents had when it came to what to teach, the fact that all my emotional eggs were in one basket - I couldn't piss my teacher off without pissing my mum off, and the fact that it was very isolating.

When my circumstances changed and I went to school, although in other ways it was bloody awful, at least there was other people around me and I learned about life outside the very closed community that my family had become.
 
Posted by chive (# 208) on :
 
My sisters and I were home schooled til I was ten and it was bloody awful. My main problem with it was the idiosyncracies my parents had when it came to what to teach, the fact that all my emotional eggs were in one basket - I couldn't piss my teacher off without pissing my mum off, and the fact that it was very isolating.

When my circumstances changed and I went to school, although in other ways it was bloody awful, at least there was other people around me and I learned about life outside the very closed community that my family had become.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
I'm not entirely unsympathetic here, however, I would suggest justlooking is missing the point here:

quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:


quote:
I suppose the other thing I would worry about is the risk of a child - especially if they are an only child - growing with the world arranged around them. Because then adult life is going to come as more of a shock.
But the world isn't arranged around them. It isn't arranged at all. That's the point. It isn't an artificial way of educating, which is what the school system is, it's learning within a natural pattern of family, friends and community. Home educated children grow up relating to adults and learning from and with them. They can grow up at their own pace and in their own way.

You seem to be contradicting yourself here-- "growing up at their own pace and in their own way" would seem to be precisely what the prior poster was referencing when s/he talks of having things arranged around them, along with the concern that that is not the way the "adult" world works.

Your other points, I think are quite valid-- as are the results. But here I think you're missing the point.
 
Posted by Padre Joshua (# 13100) on :
 
Public schools: Where else in society do people go about in age-segregated herds?

I was homeschooled all the way through. No, it isn't for everyone. But I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I definitely think that it has given me an edge in my vocation and in my college career.

I think the best part was that I was able to learn how to interact with people of all ages, races, and backgrounds. I'm certain that there are many people who were educated conventionally who learned the same thing, but I think I had an advantage because I wasn't stuck in an age-segregated classroom all day, but was instead able to go out and meet people. This has helped me in my vocation as a missionary and pastor.

Like I said, it's not for everyone. My learning style and personality was perfectly suited for it. YMMV.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
cliffdweller: Growing up at their own pace and in their own way means growing up naturally in a way that suits the particular child instead of being forced through the 'sausage machine'. It's the school system that creates an artificial world built around a standardised idea of 'child' or 'adolescent'.
 
Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :
 
There's a danger when the parent doesn't actually know how to educate the child. I'm thinking of a 'homeschooled' child in my area who grew up on a farm (a fairly isolated environment already). Homeschooling, in her case, was a euphemism for hardly any education at all.

I'm sure the really caring parents do a great job, though, and ensure their homeschooled kids get a balanced education and also meet other people. As do caring parents who school-educate. (I observed what was lacking in school education and made sure my children had access to those things - eg. relating to people of all ages - in out-of-school activities, full and free access to library books on all topics, educational visits in the school holidays. That way you get the best of all worlds).
 
Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
I'm interested in why home education seems threatening to some people.

People are reacting negatively on this thread because you're being so overtly pro-homeschooling that you're (a) dominating the conversation, making it harder for others who differ from having their say, and (b) almost coming to the point of saying that anyone who sends their child to a conventional school isn't a good parent.

Throw into the mix the fact that some of the more well-known homeschoolers tend to be isolationist weirdos like the Phelps clan, who do it so that they can guarantee that their kids grow up exactly like them rather than getting any funny ideas from actually interacting with other people, and you can perhaps see where the negative reaction is coming from.
 
Posted by Eigon (# 4917) on :
 
I have a friend who home schools her son. He goes regularly to something called Woodland School, organised by a group of homeschooling parents, and he is also part of a local drama group, so he meets lots of other kids regularly.
He's also been invited into the local primary school to teach the children there origami! He's eight, and really quite bright, and artistic - he would probably cope well with ordinary school, but at present he's having wonderful experiences, and learning, and I don't see anything wrong with that.
 
Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :
 
It certainly helps if you are in an area where the schools are open to allowing homeschooled children access to certain parts of the curriculum where they can mix with others, eg. sport - especially team games - and music. Not all schools will do this though - my sons' headmaster said to the homeschoolers, 'You either opt completely in or you opt completely out, we're not being messed around by your pick'n'mix attitude'.

I guess schools are under all sorts of pressure these days, not least from Ofsted and League Tables, that they cannot always afford to be too flexible. They are probably also worried that it will spread unrest among other children and parents who might also start thinking they can withdraw from the parts of school life they don't really fancy. Schools are quite strongly penalised if truancy figures are perceived to be going up - quite how you measure truancy when lots of pupils are opting in and out at various times, I'm not really sure.
 
Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Eigon:
I have a friend who home schools her son. He goes regularly to something called Woodland School

So he's homeschooled, but he goes to a school? [Confused]
 
Posted by LutheranChik (# 9826) on :
 
I was a perpetually bored conventional schooler who always imagined being a homeschooled Victorian child...back in the day homeschooling was illegal for the most part in Michigan.

I've been reading up on various homeschooling curricula -- one of those Internet rabbit holes one tends to fall down into while looking for other things -- apart from the crazypants Christian ones, I'm rather taken by some of the more academically rigorous ones. If I had a child and had the luxurty of being a stay-at-home mom I'd certainly consider it as an option, especially now that there are innumerable extra-school sports teams and other ways for homeschooled kids to learn socialization skills.

When I was in school I was constantly punished for "reading beyond the lesson" in my textbooks or asking questions that the slower children didn't understand. Anything that saves a child from that sort of treatment is, I think, a good thing.

From what I've read, I like the Charlotte Mason and Montessori methods...Oak Meadow, which is a sort of de-spiritualized Waldorf program also seems good for very small children, although I'd be inclined to use more rigorous writing and science curricula to augment it.
 
Posted by Meg the Red (# 11838) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Chorister:
It certainly helps if you are in an area where the schools are open to allowing homeschooled children access to certain parts of the curriculum where they can mix with others, eg. sport - especially team games - and music. Not all schools will do this though -

I'm not sure how this works in the UK, but here it's a funding issue - schools may balk at providing resources to students for whom they are not funded, which may strain their resources. The public school system here has provided a viable option for homeschooled parents where they can access activities and certified teacher support, while the Home Education centre receives funding to provide the student with curriculum materials and other resources. Same with this school. It's nice that there are options; I don't believe that one is inherently better than the others.
 
Posted by Arethosemyfeet (# 17047) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by LutheranChik:
When I was in school I was constantly punished for "reading beyond the lesson" in my textbooks or asking questions that the slower children didn't understand. Anything that saves a child from that sort of treatment is, I think, a good thing.

That can be as simple as "having teachers who are not morons". I'm a teacher and I'm delighted when a student has a complex question about my subject, or has taken the trouble to look at future work before we get to it. Indeed, my students know that the best way to avoid working for a few minutes is to ask interesting questions and let me ramble for a bit, so I have to restrain myself a little so they can get some work done.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
I'm interested in why home education seems threatening to some people.

People are reacting negatively on this thread because you're being so overtly pro-homeschooling that you're (a) dominating the conversation, making it harder for others who differ from having their say, and (b) almost coming to the point of saying that anyone who sends their child to a conventional school isn't a good parent.
The OP is asking about the pros and cons, especially in the UK. The Phelps clan are an extreme example of a US fundamentalist Christian approach.

My interest in why home education seems to be threatening to some people comes from personal experience and that of other home educators. I’m not suggesting that contributors of cons to this thread come into this category. It's not always a matter of whether or not people agree with home education. Some cons are based on legitimate fears or on personal negative experiences. But sometimes it seems to be congnitive dissonance - there are people who just don't want it to be OK or to see successful results. These can be the family, neighbours and LEA officials I've mentioned. In my own family someone has simply re-written history and pretended they supported it all along. When my son went to university neighbours' children kicked my fence down. I had abusive phone calls from an LEA officer. Other parents had similar or worse experiences. It’s all very civilised now, as the LEA Guidelines show, but there have been some hard battles.

I know it will always be a minority option and sending a child to school certainly isn't being a 'bad' parent but many people think there's no alternative or that any alternative must necessarily follow the pattern of school education in order to qualify as a ‘proper education’.

Going back to the Phelps clan; during my time in EO Fundamentalist Christians were an issue. There was a policy of membership being open to all which meant that the legal support was also available to all and this led to some difficulties. One legal supporter was asked to visit such a family and help with problems they were having with their LEA. She was very disturbed by their method of educating which included physical punishment and a rigid ’bible-based’ curriculum they’d obtained from the US. As an organisation we agreed that such families would not be refused membership and would be given all the relevant information, but that we could not actively support their methods. At the national gatherings there was zero tolerance of physical violence. Generally the kind of parents who came to these meetings were not those who hit their children and I only saw this once. The mother concerned was told that if it ever happened again she would be asked to leave. She left anyway. There are home educating groups specifically for Fundamentalist Christians and some people will form their opinions for home education from these. But in the UK these are a minority among the estimated 40,000 home educating families.

I’ve waiting a few hours before posting a response because I don’t want to dominate the conversation and really want to see what others having their say produces.

The pros and cons, rights and responsibilities, have been discussed and debated in Parliament resulting in the law and Guidelines I've linked to. 'Flexi-schooling' is mentioned in the Guidelines and FE colleges can admit underage students. It doesn't have to be all or nothing.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
cliffdweller: Growing up at their own pace and in their own way means growing up naturally in a way that suits the particular child instead of being forced through the 'sausage machine'. It's the school system that creates an artificial world built around a standardised idea of 'child' or 'adolescent'.

Yes, I understood that the first time. And, as I said, I think that's a valid argument. But it doesn't change my point-- or Think's-- about the real world not being structured to allow for that sort of individualized self-direction, "natural" as it may be. You are contradicting yourself. You can't have it both ways.

[ 09. June 2012, 15:12: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
cliffdweller: I really don't understand how this is contradicting myself. Can you explain please?

[ 09. June 2012, 15:13: Message edited by: justlooking ]
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
Perhaps it would help to revisit the original conversational thread:

quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
quote:
Originally posted by Think²:
I suppose the other thing I would worry about is the risk of a child - especially if they are an only child - growing with the world arranged around them. Because then adult life is going to come as more of a shock.

But the world isn't arranged around them. It isn't arranged at all. That's the point. It isn't an artificial way of educating, which is what the school system is, it's learning within a natural pattern of family, friends and community. Home educated children grow up relating to adults and learning from and with them. They can grow up at their own pace and in their own way.

Your point-- and a good one-- is that homeschooling allows children to learn at their own pace, following their own passions, etc.

Think made the counterpoint that this may cause problems later, since the world is not really set up for individualized self-direction-- the "world arranged around them".

You countered by saying "But the world isn't arranged around them. It isn't arranged at all. That's the point". But then you simply repeated the same argument that the individualized self-direction is a more "natural" form of education, rather than addressing Think's concern.

I think most of us agree with your point-- that homeschooling amid family and community is a "natural" form of education and can produce excellent "results" (depending, of course, on how you're defining "success"-- something we've yet to do). You paint an idyllic picture. But it still doesn't address Think's point re: whether individualized self-direction, however, natural it may be, prepares young people for, say, a corporate culture where individualized self-direction is not rewarded, where indeed conforming to a rigid, externally imposed set of expectations is, in fact, the name of the game. As dreary as that sounds, I'm afraid that is the reality for many professions these days, to a greater or lesser degree.

I'm not presuming the answer-- nor do I think, was Think. I'm just pointing out that you really haven't yet addressed the question.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
Adding on to say, perhaps preparing youth people for corporate culture is not the goal-- since we have not yet defined what a successful outcome would be. Perhaps that's the whole point-- to overturn rigid, stifling corporate culture by raising up a generation of free-thinkers. But either way, I'd like to hear a non-defensive response to Think's question.
 
Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by LutheranChik:
From what I've read, I like the Charlotte Mason and Montessori methods...

I studied at Charlotte Mason's college (motto: 'For the Children's Sake') - back in those days we were able to incorporate many of her ideas into state education, at least in the infant department. But it has more recently been clocked on the head by SATs pressures, and the like.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
You paint an idyllic picture. But it still doesn't address Think's point re: whether individualized self-direction, however, natural it may be, prepares young people for, say, a corporate culture where individualized self-direction is not rewarded, where indeed conforming to a rigid, externally imposed set of expectations is, in fact, the name of the game. As dreary as that sounds, I'm afraid that is the reality for many professions these days, to a greater or lesser degree.

I'm not presuming the answer-- nor do I think, was Think. I'm just pointing out that you really haven't yet addressed the question



Yes, it is an idyllic picture. While there were certainly difficulties, what comes back from those years is a kind of tribal feeling. I feel privileged to have been part of EO and grateful, especially for what it gave my son. I think it was a formation process. My abiding memories include lengthy consensus decision-making and people who could disagree strongly yet still still be friends.

As to the question - whether individualized self-direction, however, natural it may be, prepares young people for, say, a corporate culture where individualized self-direction is not rewarded, where indeed conforming to a rigid, externally imposed set of expectations is, in fact, the name of the game. - you seem to be suggesting that a corporate culture of rigid conformity to externally imposed expectations requires an education based on the same culture.
If this were true then chldren whose education is self-directed would grow up as misfits unable to fit into the adult world adn those who have debated the subject in parliament would have numerous examples of this. But it isn't true. As Zacchaeus pointed out, home education is about learning how to learn.

People who've learned how to learn are well equipped to learn anything they put their minds to, including rigid conformist corporate culture, if that's what's needed. So the girl I mentioned who danced her way to 18 was able to apply herself to what she needed to do for a career in nursing.

[ 09. June 2012, 17:05: Message edited by: justlooking ]
 
Posted by Firenze (# 619) on :
 
I think this discussion would sit better in Purg, rather than among the fribble of Heaven.

Firenze
Heaven Host

 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
[QUOTE][b]
As to the question - whether individualized self-direction, however, natural it may be, prepares young people for, say, a corporate culture where individualized self-direction is not rewarded, where indeed conforming to a rigid, externally imposed set of expectations is, in fact, the name of the game. - you seem to be suggesting that a corporate culture of rigid conformity to externally imposed expectations requires an education based on the same culture.
If this were true then chldren whose education is self-directed would grow up as misfits unable to fit into the adult world adn those who have debated the subject in parliament would have numerous examples of this. But it isn't true. As Zacchaeus pointed out, home education is about learning how to learn.

(sigh) wish we could avoid the defensiveness in this discussion (on both sides) but it's inevitable when we're talking about such personal choices.

Again, I wasn't "suggesting" anything, just asking you to respond to Think's question, which I believe, was a real question, not a set-up for a "suggestion".

The question isn't really will homeschoolers be able to "function" in a different environment-- clearly they can. But then clearly so can public-school educated kids. We find adults who were educated in all sorts of ways leading successful lives in all sorts of fields-- from corporate bureaucracy to creative arts and everything in between. Anecdotal evidence could be offered on both sides. So the question then is one of relativity, not absolutes. Harder to calculate, so perhaps the question is unanswerable.

[ 09. June 2012, 17:55: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
So, is the question about whether an education based on 'individualized self-direction' is a less helpful preparation for adult life than a school education?
 
Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :
 
Some children are very sensitive, my eldest son was sensitive to noise, light, different foods etc etc. I often wonder if home schooling would have been better for him. School was very hard for him - especially Primary school.

But he has turned out a happy, confident, well adjusted young man. So I think it was fine, in the end.

As a teacher I must admit that I hate what (British) schools do to children at the moment. They are so targets and results driven that 99% of creativity, for teachers and children, is driven out.

[Frown]
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
So, is the question about whether an education based on 'individualized self-direction' is a less helpful preparation for adult life than a school education?

Yes. Although, again, may be to hard to calculate unless someone has done a comprehensive study. But yes, I believe that is what Think's long-ago question was aimed at.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
I don't see any evidence to show that it's less helpful. My own experience leads to me to think that it's more helpful.
 
Posted by Think² (# 1984) on :
 
I had in the course of my schooling, American style kindergarten, homeschooling, British state primary school, traditional public school, non-traditional international sixth form college.

The sixth form was where I was happiest - but one of the key things about that experience was that we all came from very different backgrounds - so I wasn't having to break into a pre-existing set of relationships. Whereas I got bullied in the primary school, and was a loner through most of the trad secondary school.

Conversely, as an adult, one of the things that is a slight social hinderance is not having a similar experience of childhood to my peers. It gives you a kind of nostalgia bypass.

I have always, and continue, to stick out like a sore thumb in some ways. Being perceived as different is not necessarily a bad thing, but it can be lonely and can be somewhat isolating. It has taken me along time to get comfortable in my own skin - and I have remained single almost my entire adult life.

Now obviously I don't think that is all down to education - but I do think that it isn't all about educational outcome. I suspect it is easier to be homeschooled through to university rather than partially. I would think it is better if there is a community you link into whilst being homeschooled - we didn't really have that because we were in a foreign country at the time.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
I'd advise anyone thinking of home schooling to find out about the support groups. It gives children shared experiences with others who are out of the school system. I couldn't have coped without EO. My son went through primary school and he didn't hate it but there were things he found irrational and upsetting.

I was surprised by how supportive my mother was. She reasoned that if there was anything wrong with what I was doing my son wouldn't be so happy. She was amazed at all the things he did and the places we went.

[ 09. June 2012, 19:45: Message edited by: justlooking ]
 
Posted by Emma Louise (# 3571) on :
 
I think that shared cultural background is actually a good point Think. When people sit and reminisce at Uni about crazes or tv programmes or with school friends about certain teachers etc. Also I am appreciating our family being part of the local community through pre-school and church, school is a large part of that when you are school aged.

I do like the idea of being able to pursue things away from targets, with a lot more flexibility and creativity and 4 seems so young to be just one of 30. (Pre school have 1 to 5, its a huge leap to being part of a big class.) However people locally all really like our local school. If it wasn't such a good school that would make a difference (and I didn't have health issues that make full time home-schooling difficult).

I can imagine if you had a very good network of home schoolers it could be fantastic. It is in fact some of the people I know here that put me off. Very well meaning and lovely individually but seem very black and white in thinking that homeschool = always good, school = always bad. Quite a few are anti-vaxers and I heard a group near me hounded out someone who *used* to be a social worker simply due to her background and their distrust of social workers.

I used to teach in a grammar school and if my child passed the entrance I would far rather her attend there than homeschool as at that level the breadth of specialist teaching is fantastic and not something I could provide. It would be different if the local school was awful.

I certainly wouldn't want my daughter to just dance until 18 and then decide what to do, I do want the foundations academically to all be there personally. It's at primary I can see more benefit. Other countries don't start formal schooling as young as we do and there is so much learning through play you can do. My daughter is already picking up number just through counting everyday things rather than formal learning.

We were at a function at a local independent school. Amazing grounds and facilities and such small classes. That again could influence me in a different direction if it was at all financially viable! (Despite me working in state sector and thinking I would never consider private ed).
 
Posted by angelfish (# 8884) on :
 
What you say about independent schools, Emma Louise, strikes a chord with me. Sometimes I feel very envious of my wealthier friends who can afford to send little Tarquin to prep school and the Mothers Earth who have the patience and creatiity to homeschool. "He would just get lost in a class of 30" they say, and i immediately imagine my soon to be four year old drowning in a sea of eager and more confident five year olds, come September.

But then when i am not premenstrual, i remember that all our children are jolly lucky to have any schooling available to them at all, and with parental support even a mediocre school can provide an adequate education. Also people, including children, are amazingly robust and adaptable, particularly given loving and stable parenting.

I do feel that the "preparing them for the real world" question is false. It's not as though they are in hermetically sealed bubbles duing the school years and then are suddenly vomited out at 16 or 18 and real life begins. Life and experience begin at birth and their personalties will be shaped in part by their education experience but also by
loads of other things as well. It's daft to worry too much about it really, because i bet you never wonder whether you would be different, had you only had a different education. You are who you are, partly because of choices your parents made and partly just because, and the same will be true for our children.

[ 09. June 2012, 20:41: Message edited by: angelfish ]
 
Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :
 
Wise word angelfish.

[Overused]
 
Posted by Full Circle (# 15398) on :
 
I had a short period (months)of home schooling when I was eight and hated it. It changed my relationship with my mother: and made a battle ground between us that lasted for years. I went to multiple schools (from large comprehensives to small international schools) all of them were better than home schooling. It really is one of my worst memories of childhood.
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
I'm going to be homeschooling my daughter starting this year, when she finishes preschool. In preperation for that I've been getting involved in the homeschooling community. Some people have been supportive and some have been quite openly hostile to it. It's funny how in the UK educational choice in an area were people feel free to openly and rudely dissaprove of a families choices, whether those are home school, private school or state school.

These are our reasons for chosing it for our daughter:

- bright kids can learn at their own pace without being subjected to a class focussed on the lowest common denominator. Both me and my husband were bored out of our skulls in school. My little girl is a september child, and can read and write in a preschool class where only about 5 out of 30 can write their own names. Why should I put her through a reception year where she will be drilled in phonics she already knows.

- a healthier social environment. Homeschooled kids get to hang out with a mixed age group in the homeschool community, which seems to lead to better adjusted kids and less bullying than herding them into peer groups. The atmosphere at a homeschooling meet is massively different to that of a playground and the kids noticeably more relaxed.

Interestingly enough, I've had many people disagree with my choice, but NOT ONE of them has been able to say that school is not boring and full of bullies! Their arguments always seem to boil down to 'school is shit and that's where children learn to cope with life being shit, so your child will not cope with life'. I could not disagree more that being subjected to bad things is a good basis for growth and learning, so I'm secure in my choice.

The other argument I hear a lot boils down to 'school used to be shit but it's a bit better now'. I think this is wishful thinking.

That said - I would not recommend it if the family is a controlling and dysfuncitonal one. There are children who's parents are not people they should be spending a lot of time with. For me, school stunk, but I'm VERY glad I wasn't homeschooled myself because my family wasn't the healthiest place for me to be and school was a breath of different air.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Emma Louise:

I can imagine if you had a very good network of home schoolers it could be fantastic. It is in fact some of the people I know here that put me off. Very well meaning and lovely individually but seem very black and white in thinking that homeschool = always good, school = always bad. Quite a few are anti-vaxers and I heard a group near me hounded out someone who *used* to be a social worker simply due to her background and their distrust of social workers.

Yes, I share that experience. It's when home-schooling becomes all about what you're afraid of, what you're running away from-- rather than what you're drawn to, what you're adding-- that it becomes negative IMHO. Should be more about what you're "for" than what you're "against".
 
Posted by angelfish (# 8884) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
It's funny how in the UK educational choice in an area were people feel free to openly and rudely dissaprove of a families choices, whether those are home school, private school or state ... NOT ONE of them has been able to say that school is not boring and full of bulles!... 'school used to be shit but it's a bit better now'. I think this is wishful thinking... I would not recommend [homeschooling] if the family is a controlling and dysfuncitonal one.

It's not funny that you feel free to openly and rudely disapprove of parents who choose (or who can't help but go with) mainstream education - unless they admit they are controlling and dysfunctional of course.
 
Posted by Full Circle (# 15398) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
daughter:

That said - I would not recommend it if thefamily is a controlling and dysfuncitonal one. There are children who's parents are not people they should be spending a lot of time with. For me, school stunk, but I'm VERY glad I wasn't homeschooled myself because my family wasn't the healthiest place for me to be and school was a breath of different air. [/QB]

I just want to say (re my quote above)that I do not think my family was dysfunctional (or no more than any happy family) and it was certainly not controlling - actually I think the main reason that home schooling did not work was that my mother cared whether I was learning and that one to one attention basically gave me much less freedom to learn at my own pace than being in a large class where I could pace myself to a reasonable extent. For instance, I remember at primary deciding which projects were 'silly' and which were worth working on.
 
Posted by angelfish (# 8884) on :
 
Full Circle, that is basically why I have decided not to homeschool. i just know what an insufferable didact I would be, and I know that my son would not respond well to it, but I also know that he will need a lot of help to get the most out of his state Primary school
 
Posted by Full Circle (# 15398) on :
 
Sorry to double post but I also wanted to comment on this

quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:

These are our reasons for chosing it for our daughter:

Interestingly enough, I've had many people disagree with my choice, but NOT ONE of them has been able to say that school is not boring and full of bullies! Their arguments always seem to boil down to 'school is shit and that's where children learn to cope with life being shit, so your child will not cope with life'. I could not disagree more that being subjected to bad things is a good basis for growth and learning, so I'm secure in my choice.

The other argument I hear a lot boils down to 'school used to be shit but it's a bit better now'. I think this is wishful thinking.

[/QB]

I do not know you or your daughter so really cannot comment on your choice but do wish to say that I have very few memories of ever being bullied at school (and those I do have mostly relate to a period where I was the only white child in my class), nor do I remember it as boring - but I went to lots & had the challenges of integrating with different systems and social groups. Nor do I think that School days have been better than my adult times, my one real reserve about home schooling is that it muddies the role of parent and teacher. I do think that they are different roles and that it can be very healthy for different people to fill them for a child.
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
I effectively home-schooled my daughter through years 10 and 11 - GCSE years, aged 14-16. She did officially have two hours a week home tuition from the local authority (medical needs), one hour English and one hour maths, and I was down as her science teacher. Because she was on roll at the school she sat those GCSEs. It was damn difficult and I'd been working in SEN in secondary schools for a while so knew the curricula and subjects well enough - I trained as a science teacher. She came out with good grades, but I really don't recommend it for anyone to take on lightly.

I am aware that there other routes through, but my daughter wanted to study a traditional academic subject and there are sometimes too many preconceived ideas to battle - a history of illness and unconventional qualifications can be a bridge too far for some places.

She has a MEng in mechanical engineering from a Russell group university and graduated last summer. Coming in from a State school background was pretty exceptional to get that far.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
Parents are a child's first teachers.
 
Posted by Full Circle (# 15398) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
Parents are a child's first teachers.

Yes, they are. But I do not think they should be a childs only teacher
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
Neither do I. There are plenty of other adults who help children to learn. For my son these included other EO adults, sports instructors and youth group leaders. There were art workshops too - all day events put on by an art gallery for home educating families and led by their education staff. He also got involved in re-enactment and learnt a lot of history through that.
 
Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :
 
But that's because you bothered to take them. Many schools put on all those extra-curriclar events because they know darned well that if they didn't, some children would never do anything worthwhile. The number, I guess, depends on the catchment area of the school.
 
Posted by Eigon (# 4917) on :
 
Sorry not to get back to this for a while - someone upthread asked how it was that home schooled children near me went to Woodland School. That's the name they use round here for a group of home schooled children getting together once a week to do interesting things in a wood - identifying plants, lighting campfires, doing art projects and so on.
 
Posted by OliviaG (# 9881) on :
 
I was home-schooled for about six years for a variety of reasons. My parents used materials from Calvert, and they were awesome. I definitely had fewer friends my age than would be typical, but home-schooling wasn't the only reason for that. On the up-side, I have no problems enjoying my own company. The down-side was that I became convinced my parent-teachers wouldn't love me if my schoolwork wasn't perfect. You can all imagine what that can lead to. When I eventually went into the public school system, I did very well academically and was bullied mercilessly. University was a relief! I got a great education, a love of learning, and a ton of baggage I'm still trying to unpack and get rid of.

If someone were actually asking for my advice on home-schooling, I would still say go for it, with a few provisos. Monitor how the parent-child relationship is influenced by the teacher-pupil relationship carefully and be willing to adjust. Use proper educational materials, follow a curriculum, etc. but use the freedom of home-schooling to allow your child to follow their interests. It's ok to mess up the fridge with science experiments or make fuses out of gum wrappers as long as you're supervising. Make sure your child is involved in activities with other kids, such as formal and informal playgroups, arts or sports, community events, etc. If your locality gives standardized tests, see that your child takes them so you both have an external appraisal of how things are going. Most importantly though, remember that the teacher has to be willing to learn as well. OliviaG
 
Posted by Auntie Doris (# 9433) on :
 
I know a few people who do, or who have, home schooled their children. It always seemed to me that the decision to home school was far more about the parents than about the children.

Auntie Doris x
 
Posted by Zacchaeus (# 14454) on :
 
I haven't known anybody who had home schooled, but I have known a few who considered it. My concern was that they were parents who just wanted to control every aspect of their children's life, and they were worried that in schools, other people had influence over their children.

While not disputing that it worked for some people - how do we ensure that children who are homeschooled are not done so for the wrong reasons? Where are the checks and balances in the homeschooling system.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
.... The atmosphere at a homeschooling meet is massively different to that of a playground and the kids noticeably more relaxed. ....

I found this too. After a while spending more time in such groups, especially at the residential gatherings I got used to it and it was a great shock when I went back into schools as a supply teacher. It's hard to explain it to other people though.

You might be interested in this research paper Home Education: Aims, Practices and Outcomes
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Zacchaeus:

While not disputing that it worked for some people - how do we ensure that children who are homeschooled are not done so for the wrong reasons? Where are the checks and balances in the homeschooling system.

If you look at the 'HE and the Law' and 'Local Authorities' sections of Education Otherwise you'll see the checks and balances.
 
Posted by Zacchaeus (# 14454) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
quote:
Originally posted by Zacchaeus:

While not disputing that it worked for some people - how do we ensure that children who are homeschooled are not done so for the wrong reasons? Where are the checks and balances in the homeschooling system.

If you look at the 'HE and the Law' and 'Local Authorities' sections of Education Otherwise you'll see the checks and balances.
But early on in the thread you said

quote:Originally posted by Zacchaeus:
...AIUI if you homeschool you have to proove you are doing it properly though I don't know how it works in practice.

You don't have to prove anything. The duty to ensure that a child is educated in acordance with age aptitude and ability, falls on the parents and they can choose to fulfil that duty by sending a child to school or 'otherwise'. A local education authority can enquire about any child not attending school to ascertain whether or not they are being home-educated but cannot question the education provided unless there are reasons to suspect that the parents are not fulfilling their duty.


The LEA can send inspectors into schools - but how with home schooling can they get to a situation where they 'suspect that parents are nto fulfilling their duty'?
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Zacchaeus:
....The LEA can send inspectors into schools - but how with home schooling can they get to a situation where they 'suspect that parents are nto fulfilling their duty'?

The information is in the links and in the Local Authority Guidelines which are also linked in the EO doc.

The LEA can make an enquiry about a child's education and if it is not satisfied with the response can serve a notice requiring information. If no information is given or if it looks from the information that a child is not being educated then they can serve a school attendance order.

quote:
2.7 Local authorities have no statutory duties in relation to monitoring the quality of home education on a routine basis.

However, under Section 437(1) of the Education Act 1996, local authorities shall intervene if it appears that parents are not providing a suitable education. This section states that: “If it appears to a local education authority that a child of compulsory school age in their area is not receiving suitable education, either by regular attendance at school or otherwise, they shall serve a notice in writing on the parent requiring him to satisfy them within the period specified in the notice that the child is receiving such education.”

Section 437(2) of the Act provides that the period shall not be less than 15 days beginning with the day on which the notice is served.

2.8 Prior to serving a notice under section 437(1), local authorities are encouraged to address
the situation informally. The most obvious course of action if the local authority has information that makes it appear that parents are not providing a suitable education, would be to ask parents for further information about the education they are providing. Such a request is not the same as a notice under section 437(1), and is not necessarily a precursor for formal procedures. Parents are under no duty to respond to such enquiries, but it would be sensible for them to do so.



[ 10. June 2012, 18:09: Message edited by: justlooking ]
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
Just to add: Although there's no obligation for parents to allow any visit from an education advisor/inspector from my experience most do. I allowed an annual visit.
 
Posted by Aravis (# 13824) on :
 
The home schooling option crossed our minds, but it was never really a practical option; I would have had to give up work, which I didn't necessarily want to do, and my daughter was (still is!) an only child and fairly sociable. But it did worry me that she was so very bored in school by the age of six or seven. Every school holiday, when she was left to her own devices and had time to explore our own vast collection of books rather than the crappy school library, her reading skills increased by leaps and bounds. This didn't happen in term time. She did ask at one point whether she could do lessons at home and go into school just to play with her friends at break time.
Eventually, when she was nine, I had the opportunity to increase my working hours from 18.5 per week to 30, which was enough extra cash (in Wales) to send her to a private school, with a bursary for a proportion of the fees. This went against all my principles up till that point, but I don't regret it.
In the end, whatever decisions you make, you have to do what you feel is best for your child if you can manage it, financially and socially.
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
quote:
It's not funny that you feel free to openly and rudely disapprove of parents who choose (or who can't help but go with) mainstream education - unless they admit they are controlling and dysfunctional of course.
It's a fair cop. I was being too intemperate in my dismissal of schools in my last post.

I don't disapprove of parents who go with mainstream education, assuming they've balanced their families personalities, financial situation, quality of local schools etc and gone with schools for good reasons. I rarely dissaprove of any individual parents considered choices because there are always a lot of personal factors to consider. Some of those children will be the lucky ones who 'fit' school. Many don't, and I think more don't than is generally admitted by our society, where many are uncomfortable with questioning the schooling system. It's a very deeply rooted assumption that children should go to school.

Obviously not only horrible dysfunctional families shouldn't homeschool, but they are a subset who definately shouldn't IMO. I did not mean to apply that to any parent who thinks they wouldn't be temperamentally suited to it.

What I dissaprove of and what gets me riled is a parenting philosophy that thinks it's fine for children to have a bad time at school as this is character building, or in some way related to preparing them for 'real life' - and this is what I often hear from the most vociferously 'anti' people. There are lots of other parents I've spoken to who've chosen school for other reasons.

What I also think is sad is the number of parents who don't think themselves capeable of homeschooling when they perhaps are.
 
Posted by angelfish (# 8884) on :
 
Well, that was a very gracious dismount,
PerkyEars. [Biased]

I don't believe anybody really thinks that their child having a bad time at school is desireable, but given that it is impossible to prevent bad things ever happening to our children, it is perhaps healthy to accept that fact and equip them to deal with harsh times, rather than hide them away. Not to say that homeschoolers can't do this, nor that throwing the kids in at the deep end and leaving them to it helps either.
 
Posted by ianjmatt (# 5683) on :
 
We have home educated for seven years now. When our eldest was hitting High School age we gave her the option of choosing whether she wanted to enter mainstream schooling or not. She chose to stay at home - she is 14 now (year 9 in UK school terms) - is currently studying her English Lit GCSE and starting double science and maths GCSEs for exams next summer.

Our 11 year had the same choice this year and has also chosen to stay at home.

Here is a quick summary of some of the reason we chose to do it written a couple of years ago (I no longer work with Education Otherwise - in this post it says I do):

Raising dazed-out, stupefied kids
 
Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :
 
I like this ianjmatt -

quote:
Actually, I think the ideal would be small, community-based educational cooperatives run through a blend of parental involvement and employed teachers, where parents are intimately involved in the philosophy and overall direction, as well as the pastoral things.
[Overused]

Even Primary schools in the UK are becoming huge and impersonal. I taught in one with 1000 kids (I stayed 6 days and quit). The teachers and children had no sense of involvement whatever. Dreadful!
 
Posted by Niminypiminy (# 15489) on :
 
I've never considered home schooling. I wouldn't be a good teacher for my children, and I hate to think what it would do to our relationship. I'm content to have home and school be different worlds. I need to work.

But in the end I think my objections are ones of principle. Decisions about education don't only concern the academic curriculum and how it is taught; nor do one's decisions only affect one's own children. Schools are part of society at large; a local school is -- or should be -- a microcosm of society in its area. If you take your child out of their local school, whether that is home schooling, or private education, or some kind of alternative like Steiner, you are taking them out of their local community and into a self-selecting group of like-minded and like-circumstanced people.

I think that everyone loses when that happens. Removing your child from your local school means, in effect, removing them from society, from our common circumstances and experiences. That's bad for the child concerned, and it also diminishes the richness and diversity of the school's society. It means saying that 'what is good enough for the common herd is not good enough for my child'.

For me it's a matter of principle to send my children to their local school, and to spend the energy I might put into home education working to improve the educational lot of all children -- in my case through being a governor. In my view local schools should be able to cater for all children (though there are a few for whom special education is the right thing) -- and the struggle to be waged is to get them to do it. It would seem like admitting defeat to say, effectively, I abandon others to their fate: my concern is with my own.

I know, however, that people's mileage varies immensely on this question, and I absolutely do not think that people who choose to home school are unprincipled, or not community-spirited.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Niminypiminy:
I've never considered home schooling. I wouldn't be a good teacher for my children, and I hate to think what it would do to our relationship. I'm content to have home and school be different worlds. I need to work.

But in the end I think my objections are ones of principle. Decisions about education don't only concern the academic curriculum and how it is taught; nor do one's decisions only affect one's own children. Schools are part of society at large; a local school is -- or should be -- a microcosm of society in its area. If you take your child out of their local school, whether that is home schooling, or private education, or some kind of alternative like Steiner, you are taking them out of their local community and into a self-selecting group of like-minded and like-circumstanced people.

I think that everyone loses when that happens. Removing your child from your local school means, in effect, removing them from society, from our common circumstances and experiences. That's bad for the child concerned, and it also diminishes the richness and diversity of the school's society. It means saying that 'what is good enough for the common herd is not good enough for my child'.

For me it's a matter of principle to send my children to their local school, and to spend the energy I might put into home education working to improve the educational lot of all children -- in my case through being a governor. In my view local schools should be able to cater for all children (though there are a few for whom special education is the right thing) -- and the struggle to be waged is to get them to do it. It would seem like admitting defeat to say, effectively, I abandon others to their fate: my concern is with my own.

I know, however, that people's mileage varies immensely on this question, and I absolutely do not think that people who choose to home school are unprincipled, or not community-spirited.

Well said.

The problems with homeschooling are broader, societal ones. Homeschooling, like private schooling, is a distinctly privileged option. While I know that homeschooling parents often make significant financial sacrifices and live very simply to make this possible, it still is an option only for the relatively wealthy, and not available at all to single parents and the poor. That doesn't make it wrong, but does raise a concern. If those of us who have the ability to leave the system opt to do so, rather than stay and fight for a better system, then the people who lose out are the most vulnerable-- the poor, single parent families-- those with no other options.

At the same time I know, from personal experience, that these decisions aren't made on that level. These decisions are made very locally, in the family, about what's best for us, for our kid. I know that because that's what I did. I started my kids in public school, firmly committed to it, for precisely the reasons Niminypiminy outlined so well. When my middle child floundered (really more than floundered-- and I'm not talking academically)-- we prayed, we worked, we fought... but ultimately, we moved him. In our case we chose private school over homeschool (for a variety of reasons), but in terms of the issues Niminypiminy is raising, it's really the same. I remain uneasy about that choice, yet know I would do the same tomorrow.

I think the choice really comes down to that ying/yang-- between the greater societal good and what this child, this family, needs.
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
quote:
it still is an option only for the relatively wealthy
I don't think anyone would describe us as "relatively wealthy" nor have we ever been. [Killing me]

We have one partner employed full time in what is by any yardstick not a well paid job (customer service on the phones), and me having to work part-time as a childminder to make ends meet. By ends meet I mean no car, no holidays, no pension, cheap hobbies, second hand clothes etc. Other people have low paid jobs and make up the shortfall with various benefits/various ways of making money from home. It is by no means only families with one good professional income who choose to homeschool.

That said, we've made the choice to have a low-maintenance lifestyle. And even then my supplementary income is neccessary. It isn't an option for many families, but I would challenge that it's an option for the wealthy.

quote:
Actually, I think the ideal would be small, community-based educational cooperatives run through a blend of parental involvement and employed teachers, where parents are intimately involved in the philosophy and overall direction, as well as the pastoral things.
Essentially I agree with this. The best homeschooling involves a community effort, and is supplemented by professional teaching where appropriate. My plans to homeschool don't involve me sitting down with my daughter at the table teaching her stuff by myself, they involve as much involvement as possible with activities involving other families, and professional teaching where she needs it.

I do think this is a healthier model than schools, which is why I can't in all conscience take the road of becoming a school govenor to try and work 'within the system'. I'd rather be part of a broader movement that models alternative lifestyles.
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
quote:
originally posted by Niminypiminy:
Schools are part of society at large; a local school is -- or should be -- a microcosm of society in its area. If you take your child out of their local school, whether that is home schooling, or private education, or some kind of alternative like Steiner, you are taking them out of their local community and into a self-selecting group of like-minded and like-circumstanced people.

Local schools are not microcosms of society in its area. State and federal governments have too much control over what can and can't be taught as well as how it is taught. Homeschooling and private schools are the only ways parents can instill the values of their real local communities into their children.
 
Posted by Ricardus (# 8757) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by angelfish:
I do feel that the "preparing them for the real world" question is false.

Do mainstream schools prepare children for the Real World anyway? The CBI is always saying that they don't.
 
Posted by tclune (# 7959) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
Local schools are not microcosms of society in its area. State and federal governments have too much control over what can and can't be taught as well as how it is taught.

Sounds like a microcosm of society to me...

--Tom Clune
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
Not of a local community
 
Posted by Mockingale (# 16599) on :
 
At the very least, I imagine that the prom is awkward.
 
Posted by Niminypiminy (# 15489) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:

I think the choice really comes down to that ying/yang-- between the greater societal good and what this child, this family, needs.

Cliffdweller, I'm really sympathetic with your situation -- I have a child whose needs will always be very difficult for our local school to meet. I spend hours worrying and praying about what the right thing for him is. I guess I wanted to say, though, that these things are about more than just one's own child, and to add that dimension to the discussion.
 
Posted by tclune (# 7959) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Mockingale:
At the very least, I imagine that the prom is awkward.

Aren't they always?

--Tom Clune
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
... Homeschooling, like private schooling, is a distinctly privileged option. While I know that homeschooling parents often make significant financial sacrifices and live very simply to make this possible, it still is an option only for the relatively wealthy, and not available at all to single parents and the poor...

My own experience is that very few home educating families are relatively wealthy and it certainly is an option for the poor and for single parents. This pdf doc gives one parent's account. There's also a thread in netmumsSingle parent/ home schooling question which deals with working and with the benefit system. For example a single parent might work four hours a day and arrange for the child to be looked after, perhaps within another home-educating family. Child-care allowances and the tax credit system help. I doubt if it costs the state any more than it pays out for a child to use the school system.

One fact that intrigues me from the data in the research document I linked to earlier is that children from the lower socio-economic groups achieved higher test results than those of wealthier families.

As to the idea of school as local community, it might be the case at primary level, at least in some areas, but secondary schools have a much wider intake, especially church secondary schools. Most of us live within a network of communities rather than just one based on geographical area.
 
Posted by ianjmatt (# 5683) on :
 
I agree with the critique of the assumption that the school is a hub and reflection of the local community.

Our children are involved with various activities - drama group, scouts, beavers, church groups - as well as just running feral in the woods and stream near our house with friends in the village, and as such they, and we, have plenty of community involvement. The school (and really we mean primary schools) may be an element of community reflection, involvement and cohesion but it is neither the exclusive element for a necessary one.

I would also take issue with this from Niminypiminy:

quote:
I guess I wanted to say, though, that these things are about more than just one's own child, and to add that dimension to the discussion.
When it comes to making a decision in the best interests of a child, there is a hierarchy of priorities. When we were adopting our youngest this is something the social workers really worked at carefully. The interests of the child trumped the interests of the parents and of society at large. When it comes to educational and welfare decision I think it is the same.
 
Posted by art dunce (# 9258) on :
 
I am sure the motivations for choosing homeschooling are varied by family, region, country. I live in a place where people come to drop out, or urban homestead (ack), or live an "alernative " lifestyle. The majority of families that homeschool are not motivated by religion but by this philosophy that says that only mothers willing to take on white martyrdom are acceptable. THey embrace attachment parenting, are very controlling around all aspects of diet, they usually nurse well into toddlerhood and then homeschool. They completely control every aspect of their childs life and play and yet keep claiming the kids are free and self directed. They are usually either undereducated themselves or have a not very lucrative degree and so didn't have a career even before kids and just had shit jobs they hated and so they make this their vocation. They are not usually wealthy, since most of the wealthy couples I know are two career and those women didn't study and train and sacrifice to be a surgeon or an engineer to throw it all away for 18 years. It is a choice and some families seem very happy to garden and wander about canning and sewing like Little House on the Prairie out of time. Their kids often are more comfortable talking to adults and are awkward around other kids. Some of the truly dedicated ones create a creative, joyful enviroment for the kids, but more often than not they start off enthusiastic and then it wanes and you see them dragging their kids around Walmart in the middle of the day and neither them nor their kids look very happy.
I would have hated to be homeschooled since despite the bullying or the boredom I had the opportunity to decide who I wanted to be in the world away from the person you feel compelled to be with/for your family. Room to try on different personas, exposure to people very different from your familiy's circle and the space to question them and decide for yourself what your values, opinions or choices will be.

[ 11. June 2012, 17:30: Message edited by: art dunce ]
 
Posted by Niminypiminy (# 15489) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by ianjmatt:

I would also take issue with this from Niminypiminy:

quote:
I guess I wanted to say, though, that these things are about more than just one's own child, and to add that dimension to the discussion.
When it comes to making a decision in the best interests of a child, there is a hierarchy of priorities. When we were adopting our youngest this is something the social workers really worked at carefully. The interests of the child trumped the interests of the parents and of society at large. When it comes to educational and welfare decision I think it is the same.
Of course. But in bringing up children one of the things that we do is to pass on our values, and the largest part of the way we do this is by what we do rather than what we say. By removing one's child from the community-at-large (rather than a self-selecting group centred on particular interests or activities or beliefs) we are modelling 'what is good enough for the common herd is not good enough for my children'. A child's welfare and their education is not simply a private matter because we are all members one of another. It impoverishes each of us to treat these matters as if they were simply individual choices.
 
Posted by OliviaG (# 9881) on :
 
Every situation is different, but FWIW, art dunce's detailed observations have absolutely no relation to my own experience -- in fact, they're about 99% wrong / opposite. Just for starters, I was bottle-fed. OliviaG
 
Posted by ianjmatt (# 5683) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Niminypiminy:
Of course. But in bringing up children one of the things that we do is to pass on our values, and the largest part of the way we do this is by what we do rather than what we say. By removing one's child from the community-at-large (rather than a self-selecting group centred on particular interests or activities or beliefs) we are modelling 'what is good enough for the common herd is not good enough for my children'. A child's welfare and their education is not simply a private matter because we are all members one of another. It impoverishes each of us to treat these matters as if they were simply individual choices.

No - what someone is saying is: "there are a range of options and opportunities when it comes to education. We're choosing this one - others will choose something difference".

You are assuming that there is a neutral, default position on education and everything else is deviating from the 'common herd'. I would challenge that - it is an attitude that disempowers parents from making choices - from understanding that education is not 'one size fits all' and that there are various options. It may that the local state primary school - or perhaps one of the choices in urban areas (church, county primary, primary academy etc) is the right choice. But that should be a positive decision, not a default assumption.

Home education is not 'removing your child from the community at large'. The local state school is not the community - please see my comment above on how we are very involved in the community.
 
Posted by OliviaG (# 9881) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Niminypiminy:
... a self-selecting group centred on particular interests or activities or beliefs ...

What, like a public school? Let's see: self-selecting - yep, parents can choose between public schools and various programmes, at least in my burg. Centred on particular interests and activities - yep, pretty much focused on teaching certain core subjects; some physical activity or arts or languages; and informal socializing. Centred on particular beliefs - everyone in the public school system is governed by ethical and behavioural codes based on particular values. Or, to put it another way: do the objections to home-schooling on social grounds apply equally to private (public in the UK) schools (religious or non-)? Because if that's a social problem, it's a far bigger issue in terms of numbers than home schooling. And it will only increase with e.g. charter schools or school vouchers. OliviaG
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
quote:
originally posted by Niminypiminy:
By removing one's child from the community-at-large (rather than a self-selecting group centred on particular interests or activities or beliefs) we are modelling 'what is good enough for the common herd is not good enough for my children'.

One, I don't see what makes a school district with rather arbitrarily drawn boundaries the community-at-large while organic social groups are not. Two, I have no problem modeling "what is good enough for the common herd is not good enough for my children."
 
Posted by tclune (# 7959) on :
 
My crotchety view is that education is clearly a state function -- it is the society instilling in the child an understanding of who we are as a people and helping the child begin to deal with the question of how he fits into that vision.

The problem is that modern educators are idiots -- they see their task as helping the child get in touch with his inner beauty, rather than trying to civilize the little heathen. There is absolutely no compelling reason for the state to help in such a solipsistic endeavor, so the typical modern teacher has adopted a view of his profession that makes the profession a needless luxury. Why the community should be taxed to the nines to pay for an indulgence of someone else's child is beyond my ability to understand.

So, in the context of this kind of flaccid nonsense, homeschooling may be a moral imperative of responsible adults -- "when the cities lie at the monster's feet there are left the mountains." Or so ISTM.

--Tom Clune

[ 11. June 2012, 18:41: Message edited by: tclune ]
 
Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 
I don't have any children, but attended state schools as a child, and I have worked as a teacher. If I had kids and my circumstances were suitable, I would consider home schooling.

Mainstream education doesn't suit every child. Some are bullied, but many more just don't receive the breadth of education that they deserve, e.g. the low importance given to the study of foreign languages in many state schools. And I also come from an ethnic minority that, as a group, often has disappointing outcomes from state schooling. So home schooling would be an option, as would private or grammar schooling. But of course, I'd have to try to socialise my child with others as much as possible. There's Scouts, Sunday school, summer camps, etc.

The thing about not being able to fit in with other people later on is probably valid, but that can end up happening to anyone, either as a result of your upbringing, your own personality, or because you deliberately choose to live an alternative lifestyle of some kind.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
quote:
it still is an option only for the relatively wealthy
I don't think anyone would describe us as "relatively wealthy" nor have we ever been. [Killing me]

We have one partner employed full time in what is by any yardstick not a well paid job (customer service on the phones), and me having to work part-time as a childminder to make ends meet. By ends meet I mean no car, no holidays, no pension, cheap hobbies, second hand clothes etc. Other people have low paid jobs and make up the shortfall with various benefits/various ways of making money from home. It is by no means only families with one good professional income who choose to homeschool.

If you read the whole context of my comment, I think you'll see that reflected. The profile you sketch is precisely what I was referring to-- almost all the families that I know that homeschool sound a lot like you-- two parents, one working full-time, working hard to keep expenses down, living simply, to make it possible. I certainly was not meaning to imply otherwise, as I think you'll see if you read the entire comment.

At the same time, even though the model you're describing requires a great deal of sacrifice and things are not at all luxurious, it still is a privileged model. The term "relatively" was meant to suggest precisely that-- relative to the world as a whole. As I went on to share, I've made similar choices for similar reasons, making similar sacrifices to do so.

But the fact remains, that for a significant portion of society, homeschooling is not an option, no matter what sacrifices the parents are willing to make. And that segment of society is the segment that is the most vulnerable, the most in need of the boost of a good education. So, on the broader societal level, you have to wonder what happens to those kids. Will our concerns for public schools be as strong, will we fight as hard to set right all the things that are driving us away from them, once we have made that sacrifice to remove our kids from a system we believe is broken?
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Niminypiminy:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:

I think the choice really comes down to that ying/yang-- between the greater societal good and what this child, this family, needs.

Cliffdweller, I'm really sympathetic with your situation -- I have a child whose needs will always be very difficult for our local school to meet. I spend hours worrying and praying about what the right thing for him is. I guess I wanted to say, though, that these things are about more than just one's own child, and to add that dimension to the discussion.
Yes, precisely, that was my point. And yet I confess that obviously I made my decision entirely about just my own child. Which creates broader ethical concerns.
 
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 
This is an interesting thread.

I'm over 60. I've known people who have been to all sorts of different schools. Yet I've hardly ever met anyone who as far as I know had all or part of their education in somewhere other than some sort of school. The few I have met were either:-

a. Educated a long time ago, before the First World War, or in the case of primary only, well before the Second; or

b. Brought up in a remote part of a foreign country in a place where there was no viable education in their own language and education system. I believe there was once an organisation that provided UK style schooling by correspondence courses for such people, but don't know whether it still exists.

I've not met anyone my age or younger whose parents simply chose to do it themselves. It's an intriguing idea, but I'd have thought few people have the skill or time to do it. Don't you get taken to court though?
 
Posted by Niminypiminy (# 15489) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Which creates broader ethical concerns. [/QB]

I think that's my point, that the education one chooses for one's child is, as well as being a consumer choice, an ethical choice. Choosing the 'best thing' for one's own child may mean, by default, choosing a worse thing for someone else's.

That's not to say that choosing to home school is a bad thing, merely that it has ethical implications, and consequences beyond one's own family.
 
Posted by ianjmatt (# 5683) on :
 
Enoch

The modern home education movement traces it roots back to the early 20th century with educational practitioners such as Charlotte Mason and home educating families such as the GK and Francis Chesterton. It grew steadily until the second world war, and the educational reforms of the 50's and 60's pushed it back a bit until the 1980s when it took off again.

No - the law states that:

quote:
Compulsory education

7: Duty of parents to secure education of children of compulsory school age

The parent of every child of compulsory school age shall cause him to receive efficient full-time education suitable—

a: to his age, ability and aptitude, and

b: to any special educational needs he may have,

either by regular attendance at school or otherwise. (Education Act 1996 section 7)

This states that it is legally the parent's responsibility to ensure the education happens, and that this may be by attendance at school or by other means - there has been a lot of case law establish just what is meant by most phrases in this section.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
My own experience is that very few home educating families are relatively wealthy and it certainly is an option for the poor and for single parents. This pdf doc gives one parent's account. There's also a thread in netmumsSingle parent/ home schooling question which deals with working and with the benefit system. For example a single parent might work four hours a day and arrange for the child to be looked after, perhaps within another home-educating family. Child-care allowances and the tax credit system help. I doubt if it costs the state any more than it pays out for a child to use the school system.

There are probably cross-pond differences at play here. I probably should have specified it is not usually an option for single-parent and poor families in the US.

One does have to beware, though, of relying too much on anecdotal stories when making assumptions re: what is possible for the poor. Something I've found in my work w/ the homeless here is that someone can always find an exceptional example of someone who has "pulled themselves up by the bootstraps" (a favorite phrase among American pols) and managed to accomplish great things despite a background of severe poverty deprivation. Those stories are inspiring, and may include some kernels of truth that will be helpful for others seeking to make the same journey. But all too often they are used instead to deny poor and single parent families of the resources they need-- "JK Rowling was able to pull herself out of poverty-- so you just go and do the same!" as if Rowling's accomplishment was easily duplicated.

Again, UK system is obviously very different than ours, so ymmv.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Niminypiminy:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Which creates broader ethical concerns.

I think that's my point, that the education one chooses for one's child is, as well as being a consumer choice, an ethical choice. Choosing the 'best thing' for one's own child may mean, by default, choosing a worse thing for someone else's.

That's not to say that choosing to home school is a bad thing, merely that it has ethical implications, and consequences beyond one's own family. [/QB]

Yes, again, we're very much on the same page. I'm just more aware of my own short-comings in this area. My pessimism about any parent choosing the greater good over their own child's particular good may be my own defense mechanism of projection. Plus whining about my guilt makes me sound like a good & ethical person even if I'm not.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
....
I've not met anyone my age or younger whose parents simply chose to do it themselves. It's an intriguing idea, but I'd have thought few people have the skill or time to do it. Don't you get taken to court though?

This website Education Otherwise is worth a look if you want to see how home education works in the UK. EO was founded in 1977 and grew from a few families to thousands. There are several other support groups for home educating families. Around 40,000 families are believed to be involved.

Nimminypimminy - Can you give some examples of the ethical implications and the consequences beyond one's own family?

[ 11. June 2012, 21:19: Message edited by: justlooking ]
 
Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 
Enoch

So long as you can prove that your child is actually being educated, it's not agains the law. However, I understand that some local authorities are more hostile than others, and might present more obstacles. If you are taken to court, you have to make your case, don't you?

Child film stars, or the children of film stars, or rich foreigners with a peripatetic lifestyle sometimes employ tutors or governesses for their children. You still see the adverts in 'The Lady' or certain other publications. (The most famous example recently was when Gwyneth Paltrow and Chris Martin advertised for a super-qualified, multi-talented person.) The state sometimes provides free tutors for children who can't attend school due to illness.

Of course, parents aren't always qualified teachers - but private schools aren't obliged to be hire qualified teachers anyway. Many of them hire people straight from university, and then train them on the job. Only state schools are obliged to hire qualified people, I think.

Home-schooling by parents in the UK is probably less common today because most families want to have the kind of lifestyle only possible if both parents go out to work. Also, most parents are satisfied with state schools, or else can afford private schooling. But there are always exceptions. Maybe the majority of home-schooled children have been to school but have had significant problems there. I'm sure there are some statistics somewhere.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:

Nimminypimminy - Can you give some examples of the ethical implications and the consequences beyond one's own family?

can we start with the ones we already raised?
 
Posted by Gee D (# 13815) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
This is an interesting thread.

I'm over 60. I've known people who have been to all sorts of different schools. Yet I've hardly ever met anyone who as far as I know had all or part of their education in somewhere other than some sort of school. The few I have met were either:-

a. Educated a long time ago, before the First World War, or in the case of primary only, well before the Second; or

b. Brought up in a remote part of a foreign country in a place where there was no viable education in their own language and education system. I believe there was once an organisation that provided UK style schooling by correspondence courses for such people, but don't know whether it still exists.

I've not met anyone my age or younger whose parents simply chose to do it themselves. It's an intriguing idea, but I'd have thought few people have the skill or time to do it. Don't you get taken to court though?

Or in a remote part of their own country. The School of the Air flourishes here, bringing education to children on isolated properties while they remain in their own homes; or in the case of some larger properties, in a room set aside for the children living there. The school is based in Alice Springs, with teachers working via radio (perhaps a version of Skype these days) with their various pupils.

In earlier years, there was also correspondence school for children who could not attend a school for all sorts of reasons. Lessons would be posted out and exercises returned for assessment. That programme seems to have dropped out.
 
Posted by Moo (# 107) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Niminypiminy
But in the end I think my objections are ones of principle. Decisions about education don't only concern the academic curriculum and how it is taught; nor do one's decisions only affect one's own children. Schools are part of society at large; a local school is -- or should be -- a microcosm of society in its area. If you take your child out of their local school, whether that is home schooling, or private education, or some kind of alternative like Steiner, you are taking them out of their local community and into a self-selecting group of like-minded and like-circumstanced people.

I think that everyone loses when that happens. Removing your child from your local school means, in effect, removing them from society, from our common circumstances and experiences. That's bad for the child concerned, and it also diminishes the richness and diversity of the school's society. It means saying that 'what is good enough for the common herd is not good enough for my child'.

Both my daughters are now in their forties. When they were in school there was a philosophy that children are supposed to adjust to the group, and if the group rejects them, it's their fault. Obviously children need to learn not to behave obnoxiously to other children; however many children who are picked on would like to quietly mind their own business.

One of my daughters had to start wearing hard contact lenses when she was nine years old. They caused a lot of pain and made her eyes extremely light-sensitive. She was teased unmercifully because of the dark glasses she wore. She could have handled the teasing if she had not had to use a lot of emotional energy to handle the pain. I spoke to the guidance counselor, and she said the child would have to learn to handle it by herself.

AIUI most schools now provide more protection for kids who are harassed.

As far as socialization was concerned, she had friends at church, in the neighborhood, at the children's theater, and at Girl Scouts. The kids in these groups treated each other much better than kids at school did.

Moo
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
Moo, while I can see how your post relates to the thread as a whole, I'm not sure how it relates to the question you quoted from Niminypiminy re the broader ethical concerns re: society as a whole v. our own individual child. Could you say more to draw out what your point was relative to Niminypiminy concern?
 
Posted by Moo (# 107) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Moo, while I can see how your post relates to the thread as a whole, I'm not sure how it relates to the question you quoted from Niminypiminy re the broader ethical concerns re: society as a whole v. our own individual child. Could you say more to draw out what your point was relative to Niminypiminy concern?

Niminypiminy said I think that everyone loses when that happens. Removing your child from your local school means, in effect, removing them from society, from our common circumstances and experiences. That's bad for the child concerned...

If the 'common circumstances and experiences' are having a bad effect on your child, you should get him the hell out of there. I think bullying is bad for the child who does it as well as for the victim. However, if the school won't do anything, parents have a duty to protect their own child. Moreover, there is an assumption that socialization can happen only in a school setting. I named other settings where my daughter could interact with kids who did not torment her.

Moo
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
The issue of children ending up with a very narrow perspective on society isn't confined to homeschooled children. Public schools seem to be very bad at giving children anything but ignorant contempt for state schooled children. In fact, this seems to be part of what parents are paying for in some cases. I went to a state school and was thoroughly steeped in inverted snobbery both there and at home, which was equally damaging in it's own way.

I think any parent has to be very intentional about giving their child a broad and tolerant experience of society, regardless of schooling.
 
Posted by LutheranChik (# 9826) on :
 
I was bored to tears in elementary school, and I was also bullied for being fat and an "egghead," so I would have given my eyeteeth to have been educated at home. (I used to read my parents' old schoolbooks anyway.) I think the handwringing over homeschooled children not being "socialized" enough is mostly crap; if getting beaten up and having my lunch money stolen while responsible adults refuse to get involved is being "socialized," then I was socialized enough, thanks, in my first years of school.

If I had a child and had the financial freedom to homeschool him or her, I would very seriously consider it, at least for the first few years. I've been reading about various homeschool curricula lately (an Internet rabbit hole I scampered down after meeting our granddaughter's second cousin, who's been Waldorf homeschooled and is quite an interesting young man), and some of them I think I would have enjoyed as a kid...not the Christian-fundamentalist-nonsense ones, but the Charlotte Mason method, which includes a lot of nature study and eschews academic textbooks for "real" books by people who obviously know and love the subject matter at hand. (I wouldn't mind being "Charlotte Masoned" now!)

A lot of my teasing at school was focused on my lack of physical education ability -- I'm built for strength, not for agility;-)...I think perhaps had I been homeschooled I could have concentrated on things like hiking, which I love to do, and would have developed a much healthier body image.

In the US, I think the social conservatives are determined to send public education down the chute, so IMHO it's going to increasingly be everyone out for himself or herself as far as providing a decent education for children. Sad but true. Rome is burning.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Moo, while I can see how your post relates to the thread as a whole, I'm not sure how it relates to the question you quoted from Niminypiminy re the broader ethical concerns re: society as a whole v. our own individual child. Could you say more to draw out what your point was relative to Niminypiminy concern?

Niminypiminy said I think that everyone loses when that happens. Removing your child from your local school means, in effect, removing them from society, from our common circumstances and experiences. That's bad for the child concerned...

If the 'common circumstances and experiences' are having a bad effect on your child, you should get him the hell out of there. I think bullying is bad for the child who does it as well as for the victim. However, if the school won't do anything, parents have a duty to protect their own child. Moreover, there is an assumption that socialization can happen only in a school setting. I named other settings where my daughter could interact with kids who did not torment her.

Moo

Yes, you made a decision similar to that I made-- you did what was best for your child. But the question that Niminypiminy wasn't just (or even primarily) about "socialization", it was about the effect on society as a whole (or, I would add, more specifically on the public schools) when all of us who are able/motivated/ have the resources pull our kids out of a broken system rather than staying to fix it?
 
Posted by Moo (# 107) on :
 
If I had been able to fix the system, I would have. You're right, it would have been much better. However, as far as the guidance counselor was concerned, my daughter should learn to adjust to the group.

I knew what I could do for my daughter. I did not know what I could do for the school system.

Moo
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
If I had been able to fix the system, I would have. You're right, it would have been much better. However, as far as the guidance counselor was concerned, my daughter should learn to adjust to the group.

I knew what I could do for my daughter. I did not know what I could do for the school system.

Moo

Yes, again, that was my story as well. But I think Nim's question is a valid one. Are we as motivated to advocate for change, to advocate for improved conditions, after we've removed our children from the system?

My concern is that those left behind are the very ones least able to advocate for change (those w/ the least political capitol).

But again, this is "liberal guilt"-- I've already made my choice I'm just blathering on about how bad I feel about it like that makes me a better person.
[brick wall]
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:

Nimminypimminy - Can you give some examples of the ethical implications and the consequences beyond one's own family?

can we start with the ones we already raised?
Do you mean these?

"Removing your child from your local school means, in effect, removing them from society, from our common circumstances and experiences. That's bad for the child concerned, and it also diminishes the richness and diversity of the school's society. "

I don't think you've made a case for claiming that the child is removed from society or shown any evidence that it's 'bad for the child concerned'

"If those of us who have the ability to leave the system opt to do so, rather than stay and fight for a better system, then the people who lose out are the most vulnerable-- the poor, single parent families-- those with no other options."

What do you mean by 'fight for a better system'? Fight how? And what you consider a better system may be what others would fight against.

"for a significant portion of society, homeschooling is not an option, no matter what sacrifices the parents are willing to make. And that segment of society is the segment that is the most vulnerable, the most in need of the boost of a good education. "

Homeschooling isn't an option probably for most of society or at least not an option most people would seriously consider. It doesn't fit with what most parents want. Those who do want this choice include single parents and poorer families. 'A good education' isn't confined to schools. Home education is a good education too. This research includes the results of tests which show:
quote:
Baseline Assessment

This involved 4-5 year olds who were tested twice over a 'school' year.

The PIPS Baseline assessment data indicated that 64% of the children scored over 75% on the assessment where nationally, just 5.1% of children score over 75%. 'End of Reception Year' data suggested that the children's progress over the period was less than that associated with school children during their reception year. This observation, however, was offset by the home-educated children's high baseline scores.

Children from the lower end of the socio-economic class scale significantly outscored those from the upper spectrum of the scale.(my emphasis)

There was no score differences between families who owned and did not own a television.

Children from religious families did not score significantly differently from those children from more secular families at the start of reception although by the end of reception the score difference was significant.

Literacy Assessments

Working with the idea of a normal bell curve distribution, we expect to find 16% of children in the top band. Percentages of home-educated children within this score band for literature were as follows:

94% of 6 year olds

77.4% of 7 year olds

73.3% of 8 year olds

82.3% of 10 year olds

Figure 1 shows the percentages of year 1, 3 and 5 children in each band. As can be seen, none of the children fell into the lower 16% band.

The paper quotes some earlier research Thomas (1998) into children's informal learning processes.

Thomas hypothesised that on entering school, children lost the art of informal learning, at least to the degree experienced by children who had not been at school. The type of learning that occurred naturally was very different from that of school;

The very high test scores of the home educated children may be a natural consequence of retaining the art of informal learning rather than an indication of higher ability.

So, on the broader societal level, you have to wonder what happens to those kids. Will our concerns for public schools be as strong, will we fight as hard to set right all the things that are driving us away from them, once we have made that sacrifice to remove our kids from a system we believe is broken?

The things that drive some of us away may be exactly the things most parents want, e.g. timetables, regimentation, uniforms.

You've produced what you consider to be ethical considerations but I don't think you've made a case in support and there are no examples of adverse consequences stemming from my or anyone else's decision to home educate.
 
Posted by Moo (# 107) on :
 
The specific evil in this case was the idea that if a kid is picked on, it's his fault. The group cannot possibly be wrong.

When I was in elementary school in the 1940s, our parents and teachers all said the same thing, "If you don't like so-and-so, you don't have to play with him. If you're not going to play with him, leave him alone."

When my daughters were in school the 'adjustment to the group' idea was firmly entrenched. The teachers and guidance counselors were 'the professionals'. We amateur parents just didn't understand.

Moo
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
Justlooking-- whoa, dial down the paranoia. You're jumping to conclusions and answering questions no one is asking.

quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by cliffdweller:
[qb] [QUOTE]Originally posted by justlooking:

"Removing your child from your local school means, in effect, removing them from society, from our common circumstances and experiences. That's bad for the child concerned, and it also diminishes the richness and diversity of the school's society. "

I don't think you've made a case for claiming that the child is removed from society or shown any evidence that it's 'bad for the child concerned'

Nim is the only one who made that comment, and even then I think it was secondary to the larger question about society as a whole. Most of us here seem, despite your fears, to be fairly comfortable that homeschooled children can have a very good education.


quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
[QUOTE]
"If those of us who have the ability to leave the system opt to do so, rather than stay and fight for a better system, then the people who lose out are the most vulnerable-- the poor, single parent families-- those with no other options."

What do you mean by 'fight for a better system'? Fight how? And what you consider a better system may be what others would fight against.

Imagine for a moment that homeschooling was not an option, not under any circumstances. Imagine that private schooling was not an option. You were trapped, for whatever reason, in the public school. What would you have done? That's what I mean by "fight for a better system."

quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
[QUOTE]"for a significant portion of society, homeschooling is not an option, no matter what sacrifices the parents are willing to make. And that segment of society is the segment that is the most vulnerable, the most in need of the boost of a good education. "

Homeschooling isn't an option probably for most of society or at least not an option most people would seriously consider. It doesn't fit with what most parents want. Those who do want this choice include single parents and poorer families. 'A good education' isn't confined to schools. Home education is a good education too.

... many links to stats...

Justlooking, why did you post all those stats? Who are you trying to convince? My comment, if you read it, assumed that homeschooling can and often is a "good education"-- as I and most others here have assumed throughout this thread. That was my point. Your defensiveness (perhaps based on past experiences) is making it hard for you to hear what's actually being said and asked. That's understandable, this discussion is so personal, so emotional, it makes most of us defensive.

Now, why don't you answer the question I was actually asking?


quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
[QUOTE]
So, on the broader societal level, you have to wonder what happens to those kids. Will our concerns for public schools be as strong, will we fight as hard to set right all the things that are driving us away from them, once we have made that sacrifice to remove our kids from a system we believe is broken?

The things that drive some of us away may be exactly the things most parents want, e.g. timetables, regimentation, uniforms.

I doubt the difference is as large as you assume.


quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
[QUOTE]
You've produced what you consider to be ethical considerations but I don't think you've made a case in support and there are no examples of adverse consequences stemming from my or anyone else's decision to home educate.

The consequence we would be looking for in this case would be declining public schools. Which seems to be something that is assumed in the argument for homeschooling, although if we wanted to take the time we could probably produce stats parallel to yours to document the decline.

Do you see no validity to the concern whatsoever? Do you-- and I-- hold any responsibility for the children of other parents? The children of our neighbors with fewer options?
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
The specific evil in this case was the idea that if a kid is picked on, it's his fault. The group cannot possibly be wrong.

When I was in elementary school in the 1940s, our parents and teachers all said the same thing, "If you don't like so-and-so, you don't have to play with him. If you're not going to play with him, leave him alone."

When my daughters were in school the 'adjustment to the group' idea was firmly entrenched. The teachers and guidance counselors were 'the professionals'. We amateur parents just didn't understand.

Yes. A bad system. For your kid... but also for many, many others. Kids with fewer choices.

So how does the system change? Does the system change when we (and it really is "we") pull our kids out? Perhaps-- if enough do so. Does the system change when we stay and advocate for change, not just for our kids, but for all kids? This is the harder choice-- the road not taken by me, but the one it sounds like Nim chose. It's a courageous choice.
 
Posted by Moo (# 107) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller
So how does the system change? Does the system change when we (and it really is "we") pull our kids out? Perhaps-- if enough do so. Does the system change when we stay and advocate for change, not just for our kids, but for all kids? This is the harder choice-- the road not taken by me, but the one it sounds like Nim chose. It's a courageous choice.

I don't know how to get through to people who patronizingly tell me that they are professionals, and I don't understand how things should be done.

It requires a specific personality type or set of skills to fight this kind of battle. I don't have what it takes.

Moo
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller
So how does the system change? Does the system change when we (and it really is "we") pull our kids out? Perhaps-- if enough do so. Does the system change when we stay and advocate for change, not just for our kids, but for all kids? This is the harder choice-- the road not taken by me, but the one it sounds like Nim chose. It's a courageous choice.

I don't know how to get through to people who patronizingly tell me that they are professionals, and I don't understand how things should be done.

It requires a specific personality type or set of skills to fight this kind of battle. I don't have what it takes.

Yeah, that's my feeling as well. Yet I can't help thinking that we probably have more resources, more political capital, than those we are leaving behind.

Then there's the question of timing. Change takes time. Changing a system takes time. When it's your kid that's being bullied/ poorly educated/ whatever, how long can you wait? Every wasted year carries with it huge consequences.

On the macro level, I don't think there's any getting around the truth of what Nim is challenging us to. If everyone thought like me/justlooking/moo the schools in Little Rock would still be segregated.

But when it's my kid....
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
quote:
originally posted by cliffdweller:
Yes, you made a decision similar to that I made-- you did what was best for your child. But the question that Niminypiminy wasn't just (or even primarily) about "socialization", it was about the effect on society as a whole (or, I would add, more specifically on the public schools) when all of us who are able/motivated/ have the resources pull our kids out of a broken system rather than staying to fix it?

I'm still wondering...

What makes an arbitrarily drawn school district the community as a whole but not organic social groupings?

and

Why should I accept that what is good for the common herd is good for my children?
 
Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 
Presumably it's possible to speak out for improvements in state education without actually sending your child to a state school? After all, we all have to live and work in a society where the majority are schooled in that system, so it's not as though other people don't have an investment in its success.
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
Not really

Cliffdweller is right about that.
 
Posted by Antisocial Alto (# 13810) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:


What makes an arbitrarily drawn school district the community as a whole but not organic social groupings?

The fact that "organic" social groupings tend to segregate themselves by race and wealth? Take churches for example- very few, especially in rural areas, are truly diverse.

From my own experience, if I hadn't gone to public schools I probably wouldn't have known black kids, poor kids or kids who weren't faculty brats. My "organic" extracurricular activities- church, Scouting, and various music groups- were all lily-white and upper-middle-class. I'm glad those weren't the only kids I socialized with outside my home.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
cliffdweller:
I asked Niminypiminy for some examples of the claimed ethical implications and the consequences beyond one's own family and you answered with:
quote:
..can we start with the ones we already raised?
. 'we' presumably being youself and Niminypiminy. I looked back through the relevant posts and quoted what seemed to be the ones already raised.

quote:
Imagine for a moment that homeschooling was not an option, not under any circumstances. Imagine that private schooling was not an option. You were trapped, for whatever reason, in the public school. What would you have done? That's what I mean by "fight for a better system."
When my son was in primary school the system at that time still allowed for corporal punishment. I joined the STOP society and served legal notices on the school and LEA to protect my child. Some of the schools rules I considered irrational and challenged them. However, fighting for changes can turn school into a battleground and since parents have different ideas about what makes for a better system there would be a lot of fighting at cross purposes.

The fact is that home schooling is an option. That's the reality and most people deal with life as it really is and not on the basis of some imagined circumstance.

As I understand it, "for a significant portion of society, homeschooling is not an option,.. And that segment of society is the segment that is the most vulnerable, the most in need of the boost of a good education. " is your view that single parents or poorer families are vulnerable in some way which removes the option of home education. Which is not true since many single parents and poorer families do home educate. Your reference to "the boost of a good education" is made in the context of fighting for unspecified changes to the school system as if this is the way to provide that boost. You seem to have some romatic idea of home educators being able to champion the 'vulnerable' by remaining in the school system.

The 'stats' are results which contradict a number of assumptions about home education, school education and poorer families. They contradict your assumptions since the research found that the children of poorer families obtained significantly higher results. The research suggests that if the home educated children had gone to school they would not have obtained the same very high results, that children do not need to be taught in order to learn, and that the school system may suppress children's natural learning ability. It's nothing to do with a 'decline' in public schools. Schools by their nature cannot allow for natural learning.

quote:
Do you see no validity to the concern whatsoever? Do you-- and I-- hold any responsibility for the children of other parents? The children of our neighbors with fewer options?


No I don't. I think this is patronising and untrue.

I don't think you've made a coherent case for home education having ethical implications for wider society nor have you shown how the 'most vulnerable-- the poor, single parent families' lose out.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
cliffdweller:

quote:
If everyone thought like me/justlooking/moo the schools in Little Rock would still be segregated.

First of all - speak for yourself, do not speak for me.

Then, explain how if everyone thought like you the schools would be still be segregated.

[ 12. June 2012, 01:32: Message edited by: justlooking ]
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
quote:
originally posted by Antisocial Alto:
The fact that "organic" social groupings tend to segregate themselves by race and wealth? Take churches for example- very few, especially in rural areas, are truly diverse.

So?

I don't value diversity for the sake of diversity.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
originally posted by cliffdweller:
Yes, you made a decision similar to that I made-- you did what was best for your child. But the question that Niminypiminy wasn't just (or even primarily) about "socialization", it was about the effect on society as a whole (or, I would add, more specifically on the public schools) when all of us who are able/motivated/ have the resources pull our kids out of a broken system rather than staying to fix it?

I'm still wondering...

What makes an arbitrarily drawn school district the community as a whole but not organic social groupings?

I don't think it's that organic social groupings are not community, but rather that public schools are our community. Not the only community, but an important part of our community, an important part of the social fabric that makes society work. When we abandon them we imperil our future.


quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
Why should I accept that what is good for the common herd is good for my children?

The question we're asking here is the reverse-- if the public school system is not good for your kids, doesn't it stand to reason that it is also quite possibly not good in the same ways for lots of other children-- children with fewer (or no) other options, and whose families have less political capitol to bring about needed change?
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Presumably it's possible to speak out for improvements in state education without actually sending your child to a state school? After all, we all have to live and work in a society where the majority are schooled in that system, so it's not as though other people don't have an investment in its success.

quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
Not really

Cliffdweller is right about that.

Actually, I do think it's possible. I just think it's less likely. We're less likely to know what those problems are, for one thing, after we've flown away. And we're less likely to be motivated to do something when it's not our kid's future on the line.

But I do think it's possible. And perhaps that's what I'm advocating here (for myself as much as anyone). That if we feel we must move our kids, then do so-- but don't forget those who are left behind. Stay connected to them, stay involved-- and be an advocate for change.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
cliffdweller:

quote:
If everyone thought like me/justlooking/moo the schools in Little Rock would still be segregated.

First of all - speak for yourself, do not speak for me.

Then, explain how if everyone thought like you the schools would be still be segregated.

Well, I was speaking for myself. I was talking about the painful choice we make between what is best for my kid v. what is best for all the kids.

The parents who integrated the schools in Little Rock made the exact opposite choice you and I did. They chose to put their kids in a toxic-- really toxic, to the point their lives were at serious risk-- situation. They chose to put their kids in a situation where federal marshals had to walk their kids to school. They did that for the sake not only or even primarily of their own kids. They did so for the sake of all the children-- the children of the entire community, who indisputably (I hope) are better off because of the courageous choices they made.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
(sigh) justlooking, you seem to have missed it, but many people here are sympathetic to your pov. Your defensiveness is really, really getting in the way of what would otherwise be a good and cogent argument.

quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
Imagine for a moment that homeschooling was not an option, not under any circumstances. Imagine that private schooling was not an option. You were trapped, for whatever reason, in the public school. What would you have done? That's what I mean by "fight for a better system." [/b]

When my son was in primary school the system at that time still allowed for corporal punishment. I joined the STOP society and served legal notices on the school and LEA to protect my child. Some of the schools rules I considered irrational and challenged them. However, fighting for changes can turn school into a battleground and since parents have different ideas about what makes for a better system there would be a lot of fighting at cross purposes. [/QUOTE]

Yes. But it's worth it. This is an excellent example of what I was talking about. Would that we all (and by "we" I mean "me") would do the same.


QUOTE]Originally posted by justlooking:

As I understand it, "for a significant portion of society, homeschooling is not an option,.. And that segment of society is the segment that is the most vulnerable, the most in need of the boost of a good education. " is your view that single parents or poorer families are vulnerable in some way which removes the option of home education. Which is not true since many single parents and poorer families do home educate.
[/QUOTE]

Again, there may be cross-pond differences here due to the differences in benefits programs to aid the poor. In the US it is very unusual for a poor or single parent to homeschool, because it is simply not possible-- logistically as well as economically. Now again, many middle-class parents make significant sacrifices to homeschool-- leading very simple lives w/ few if any luxuries in order to make that possible. Again, this is the profile of most of the homeschoolers I know here in the US. But even w/ those sacrifices it is not an option available to Americans below a certain level of poverty or w/o a working partner. There are, of course, notable exceptions.


QUOTE]Originally posted by justlooking:
[b]
The 'stats' are results which contradict a number of assumptions about home education, school education and poorer families. They contradict your assumptions since the research found that the children of poorer families obtained significantly higher results. The research suggests that if the home educated children had gone to school they would not have obtained the same very high results, that children do not need to be taught in order to learn, and that the school system may suppress children's natural learning ability. It's nothing to do with a 'decline' in public schools. Schools by their nature cannot allow for natural learning.
[/QUOTE]

Justlooking, THIS is the point: in the context of the discussion at hand, NO ONE was disputing that. NO ONE. You posted the stats under a quote of mine which was not AT ALL disputing this, in fact, was ASSUMING these very facts. Which is why I asked, "who are you arguing with?". It feels very, very much like you are engaging in shadow boxing here.


QUOTE]Originally posted by justlooking:
[b]
quote:
[b]Do you see no validity to the concern whatsoever? Do you-- and I-- hold any responsibility for the children of other parents? The children of our neighbors with fewer options?


No I don't. I think this is patronising and untrue.
[/QUOTE]

Wow. Seriously? You seriously think it is "untrue" that we have a responsibility for the children of our neighbors? And you think the suggestion that we might is "patronizing"? Seriously?

Well, if that is the case, I can't think of a single response. Other than wow. Just wow.

[ 12. June 2012, 02:12: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
agh, the html is massively messed up there-- tried to fix it and only made it worse, then ran out of edit window. Bleh.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
I'm gonna try reposting the worst of it and see if I can fix the html. Wish me luck.

quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
As I understand it, "for a significant portion of society, homeschooling is not an option,.. And that segment of society is the segment that is the most vulnerable, the most in need of the boost of a good education. " is your view that single parents or poorer families are vulnerable in some way which removes the option of home education. Which is not true since many single parents and poorer families do home educate.



Again, there may be cross-pond differences here due to the differences in benefits programs to aid the poor. In the US it is very unusual for a poor or single parent to homeschool, because it is simply not possible-- logistically as well as economically. Now again, many middle-class parents make significant sacrifices to homeschool-- leading very simple lives w/ few if any luxuries in order to make that possible. Again, this is the profile of most of the homeschoolers I know here in the US. But even w/ those sacrifices it is not an option available to Americans below a certain level of poverty or w/o a working partner. There are, of course, notable exceptions.


quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
The 'stats' are results which contradict a number of assumptions about home education, school education and poorer families. They contradict your assumptions since the research found that the children of poorer families obtained significantly higher results. The research suggests that if the home educated children had gone to school they would not have obtained the same very high results, that children do not need to be taught in order to learn, and that the school system may suppress children's natural learning ability. It's nothing to do with a 'decline' in public schools. Schools by their nature cannot allow for natural learning.



Justlooking, This is the point: in the context of the discussion at hand, NO ONE was disputing that. No one. You posted the stats under a quote of mine which was not AT ALL disputing this, in fact, was assuming these very facts. Which is why I asked, "who are you arguing with?". It feels very, very much like you are engaging in shadow boxing here.


Sorry again for the messed up html.

[ 12. June 2012, 02:17: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
fwiw: here is a link to an abstract re: research into American homeschooling. The conclusion of the extensive research was that in the US it is undertaken primarily by white families of moderate income & education, and almost exclusively two-parent families. Again (third time), differences in the types of assistance available to single families in UK v. US may account for these differences.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Well, I was speaking for myself. I was talking about the painful choice we make between what is best for my kid v. what is best for all the kids.

You included me and moo in your allegation that schools would still be segregated.

You are not responsible for all kids. They have their own parents and do not need you to make any choices for them. My choices were based on what was best for my child. I found I couldn't support a system I thought diminished children. But I was responsible only for my child and other parents made their own choices.

quote:
The parents who integrated the schools in Little Rock made the exact opposite choice you and I did.
Again, speak for yourself and don't include me in your decisions.

There was a lot more to desegregation than choices made by some parents. The teenagers themselves took a leading role. Also, it had nothing to do with home education. It was all about school education. Just what is it that you feel you could be fighting for? You talk about making changes and improving the system for others - what changes? What would you be doing other than bestowing your presence? And what makes you think other parents would want your help?

You know sod all about what led to my son being educated out of the school system and I'm not going to tell you the whole story because it's none of your business. But I've been involved in active campaigning and not just theoretical wrangling. If I could, I would have changed the school system to something more in line with the free school movement. I doubt if this is what most parents want.

[ 12. June 2012, 02:40: Message edited by: justlooking ]
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
[QUOTE]
You know sod all about what led to my son being educated out of the school system and I'm not going to tell you the whole story because it's none of your business. But I've been involved in active campaigning and not just theoretical wrangling. If I could, I would have changed the school system to something more in line with the free school movement. I doubt if this is what most parents want.

Yes, obviously I don't know you or your situation. But clearly it was something very painful-- as evidenced by the very, very defensive way you have engaged in this conversation. I know you don't realize this, but for the most part I've been agreeing with you. It doesn't sound like we're ever going to get past your feeling of attack, no matter what I say. So best to leave it be.
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
quote:
originally posted by cliffdweller:
I don't think it's that organic social groupings are not community, but rather that public schools are our community. Not the only community, but an important part of our community, an important part of the social fabric that makes society work. When we abandon them we imperil our future.

Schools are part of our community. Public schools are no more a part of our community than private schools. Our schools are wherever we send our children regardless of who runs the schools. Even those who homeschool usually don't try to educate their children entirely apart from other children.

quote:
originally posted by cliffdweller:
The question we're asking here is the reverse-- if the public school system is not good for your kids, doesn't it stand to reason that it is also quite possibly not good in the same ways for lots of other children-- children with fewer (or no) other options, and whose families have less political capitol to bring about needed change?

As justlooking said, we will not all agree on what we want in a school. To me, it makes sense for those who want the same type of education to band together and find a way to provide that for their children. Public schools can provide what some parents want for their children. Whether or not the public schools provide the type of education the parents want depends as much on the other parents as anything else. The middle class doesn't have anymore political capitol than the poor. We all have one vote regardless of our income. The middle class might have more money than the poor but not enough to buy political influence.

Tclune's Robinson Jeffer's quote is very appropriate.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
originally posted by cliffdweller:
I don't think it's that organic social groupings are not community, but rather that public schools are our community. Not the only community, but an important part of our community, an important part of the social fabric that makes society work. When we abandon them we imperil our future.

Schools are part of our community. Public schools are no more a part of our community than private schools. Our schools are wherever we send our children regardless of who runs the schools. Even those who homeschool usually don't try to educate their children entirely apart from other children.
Again, no one is arguing that point.

quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
The middle class doesn't have anymore political capitol than the poor. We all have one vote regardless of our income. The middle class might have more money than the poor but not enough to buy political influence.

I assure you, that simply is not the case, at least in the US, particularly re: local school boards.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
]
Yes, obviously I don't know you or your situation. But clearly it was something very painful-- as evidenced by the very, very defensive way you have engaged in this conversation. I know you don't realize this, but for the most part I've been agreeing with you....

No it wasn't 'something very painful'. And I'm not so much interested in whether or not you are agreeing with me as trying to find out just what it is you are arguing for.

I'm not feeling 'attacked'. I'm bewildered by statements like this -

" That if we feel we must move our kids, then do so-- but don't forget those who are left behind. Stay connected to them, stay involved-- and be an advocate for change."

Is this what you're doing? Are you working as an advocate for 'those who are left behind'. What changes are you advocating? Because if you're not actually doing anything it's just emotional rhetoric.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
[QUOTE]

Is this what you're doing? Are you working as an advocate for 'those who are left behind'. What changes are you advocating? Because if you're not actually doing anything it's just emotional rhetoric.

um.... yeah. Like I said. Almost word for word.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
So what are you doing?
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
You're not following, justlooking. Like I said, you are so defensive you're not following what I'm saying, even when I'm quite direct or repeat myself. There really is no point, it's only causing needless angst. Let it go.
 
Posted by Think² (# 1984) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
originally posted by Antisocial Alto:
The fact that "organic" social groupings tend to segregate themselves by race and wealth? Take churches for example- very few, especially in rural areas, are truly diverse.

So?

I don't value diversity for the sake of diversity.

Now this I find strange. The narrower ones experience then, I think, the risk is the narrower one's mind.

More broadly, the less involvement you have with "the common herd" the less you are likely to care about their fate. Ultimately, that leads to a looking after number one, devil take the hindmost society the gradually becomes more fragmented and divided.

[ 12. June 2012, 06:37: Message edited by: Think² ]
 
Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :
 
I have a fair bit to reply to here, so will break into a few posts, but a disclaimer to start with. I was educated at home for five and a half years. I did not enjoy it.

quote:
Originally posted by FullCircle:
I had a short period (months)of home schooling when I was eight and hated it. It changed my relationship with my mother: and made a battle ground between us that lasted for years. I went to multiple schools (from large comprehensives to small international schools) all of them were better than home schooling. It really is one of my worst memories of childhood.

Yep. I saw this thread a few days ago and intended to comment on it but my mother was staying with us over the weekend so I couldn’t because it is still a bit of a live issue between us (I am 35).

quote:
Originally posted by Chive:
My sisters and I were home schooled til we were ten and it was bloody awful. My main problem with it was the idiosyncracies my parents had when it came to what to teach, the fact that all my emotional eggs were in one basket - I couldn't piss my teacher off without pissing my mum off, and the fact that it was very isolating.

Oh my God, is it isolating. Evidently there are people posting on this thread who have had a different experience, but once you are out of the school system, there are no opportunities to see other people your own age unless your parents both approve of it [idea of socialising] and them [people in question] and place sufficient value on the idea to make it a priority. Didn’t happen much for me – and when it did, it was in a context where both my, and their – whoever they were – parents were right there, hanging around, being all grown up and lame and fucking watching me. How can anyone act normally or build anything approaching a rapport with someone else in such a situation? (even if such a situation had occurred more than about three times a year).

quote:
Originally posted by ArtDunce:
I would have hated to be homeschooled since despite the bullying or the boredom I had the opportunity to decide who I wanted to be in the world away from the person you feel compelled to be with/for your family. Room to try on different personas, exposure to people very different from your familiy's circle and the space to question them and decide for yourself what your values, opinions or choices will be.

Oh YES – and this. This, this, and this. I was actually bullied at school, before I was removed at ten, but despite this, I did not want to leave – I was horrified by the idea, in fact. Obviously I did not get any choice in the matter, and I think even now I could talk until I was blue in the face to my Mum about how the opportunity to ‘…try on different personas…and decide for [my]self what [my] values, opinions and choices will be’, was worth any amount of bullying [and there was more of it than I ever disclosed to my parents] – in fact, this sort of freedom is worth more (to me, anyway), than all other freedoms combined. I had it taken away from me, and I’m still struggling with the implications of that.
 
Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
What I dissaprove of and what gets me riled is a parenting philosophy that thinks it's fine for children to have a bad time at school as this is character building, or in some way related to preparing them for 'real life' - and this is what I often hear from the most vociferously 'anti' people. There are lots of other parents I've spoken to who've chosen school for other reasons.

I would class myself as ‘vociferously anti’ – or possibly ‘scarred by’, and I wouldn’t make the argument that bad times are character building – in fact I think that’s a crock of shite. I would say that bad times can be had at home at least as easily as at school, depending on the child, and that you, as the parent, won’t necessarily know this, because your child may not feel free to tell you the length and breadth and depth of what they feel on the topic. I still don’t feel free to do so, and as I have already said, I’m 35. And I’ve had a few years of therapy. And my parents weren’t bad people, they were trying to do what they thought were right, and they never shut us in cupboards or hit us with hosepipes or anything like that.

quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
What I also think is sad is the number of parents who don't think themselves capeable of homeschooling when they perhaps are.

What I find astonishing (and I’m not directing this at you, because I know nothing of your background), is that parents with no training for the job imagine they can do a better job than those who have been trained. It’s very dismissive of an education system, that by and large, does work. Yes, there are some people who it does not work for – I know that. But really – my mother left school at 14 to go and work in an office, and thought she might take on educating her two children – I am (and I don’t love this about myself, but hell, I’m very academic) – I had outrun her by the age of 12! It didn’t do wonders for an already fragile relationship, I have to say. But even for those parents who are massively educated and intellectual, there is a big difference between knowing things and knowing how to teach them.

quote:
Originally posted by Zaccheus:
I haven't known anybody who had home schooled, but I have known a few who considered it. My concern was that they were parents who just wanted to control every aspect of their children's life, and they were worried that in schools, other people had influence over their children.

Yep. Education system very ‘wordly’, one’s children need to be soaked in this* crap all day, every day, and only socialise with church people. Otherwise they might be swayed by deceptively persuasive ideas**.

* pdf's at bottom of page, can't link directly to them.
**scientific evidence.

quote:
Originally posted by Zaccheus:
I know a few people who do, or who have, home schooled their children. It always seemed to me that the decision to home school was far more about the parents than about the children.
Auntie Doris x

Yes, though to be fair, in my case, I think it was about the parents’ fears with respect to the children, which were silly and groundless, but entirely sincere, nonetheless. And I should acknowledge that my parents made considerable financial sacrifices in order to impose this stuff on us…

quote:
Originally posted by Cliffdweller:
Yes, I share that experience. It's when home-schooling becomes all about what you're afraid of, what you're running away from-- rather than what you're drawn to, what you're adding-- that it becomes negative IMHO. Should be more about what you're "for" than what you're "against".

Yes. See above. In my experience, there was plenty of it about – but of course my experience will not have been representative seeing as those with whom we socialised will have been a self-selecting group.
 
Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :
 
I may be unusual here in that both my sons went to the local 'sink' comprehensive school when they were 11. It had just failed its Ofsted and was listed as one of the worst ten in the country.

Why did we send them there? Because we had told them the school they went to was their choice - and this was where they chose, as many of their friends were going there. The social mix was considerable.

My hunch was if they were going to do well, they'd do well anywhere.

This turned out to be a good hunch - they made good friends of all social and ethnic backgrounds. Both have good Master's degrees now and are getting on well in life - they can mix with anyone fearlessly.

When I ask them they are happy with their choices and have no regrets.

<typo>

[ 12. June 2012, 09:44: Message edited by: Boogie ]
 
Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
If those of us who have the ability to leave the system opt to do so, rather than stay and fight for a better system, then the people who lose out are the most vulnerable-- the poor, single parent families-- those with no other options.

Sadly, this happens anyway, homeschool or not. State schools in this country have a zoning system in place, but they are widely gamed by parents who ‘just want the best for their children’, and assume that a school where 25% of the children are Indian/Pacific Islanders cannot possibly be a good option for their children (I’m not making this up – I have actually had people say to me – ‘I can’t have him go to the local school, it’s full of Indians’) – and thus perpetuate the problem.

quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
Local schools are not microcosms of society in its area. State and federal governments have too much control over what can and can't be taught as well as how it is taught. Homeschooling and private schools are the only ways parents can instill the values of their real local communities into their children.

[emphasis mine]

With respect, bollocks. My ‘real local community’ was a typical provincial rural NZ 1970s/80s one – hard work, rugby, and beer, casual racism and benign ‘live-and-let-live’ secularism. However, I saw very little of it during the time I was kept at home with my brother and my English immigrant, non-drinking, non-sporting, end-times obsessed only-socialise-with-other-fundamentalists parents. However, my local school probably was reasonably representative of it, seeing as the parents of the majority of the children would have fitted that bill.
 
Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Think2:
Conversely, as an adult, one of the things that is a slight social hinderance is not having a similar experience of childhood to my peers. It gives you a kind of nostalgia bypass.

I have always, and continue, to stick out like a sore thumb in some ways. Being perceived as different is not necessarily a bad thing, but it can be lonely and can be somewhat isolating. It has taken me along time to get comfortable in my own skin - and I have remained single almost my entire adult life.

Oh God, I feel your pain. In addition to not having friends as an adolescent, we didn’t have a TV. I arrived at University (having picked one about 1000km from my home), and in addition to not having sampled a banned novel or an alcoholic beverage before, I had also not: heard of Monty Python, seen any Star Wars movies, or watched a game of rugby (a fairly big deal, in NZ, anyway).

(I am pleased to be able to say that many years later I got in the last word on the ‘Well I’ve never’ drinking game with ‘Well, I’ve never seen any Star Wars movies’, so it wasn’t all wasted) [Biased]
 
Posted by Niminypiminy (# 15489) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:

You are not responsible for all kids. They have their own parents and do not need you to make any choices for them. My choices were based on what was best for my child. I found I couldn't support a system I thought diminished children. But I was responsible only for my child and other parents made their own choices.


I'm sorry to have missed the debate that's raged around posts I made. Just to backtrack a little and explain myself. But first two caveats: I have no doubt that home schooling can give children a very good education ( pace points made by Anoesis and Chive); and when you see your child seriously unhappy in school your most immediate responsibility is to them.

What I think I am trying to articulate (probably not very well) is a conviction that education is not merely a matter of the development of a single person, and not merely the preference of a single family. The discourse of 'choice' which has become the controlling language through which we think about education (it underpins much of the debate on this thread) implies that 'your choice' is for you alone to make on behalf of your child, and that everyone else has exactly the same ability to make choices for their own child. justlooking expresses that perfectly in the quotation above.

But what about if we see education as a social good (I think this is what tclune was referring to in an earlier post where he talked about education as a state function)? Our individual choices don't have no impact on others. If I remove my child from my local school, it would have an effect. I would no longer be a parent governor, and although I could stay on as a community governor there would be less reason for me to do so. One of the things I do as a governor is take a special interest in SEN and child protection -- that is, in the provision for the most vulnerable children in that school, many of whom have parents who could not or would not be able to have any significant involvement in their child's education. Those people are not going to be home schooling their children: they don't have the capacity or desire. But do their children deserve any less than the best -- do they deserve any less than their home-schooled or privately educated peers?

If all of those people who could home educate, or send their children to private school, or to some other alternative, were to do so, what would be the combined effect of our choices? Who would come in to read with children, run the PTA, be governors, push for the school to improve its provision for all? And a currently very diverse school population would end up being monocultural: made up of the most vulnerable, those with poorly educated, disempowered, apathetic or bewildered parents.

If I were to remove my children from the school, they would be removed from a situation where they must rub along with a lot of people who don't live like we do. I'm not talking about knowing a lot of people through church or any other kind of self-selecting group. I'm talking about knowing people their parents don't know, seeing a world of difference from their own class and cultural background. The world isn't just full of 'people like us', nor should school be. My children go to school with children who live in families where no-one works, where children sleep four or more to a room, where only the children speak English, where children are cared for by grandparents because the parents are incapable. I hope they will come out of it being able to get along with all sorts of people, not just people from a similar background. I hope to be able to say, as Boogie does about her children, that they've done fine in the end, and that they wouldn't change anything.

That's what I mean when I say that our individual choices have broader ethical implications. It's not that I don't worry about my children, particularly one of them. If it came to it, we might in the end have to say 'enough is enough'. But I try to think about what can help my children that can help others as well, and the way my choices affect what others are able to choose. Because we're not simply independent, free agents, choosing only for ourselves. What I do affects you -- even if I never know what those effects are.
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
I also did a lot of work to change from within - on two out of three primary PTAs (we moved house twice) and as a school governor, technically the community governor although I was also a parent. And with a few others from the town church chose to send my daughter to the local state secondary school. Her secondary school was in special measures for a few years while she was there and my daughter did get to have experiences that she would no doubt have preferred not to have.

However, as a single parent, it was better by far for my daughter to spend time away from me and get to do things without me. For that reason too I worked in schools in the next town. Relationships can get too intense, and I want my daughter to be her own person, not a vicarious extension doing the things I wanted to do and didn't. So for us home schooling wasn't ideal, but necessary. I'd have to ask her what she thought of it now, she's almost certainly got some opinions.

I think the experiences of sink state school have really helped. She is another who has come out with a Masters and I suspect that is partly through having to be self-motivated and organise her own learning, which she would not have learned in many schooling situations, particularly with the hothousing that goes on in many schools. Her job now is project engineer and I was so proud of her comments when she was talking about having to work with the guys on the factory floor - about having to be sensitive to their knowledge and experience, that they have children of her age, when she is technically several rungs above on the management ladder.

And anoesis - the time we were involved in home schooling was when I introduced my daughter to The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Priscilla, Queen of the Desert! Very much out of step with the prevailing culture in a different way.
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Think²:
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
originally posted by Antisocial Alto:
The fact that "organic" social groupings tend to segregate themselves by race and wealth? Take churches for example- very few, especially in rural areas, are truly diverse.

So?

I don't value diversity for the sake of diversity.

Now this I find strange. The narrower ones experience then, I think, the risk is the narrower one's mind.

More broadly, the less involvement you have with "the common herd" the less you are likely to care about their fate. Ultimately, that leads to a looking after number one, devil take the hindmost society the gradually becomes more fragmented and divided.

Well, if I decided that what was good for the common herd was good for my children, I wouldn't care about the variety of their experiences because what was good enough for the common herd was good enough for my children. Wanting to provide a variety of experiences to one's child might be one of the reasons parents don't send their children to public schools.

As to racial diversity, if my wife and I continue to live in the same house we live in now, our daughter would attend a more racially diverse school if we chose the most popular private option rather than sending her to public school. Besides, just because children attend school with people different from them doesn't mean they will come to care about their well being. Demographics will not be much of a factor in where my wife and I decide to send our daughter to school.
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
quote:
originally posted by anoesis:
With respect, bollocks. My ‘real local community’ was a typical provincial rural NZ 1970s/80s one – hard work, rugby, and beer, casual racism and benign ‘live-and-let-live’ secularism. However, I saw very little of it during the time I was kept at home with my brother and my English immigrant, non-drinking, non-sporting, end-times obsessed only-socialise-with-other-fundamentalists parents. However, my local school probably was reasonably representative of it, seeing as the parents of the majority of the children would have fitted that bill.

Again, it depends on how community is defined and what values you think are important. Sounds like your parents didn't have much of a community period. I hate to break this to you but children who attend public schools can be just as isolated only in a different way.
 
Posted by la vie en rouge (# 10688) on :
 
Justlooking, here's what I think you're not getting, and the reason that people are getting frustrated - you're coming to this from the point of view of an interested parent doing the best for your child. With a parent like that, I think most children will generally do ok whatever they choose. Your child is educated well because you give a damn.

Trouble is, though, that too many parents don't give a damn. On the sink estate where my Dad was a primary teacher for 20 years, a considerable proportion of the parents didn't. So the only hope for those children to get a good education was other people, like their teachers and school governors, and indeed the parents of other children in the same school.

You (and Beeswax) seem to be taking the attitude "well, they're not my children, so why should I care?", which sounds (a) selfish - as if you don't care about any children not in your own immediate family and (b) shortsighted - because it's for the good of society as a whole for all children to be given the best possible education.
 
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 
Parents have, and are entitled to have, different ideas as to what is the best education for their children, which parameters they rate or don't rate and what's practical for them and what isn't. But it seems to me that anything other than 'what's best for our child/children' is high-minded tosh.

Perhaps I have misunderstood what is being argued in some posts. Nevertheless, you do not send your little dears to school, however lovely they are to you, to bestow the wondrous gift of their personalities on the other children. Nor are either you, nor your better education and organising skills, a special blessing that is your gift to bestow upon your fellow parents or the PTA.
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
If being concerned first and foremost about my children makes me selfish, then I'm selfish. I don't suffer from liberal guilt. As for shortsighted, the rest of society can only do so much to overcome the effects of bad parenting. Every child gets a free education. Those who put any effort into it at all can attend college and at minimum get need based financial aid.

Tutoring and other after school programs might also help. Adults can volunteer to help with programs of that nature without having a child in the schools primarily served by the program. I bet most of them wouldn't exist at all if only adults who had children in the school or even just lived in the school district participated in them. Chances are the adults who participate do so because of an affiliation with an organic social group such as a church or service organization.

[ 12. June 2012, 15:00: Message edited by: Beeswax Altar ]
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
anoesis's comment, "Obviously I did not get any choice in the matter" is the starting point of where it all goes wrong. Whatever choices are made, the child needs to be involved in the decision-making processes.

UK legislation which involves providing services to children, including education, will have some reference to the duty to:

(a)ascertain the child’s wishes and feelings - regarding the provision of those services; and
(b)give due consideration (having regard to his age and understanding) to such wishes and feelings of the child....

This seems to be well-embedded into medical services and social care. There are procedures for ensuring that children are part of the decision-making processes which affect them.

With education it's more difficult. The ultimate legal responsibility lies with parents and the law assumes they are discharging their duties unless there are grounds for believing they are not. This thread is about the pros and cons of home education - the delights, the difficulties and the dangers. A major danger is where children are not party to the decision.

My child's right to be consulted and involved was always a guiding principle for me. So when he started at primary school at a time when teachers could still hit children, I told him about the STOP campaign and he was in full agreement with me serving the notices. When school reports came, with a space for parents' comments and a dotted line for signature, I added a dotted line for pupil's signature and he would write his comments and sign. His comments were invariably positive but I know it annoyed the school. However, my duty was to ensure that my child knew his feelings mattered and had a place. Things that upset him about school were rules for the sake of rules. He had no problem with rules he could see the purpose of but some were irrational and I couldn't make them rational for him - certain rules about dress for example. There were issues with the secondary school he would have attended and challenging these when he was a pupil would have put him in the centre of a battle. He loved the idea of home-based education and the whole EO environment. The final decision was his. I continued to be involved in campaigns around children's rights and education but not at the expense of my own child.

A key phrase from an enquiry into the way social service and medical staff had responded to allegations of widespread abuse in one UK town was “Children are not objects of concern". I think this understanding needs to be at the heart of all decision-making about children. It can easily be overlooked when adults are discussing their concerns about children's education. I also get uneasy with some discussions around poverty and vulnerability which turn people into "The Poor" and "The Vulnerable".

cliffdweller: you've made impassioned pleas for those who opt out of the state school system to maintain contact and fight for improvements but you haven't identified any practical ways of doing this. A few examples of what you are doing or what you think others should be doing would help to make clear what it is you are fighting.

The desire to help those we see as less fortunate can be expressed in ways which diminish them.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
Plus, what Enoch said, especially this:

" ....Nor are either you, nor your better education and organising skills, a special blessing that is your gift to bestow upon your fellow parents or the PTA. "
 
Posted by OliviaG (# 9881) on :
 
There can be many reasons to home-school that aren't due to "problems" in the school system and that parents are under no obligation to try to fix. Examples: my parents wanted me to be educated in English, and they did not want me to attend religious education. Would it have been reasonable to ask a public school in *Mexico* to set up an English program for me and perhaps a handful of other ex-pat kids? Would it have been reasonable for them to tell a Catholic private school that they should accept ATHEIST students? OliviaG
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
Every child gets a free education. Those who put any effort into it at all can attend college and at minimum get need based financial aid.

I gather this is true in the UK. fwiw, it is not true in the US, and has not been true for at least a generation.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:

cliffdweller: you've made impassioned pleas for those who opt out of the state school system to maintain contact and fight for improvements but you haven't identified any practical ways of doing this. A few examples of what you are doing or what you think others should be doing would help to make clear what it is you are fighting.

(sigh). Why do you so wish to prolong this, yet take so little time to actually listen to what others are actually saying???

I have addressed this at least four times-- long before you raised the question. You may have missed it because the answer is not the one you're expecting-- just as you've missed many, many points I and others have made that weren't the antagonistic barbs you are poised to defend against.

This is what has been frustrating about this conversation-- not that we disagree, but that you continue to argue points where we are in agreement, posting stats to support premises not in dispute, angrily answering charges no one is making. You claim to be dispassionate about the whole thing, but you are acting like a wounded bear. Perhaps there is some reason for that, perhaps not, you don't want to share that so we'll never know. But it might feel really, really good to just put down the shields for a moment. To consider the possibility that the entire world is not a battlefield, and there just might be one little corner somewhere where you are not under attack. Yet I'm sure this suggestion will appear "patronizing". Ah, well.

Just a possibility.
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
I live in the United States.

Who gets charged tuition to attend public schools?

Do you not know how easy it is to get into community colleges and even most state universities?

Between in-state tuition and federal, state, and institutional financial aid, getting a bachelor's degree is affordable and student loans are subsidized. For instance, if you go to community college and do work study, you can get an undergraduate degree and come out with less than $20,000 in student loans. Most students who come from a poor family and did well academically could come out with much less if any student loan debt.
 
Posted by TurquoiseTastic (# 8978) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:

cliffdweller: you've made impassioned pleas for those who opt out of the state school system to maintain contact and fight for improvements but you haven't identified any practical ways of doing this. A few examples of what you are doing or what you think others should be doing would help to make clear what it is you are fighting.

(sigh). Why do you so wish to prolong this, yet take so little time to actually listen to what others are actually saying???

I have addressed this at least four times-- long before you raised the question. You may have missed it because the answer is not the one you're expecting--

I've got to say I've missed it too. I've looked carefully through the thread and I can't see you addressing it anywhere.

Unless you mean the bits where you say "this is all liberal guilt and I don't really know *what* to do". Is that the "non-expected answer" you mean?
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
I live in the United States.

Who gets charged tuition to attend public schools?

Do you not know how easy it is to get into community colleges and even most state universities?

Between in-state tuition and federal, state, and institutional financial aid, getting a bachelor's degree is affordable and student loans are subsidized. For instance, if you go to community college and do work study, you can get an undergraduate degree and come out with less than $20,000 in student loans. Most students who come from a poor family and did well academically could come out with much less if any student loan debt.

Actually, I know the system quite well. I teach in the university system. Most state universities and particularly the community colleges are desperately underfunded and overcrowded, meaning that it may take 4 or more years to complete a 2 year program, just because you can't get into the required courses. Tuition is rising. Federal and state scholarships disappeared a generation ago for anything other than athletic scholarships. Institutional aid is available at most private colleges. Indeed, many students are finding it cheaper to attend a private school w/ tuition upwards of $20K a semester because of the availability of financial aid.

Subsidized student loans ended this year. Most students are currently graduating with far more than $20K in debt, and little chance of paying it back. This is a concern that is being discussed at every level of higher ed. right now.

I went through college on a free ride due to government financial aid. But those programs are all history now.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by TurquoiseTastic:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Unless you mean the bits where you say "this is all liberal guilt and I don't really know *what* to do". Is that the "non-expected answer" you mean?

Pretty much-- although that isn't precisely what I said (not quite that passive). I made the same exact admission (almost word for word) that justlooking accused me of, only a few posts prior to the accusation. And a few posts prior to that. Some were more specific than the one you're referencing here. I also affirmed the things justlooking is doing and those others mentioned as the sort of thing I'm talking about. But that's par for the course here.

Honestly, it just seems this conversation has gotten so personal, so painful for folks (oh, but not justlooking, of course) that we're not hearing each other. I keep trying to leave the conversation but justlooking appears to be a very angry dog with a very big bone to pick.
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
I don't think that many state schools are full of parents who are apathetic about their children's education. I think that's a typical bit of middle class snobbery tbh. I live in a very low income community and I don't know any of these parents. It's a typical bit of liberal arrogance, believing there's a need to save those hapless people over there who don't care like we do. But then I'm a member of the working classes, so I can easily percieve the amount of patronisation that gets thrown in our direction.

Badly educated and lacking on self-confidence, perhaps. But where did these parents who are 'badly educated' come from then? We've had compulsory education here for decades. So logically it's the schools that are churning them out. These same schools that for decades have had well meaning, 'engaged' parents being govenors and volunteers and 'fighting for improvement'.

I think it's well meaning but delusional to not realise that it's not always about good schools and bad schools, it's that for a lot of children, the school system per se doesn't work well, and no amount of effort is going to fix that. One way in which it doesn't work is that it supposedly spends 10 years teaching people something, but ends up sending many of them away with the message that they are a bit thick, that they are not high flyers, and that they certainly don't know anything well enough to teach it to their own kids. I think this is sad.

quote:
What I find astonishing (and I’m not directing this at you, because I know nothing of your background), is that parents with no training for the job imagine they can do a better job than those who have been trained.
People have been teaching children and young people what they know for thousands of years before it was thought that teaching was something that needed teaching in it's own right.

I do believe their are areas of life where having a piece of paper to say you can do it doesn't count for much in my book. I've supposedly been 'trained' to look after small children in my capacity as a childminder, but what I've really been trained in is to jump through the paperwork hoops required. My actual, valuable, training in doing the job is entirely hands on.

Off the top of my head, I would say a teacher needs knowledge, an enjoyment of conveying it, a willingness to learn, create and try out different methods of teaching something, and an ability to get to know and inspire their student. They need to be ready to learn alongside their students. I'm pretty sure they do not need a PGCE.

quote:
I would have hated to be homeschooled since despite the bullying or the boredom I had the opportunity to decide who I wanted to be in the world away from the person you feel compelled to be with/for your family.
This wasn't the case for me. I felt compelled to fit into a certain mould by my peer group. It wasn't until I got out of school and went to uni that I found the confidence to discover who I was and feel there was permission to be it.

(I've more to add but now I'm getting kicked off the PC by my child... [Big Grin] I do think a lot of the stories of isolation and bad relationships with family are cautionary tales for homeschoolers. I hope I'm not sticking my fingers in my ears and pretending it can't happen to us.)
 
Posted by Niminypiminy (# 15489) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
But it seems to me that anything other than 'what's best for our child/children' is high-minded tosh.

Perhaps I have misunderstood what is being argued in some posts. Nevertheless, you do not send your little dears to school, however lovely they are to you, to bestow the wondrous gift of their personalities on the other children. Nor are either you, nor your better education and organising skills, a special blessing that is your gift to bestow upon your fellow parents or the PTA.

Well, fair point. But last time I looked, the school was not overwhelmed with people rushing to do the work. AFAIK the only regular helpers are from the educated middle class.

Also I didn't say that I send my children to school to bestow the wondrous gift of their personalities on other children. I would never say that -- especially as one of my children has severe social difficulties. I tried to say, perhaps badly, that everyone benefits when there is a true social mix.

It may all be high-minded tosh on my part. I tend to think of it as living out Christian values.
 
Posted by Niminypiminy (# 15489) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
I don't think that many state schools are full of parents who are apathetic about their children's education. I think that's a typical bit of middle class snobbery tbh. I live in a very low income community and I don't know any of these parents. It's a typical bit of liberal arrogance, believing there's a need to save those hapless people over there who don't care like we do. But then I'm a member of the working classes, so I can easily percieve the amount of patronisation that gets thrown in our direction.

Badly educated and lacking on self-confidence, perhaps. But where did these parents who are 'badly educated' come from then? We've had compulsory education here for decades. So logically it's the schools that are churning them out. These same schools that for decades have had well meaning, 'engaged' parents being govenors and volunteers and 'fighting for improvement'.


(apols for double posting - x-posted with my previous)

I do think these are really fair criticisms of views I have voiced. It's very easy for educated, articulate middle class people like me to believe they are god's gift to others. I accept that the activism of people like me can disempower others.

But I do know people who are apathetic about their children's education. I know families who keep their children of school for two days a week or more, every week. I know parents who have assaulted teachers because they have been asked to abide by school rules. I know children whose parents are drunk most of the time. That's not true of all the parents at my children's school, but it is true of some.

It's as much a falsehood to say that no working class parents are like that as to say they all are. (And I do know that not all the parents I am talking about above are working class.)
 
Posted by Beeswax Altar (# 11644) on :
 
quote:
originally posted by cliffdweller:
Federal and state scholarships disappeared a generation ago for anything other than athletic scholarships.

Stand and federal governments still offer grants.

quote:
originally posted by cliffdweller:
Most students are currently graduating with far more than $20K in debt, and little chance of paying it back. This is a concern that is being discussed at every level of higher ed. right now.

Yes, my wife has a ton of student loan debt from her undergraduate degree. She didn't spend two years at a community college and then go to a state school. We both have debt from seminary and graduate school.

Is sending our child to public school going to somehow improve the state of higher education in the United States?
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
originally posted by cliffdweller:
Federal and state scholarships disappeared a generation ago for anything other than athletic scholarships.

Stand and federal governments still offer grants.
Really quite little. Especially compared to the heyday of the 70s.


quote:
Originally posted by Beeswax Altar:
quote:
originally posted by cliffdweller:
Most students are currently graduating with far more than $20K in debt, and little chance of paying it back. This is a concern that is being discussed at every level of higher ed. right now.

Yes, my wife has a ton of student loan debt from her undergraduate degree. She didn't spend two years at a community college and then go to a state school. We both have debt from seminary and graduate school.

Is sending our child to public school going to somehow improve the state of higher education in the United States?

Not at all. This is a tangental discussion. Feel free to steer us back on track.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by TurquoiseTastic:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:

cliffdweller: you've made impassioned pleas for those who opt out of the state school system to maintain contact and fight for improvements but you haven't identified any practical ways of doing this. A few examples of what you are doing or what you think others should be doing would help to make clear what it is you are fighting.

(sigh). Why do you so wish to prolong this, yet take so little time to actually listen to what others are actually saying???

I have addressed this at least four times-- long before you raised the question. You may have missed it because the answer is not the one you're expecting--

I've got to say I've missed it too. I've looked carefully through the thread and I can't see you addressing it anywhere.

Unless you mean the bits where you say "this is all liberal guilt and I don't really know *what* to do". Is that the "non-expected answer" you mean?

Thank you TT.

So he's not doing anything himself because he doesn't know what to do. He's sent his kid to a ee-paying school and feels guilty about it. This much I understand. I had hoped, with all the ferences to fighting for change, to glean some notion of what changes are envisaged and how they might be fought for.

What I can't follow, and there's more than cliffdweller promoting this, is the line of argument that sees a decision made in the best interests of one's own child to be a decision made against the interests of other children.
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
quote:
It's as much a falsehood to say that no working class parents are like that as to say they all are. (And I do know that not all the parents I am talking about above are working class.)
True enough, sadly. I'm not sure what the answer is.
 
Posted by LutheranChik (# 9826) on :
 
Bitching about public schools is, in the US, as old as public schools themselves. (About a hundred years ago, in another part of Michigan, one irate taxpayer was so angry at being asked to help finance the local school that he blew it up -- with about 40 kids, several teachers and himself in it.)We just don't have a mentality in this country that there's value in doing anything in a collective way, except maybe waging war. (One of my friends suggests that since most of our ancestors were disgruntled non-conformists, most of us are genetically selected for rugged individualism.)

The conservative party line these days is that creating competition with local public schools -- charter schools (publicly funded schools, sometimes in partnership with business, often with a particular curriculum focus), homeschools, vouchers parents can use for private school tuition -- will somehow raise the bar for the public schools: "Oh, no...we're losing all our kids to School X. We'd better step up our game." What actually happens, though, is that the public schools, which receive money on a per-pupil basis, lose even more money as parents go elsewhere.

That's one thing. Then there's the assortment of good ol' boys and gals who make up the school boards of some school districts. When I was in high school I was appointed to some sort of sub-committee involving a couple of these folks; our charge was to revisit graduation requirements, but instead of making them more rigorous the adults, unlike the student committee members, wanted to make them less so: "After all, most of ya are gonna wind up pumping gas or workin' in a beauty shop or cashiering or some'in...why ya need to know all that stuff?" Apparently the whole omigod it's a Cold War/we have to beat the Russians in science and technology thing never percolated down to the community leadership of central rural Michigan. [Roll Eyes]
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:
[QUOTE]
So he's not doing anything himself because he doesn't know what to do. He's sent his kid to a ee-paying school and feels guilty about it. This much I understand. I had hoped, with all the ferences to fighting for change, to glean some notion of what changes are envisaged and how they might be fought for.

Think how much longer you could have savored that win had you been engaging mindfully in the conversation two days ago when I first mentioned it.

(she, btw)

[ 12. June 2012, 21:29: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
 
Posted by ianjmatt (# 5683) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:
What I find astonishing (and I’m not directing this at you, because I know nothing of your background), is that parents with no training for the job imagine they can do a better job than those who have been trained.

I'm going to call BS on this. The PGCE qualification is all about teaching a group of 30 kids of varying abilities in a way that helps the majority of them. It is essentially 8 months shared between work experience and some theory - and it does not contain any study of educational pedagogy or the history of educational theory.

In reality, it is a year learning how to crowd-control.

How that applies to someone using their existing (and equivalent knowledge) to teach their kids escapes me.
 
Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on :
 
Forgive me IanJMatt but don't most* Primary School teachers have a B.Ed? I think a four year degree, part practical part theoretical taught largely at new Universities.

PGCE are usually for secondary school where people have a first degree in the subject speciality.

Jengie

*Well aware it is most and not all, I know someone with a primary PGCE, she is a gifted teacher but her kids go to the LEA primary school.
 
Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Forgive me IanJMatt but don't most* Primary School teachers have a B.Ed? I think a four year degree, part practical part theoretical taught largely at new Universities.

PGCE are usually for secondary school where people have a first degree in the subject speciality.

Jengie

*Well aware it is most and not all, I know someone with a primary PGCE, she is a gifted teacher but her kids go to the LEA primary school.

Yes - same here in NZ. In fact, many early childhood teachers have degrees also.
 
Posted by ianjmatt (# 5683) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
Forgive me IanJMatt but don't most* Primary School teachers have a B.Ed? I think a four year degree, part practical part theoretical taught largely at new Universities.

PGCE are usually for secondary school where people have a first degree in the subject speciality.

Jengie

*Well aware it is most and not all, I know someone with a primary PGCE, she is a gifted teacher but her kids go to the LEA primary school.

You could be right - fair enough.
 
Posted by anoesis (# 14189) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
People have been teaching children and young people what they know for thousands of years before it was thought that teaching was something that needed teaching in it's own right.

If you mean that children learned, alongside their parents, how to plant seed and harvest things, how to skin a rabbit, etc., then I agree with you. If you are talking about the school system teaching children 'what they needed to know' before there was much in the way of educational theory, or 'teaching of teaching' then I don't think I do.

quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
I do believe their are areas of life where having a piece of paper to say you can do it doesn't count for much in my book. I've supposedly been 'trained' to look after small children in my capacity as a childminder, but what I've really been trained in is to jump through the paperwork hoops required. My actual, valuable, training in doing the job is entirely hands on.

Obviously there are areas of life where having a piece of paper saying that you can do it (or you have achieved it) are not the most relevant thing. But let me beg and plead with you, for your children's sake, don't cut them off from options which involve pieces of paper! You cannot (and should not) practice law, medicine, accountancy, engineering, gasfitting, physiotherapy, heavy goods transport, and other careers too great to number, without a piece of paper which says you can. Although I have not studied any of the above disciplines myself, I suspect that most of them use educational techniques which build on skill sets the candidates are assumed to be familiar with already.

quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
Off the top of my head, I would say a teacher needs knowledge, an enjoyment of conveying it, a willingness to learn, create and try out different methods of teaching something, and an ability to get to know and inspire their student. They need to be ready to learn alongside their students. I'm pretty sure they do not need a PGCE.

I think you have done a good job of identifying the qualities of a desirable teacher. However, if there were no requirement for any training at all - even a PGCE - what sort of screening process would you propose? I realise that posession of a PGCE does not therefore imply enthusiasm, creativity, a love of learning, etc., but at the very least having SOME sort of standardised hoop through which candidates must jump should do MORE to weed out a.)total incompetence, and b.)craziness than nothing at all.

(Please note, I am NOT trying to imply that you are either incompetent or crazy, merely saying that although a system which requires teachers to have a certain qualification will not guarantee they are great, I am a lot more comfortable with it than the idea that anyone with spare time on their hands could just rock up to a school and apply to teach my kids!)
 
Posted by Niminypiminy (# 15489) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by anoesis:

(Please note, I am NOT trying to imply that you are either incompetent or crazy, merely saying that although a system which requires teachers to have a certain qualification will not guarantee they are great, I am a lot more comfortable with it than the idea that anyone with spare time on their hands could just rock up to a school and apply to teach my kids!)

I'm a teacher, though I don't teach school age children. In HE, where I teach, universitites now require lecturers to take a PGCE on the job (I never had to do this, because it only came in a few years ago). I'm struck by how much better, more imaginative and resourceful my younger colleagues (who have been through this training, and thus had to spend quite a bit of time thinking about how to teach) are as teachers than I am.

Because we've all been taught, most of us think we know a bit about how to teach. But doing it is a lot harder than it looks. If anything, I wish there were longer teacher training.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
Given anoesis' experiences I can understand concerns about having some kind of 'screening'. In the UK most home-educators are not qualified teachers but a large proportion are - more than you'd find in the general population. I found it was a question people often asked and it seemed to reassure people if they knew I was a qualified teacher. It also helped in dealing with LEA officials. But I don't think it had much bearing on my own child's learning.

Learning within the school system is a different process. Children have a natural ability to learn and a natural desire to learn which they have to adapt when they get into the school system. The research involving baseline tests and literacy tests shows a huge difference between home and school educated children. This kind of research has been going on for a long time. I can remember discussion within EO in the late 1980's when some families were involved in comparative tests and they were stunned by the results. For people used to the school system and judging by test results it might look as if the EO children were all exceptionally bright but in reality it shows the results of a natural learning process. It also explains why people who may have had no formal learning at all and taken no public exams are still able to apply themselves to formal study and gain qualifications when they want them.

As for screening parents, UK law works on the assumption that parents are fulfilling their duty unless there is evidence to show they are not. There is no legal definition of what constitutes a suitable education. The first legal interpretation came from appeal case in 1981(Harrison and Harrison v Stevenson) when parents appealed against a conviction for failure to comply with school attendance orders. The Court ruled that education is suitable to a child’s age, ability and aptitude “if, and only if, the education is such as:

i. to prepare the child for life in modern civilised society, and
ii. to enable the child to achieve his full potential”.

Another case in 1985 (DfES, ex parte Tallmud Torah Machzikei Hadass School Trust) provided this definition: “education is ‘suitable’ if it primarily equips a child for life within the community of which he is a member, rather than the way of life in the country as whole, as long as it does not foreclose the child’s options in later years to adopt some other form of life if he wishes to do so”.

I think there could be scope for education authorities when they ask parents for information to include a question about how they are fulfilling their duty with regard to consulting the child and taking the child's wishes into account. This is as much a part of a parent's duty as the duty to ensure the child is educated. I know some parents strongly disagree but I think it's reasonable for an LEA to make periodic visits and to see and speak with the child. The general advice I remember from EO was to respond in a reasonable way to any reasonable request. Just because the LEA has no legal right to visit and to see the child doesn't mean that it's unreasonable for them to do so.

Of course none of this applies if parents haven't notified their LEA that they're home educating and no-one else has told them. Should there be a legal duty to notify?
 
Posted by ianjmatt (# 5683) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by justlooking:

I think there could be scope for education authorities when they ask parents for information to include a question about how they are fulfilling their duty with regard to consulting the child and taking the child's wishes into account. This is as much a part of a parent's duty as the duty to ensure the child is educated. I know some parents strongly disagree but I think it's reasonable for an LEA to make periodic visits and to see and speak with the child. The general advice I remember from EO was to respond in a reasonable way to any reasonable request. Just because the LEA has no legal right to visit and to see the child doesn't mean that it's unreasonable for them to do so.

Of course none of this applies if parents haven't notified their LEA that they're home educating and no-one else has told them. Should there be a legal duty to notify?

Up until last year we had a great experience with our local authority home education people. We had a former headmaster who would spend half a day a year with us and the kids and we always found it helpful and instructive (and we always had decent reports afterwards). The children would look forward to showing hi what work they had done that year, reading extracts, some maths stuff etc.

However, the LEA decided to get rid of its two inspectors and pass the responsibility on to the Educational Welfare Officers. The problem with this is that these people are not there to help you in the choices you have made, but to check up on you. The whole emphasis has shifted from positive to negative and frankly makes us a lot less willing to be as open as we were before.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
It's probably to do with money. EWOs are cheaper and this kind of cost-cutting is going on in schools especially since they can now use unqualified staff. An EWO can fulfil the LEA's basic legal duty but it's shame if you're used to having someone who'll take an interest in the details of what you're doing.

We had an education advisor who would stay for around an hour just going through a kind of checklist. I recall him once asking my son about whether he followed any kind of timetable and after thinking for a bit he was told "I do try to watch Neighbours at 1.00 o'clock if I'm in." I did wonder what he'd make of that in the report and I can't remember the exact wording but it was along the lines that my son was following a self-determined and largely unstructured timetable.
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
quote:
You cannot (and should not) practice law, medicine, accountancy, engineering, gasfitting, physiotherapy, heavy goods transport, and other careers too great to number, without a piece of paper which says you can. Although I have not studied any of the above disciplines myself, I suspect that most of them use educational techniques which build on skill sets the candidates are assumed to be familiar with already.
Well true. But this is all a long way from what a primary school age child needs to know. Those things build on physical coordination, and basic numeracy, literacy and curiosity which I would like to think most people can pass on.

I don't think it's realistic to claim any family can, without any outside input, teach any subject to A-level standard, that would be silly. Parents should know their limits, and look to tutors, colleges, teaching swaps in the community, to supplement what they can teach, and I'm guessing this gets more neccessary the older a child gets and the more focused their interests get.

Perhaps for a lot of families homeschooling in the primary years and school in the secondary years or sixth form is the best model and it's my understanding that some families do this.
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
quote:
I'm struck by how much better, more imaginative and resourceful my younger colleagues (who have been through this training, and thus had to spend quite a bit of time thinking about how to teach) are as teachers than I am.
That's interesting. At the moment I can't see much discussion in the home ed world about what skill set parents need, and how to develop parents as teachers/facilitators of learning. Perhaps there should be, although I don't think a mandatory qualification is neccessary.
 
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 
Is an Education Welfare Officer the same as what we used to call a School Bobby, and later a School Attendance Officer - i.e. a person whose job is to go round making sure children don't bunk off school or work under age?
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
@ Enoch - yes EWO is an old style School Attendance Officer, but that role now exists in a different format

@PerkyEars - in my experience, the local primary school tends to be more a part of the community and less stressful for children. The children I'm aware of being home-schooled have been more often of secondary age. Secondary schools being far more challenging places for many children.

Similarly, quite often I've come across families who have sent their child/ren to the local primary school until they were 7, then into private school.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
Is an Education Welfare Officer the same as what we used to call a School Bobby, and later a School Attendance Officer - i.e. a person whose job is to go round making sure children don't bunk off school or work under age?

Sometimes they're known as Education Social Workers. I think the main role is still to do with school attendance and with helping to resolve any problems. For instance a child may be absent to look after a parent who is ill and the EWO would help to get alternative care. They can instigate legal proceedings if parents are faling to ensure the child attends school.

Their role with home educating families is to check the child is receiving an education and that there are no problems preventing the child learning and no sign of neglect or abuse. So if they meet a child who looks cared for and happy and who can talk about what they're learning then everything's fine. Parents may have already given a written account of education provision to the LEA and I suppose the EWO might look for confirmation of that.
 
Posted by ken (# 2460) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by PerkyEars:
I don't think it's realistic to claim any family can, without any outside input, teach any subject to A-level standard, that would be silly.

I assume you mean teach "every" subject rather than "any" subject? I mean the parents might be A-level teachers already.

Or even if not teachers, people who know about the subject. I'm pretty sure I could teach Biology to A-level to one or two interested students, as well or better than most schools do to two-dozen bored ones. (And if home-schooling and the student is not interested, why are you doing it?)

And I could probably handle Chemistry as well, though some of the laboratory resources might be hard to come by. Perhaps I flatter myself but I think I might make a good stab at English, though it would be, as the cliche goes, a "learning experience" for me as well as the students, more a matter of working through it together than passing on what I know. History and Religious Studies the same.

Maths on the other hand would be a very bad thing for me to try to teach. Ditto Physics, because you need so much maths to do it. And as I know no languages other than English I'm hardly likely to teach them. I got kicked out of school Geography after the age of 13, though I imagine I might be able to catch up enough to teach at least adequately - same goes for Computer Science which I have never studied in my life but suspect I could cope with. Whoudl the same be true of Economics or Psychology? On the other hand I have no illusions whatsoever that I could cope with teaching A-level Art or Music or even passing them myself.
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
quote:
I assume you mean teach "every" subject rather than "any" subject?
Yes...I mean 'any' as in 'any subject their child might want'. Obviously lots of people can teach various things to A-Level standard.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
By the time people are at the A level stage, and often long before, the parents' role is likely to be more facilitator than teacher. In fact that's what it is a lot of time with younger children. It's often more about providing resources and supporting and encouraging learning than school-type teaching.

Home educated teenagers, depending where they live, can access much of what is provided for post-16 and adult learners. I know of many, including my own child, who from the age of about 14 were following their own curriculum using local resources such as FE colleges, community centres, sports facilities, evening classes, drop-in workshops and libraries.
 
Posted by Jenn. (# 5239) on :
 
isn't that prohibitively expensive for many? Certainly when I was unwell and looking to do courses to keep my brain working, only very basic courses were affordable.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
Most of it's free for people under 20. FE colleges receive funding for every student on roll and they have discretion to admit under-age students. Some for example provide access for school students who want to follow a course they can't take at school or who may be so disenchanted with school they cause problems and can cope better with the more adult environment of a college. There was DofES advice about this at the time my son and a few of his EO contempories wanted to take courses and an LEA had queried the legal and funding position. The advice was that the colleges had a discretion to admit home educated under 16's without losing their status or funding as 16+ providers.

It may be different now but a lot of the community education provision was free for everyone. There were drop-in workshops for English and Maths where people could work at whatever they wanted, including GCSE preparation. At 14 my son was spending one day a week at FE college on a 2-year course designed as a day-release programme for engineering apprentices. He was also using drop-in workshops for English and Maths. I can remember an EO girl of 13 who enrolled on a course of evening classes leading to a GCSE in Design Technology and no-one knew her age until it came to filling in the paperwork for exam entry at the end of the course. They'd assumed she was 17.

[ 14. June 2012, 12:27: Message edited by: justlooking ]
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
The FE scene has changed in the past few years. There is no longer funding for under age students to access vocational courses, certainly in this area. The schools were working on that one too - sending year 10 and 11 students (age 14-16) to learn things like motor vehicle maintenance, bricklaying and/or hairdressing. That's gone.
 
Posted by PerkyEars (# 9577) on :
 
quote:
The FE scene has changed in the past few years. There is no longer funding for under age students to access vocational courses, certainly in this area. The schools were working on that one too - sending year 10 and 11 students (age 14-16) to learn things like motor vehicle maintenance, bricklaying and/or hairdressing. That's gone.
That's a real shame. [Frown]
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
I think it may depend on LEA policy for a particular area. Some recent discussion has been about whether 14 - 16 year-olds should be able to attend as full-time students. This 2010article from the Guardian discusses proposals about extending the current provision for 14-16 year olds who are registered as school studentsd but attend part-time college courses. There's also been some recent research on the impact of 14-16 year olds in colleges which indicates that on the whole they've fitted in well with older students.

I'm not sure how it works but I suppose the school pays the college from the funding they receive for each pupil. For home educated teenagers the college would get funding from the same source as for its older students. Access to education is free for all 5-19 year olds. Parents can pay for private education of course but it doesn't affect the child's right to the free provision.

Ianjmatt will be more clued up about what the current situation is with EO teenagers.
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
But it won't be available for 14-16 year olds. They'll be reserving it for all the 16-18 year olds who have compulsory education until they are 18, and college is one option, but it's not going to work for colleges if they have to contain some of the sort of student I've been teaching from 14 to 18. The current year 9s, I think, are where this particular change kicks in.
 
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
Also, 16-19 funding streams come from the LSC (the Learning and Skills Council). The under 16 funding stream comes through Local Authority (LEAs went years ago in the shake ups following Victoria Climbié and Every Child Matters, it's now all one service together with social care and other children's services). I can tell you from past and bitter experience negotiating funding at that bridging age is painful if not impossible, and that was before we got the present Government's changes under Gove.

The students we've just sent off to college in September at 16 have conditional places for 6 weeks, in some cases, dependent on attendance. Further Education colleges' funding is not based on numbers on roll, but far more stringent criteria, such as attendance, punctuality and exam results. So they are getting far more ruthless at kicking students out who don't perform. That batch of students are also being charged for some of their course materials - it's not free.

Locally, there is very little in the way of evening classes for basic functional skills such as Functional Skills English and Maths, either.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
Current home educators will know how the system will affect them. It's going to be an interesting few years from 2013.
 
Posted by LutheranChik (# 9826) on :
 
I know some very competent homeschool parents (including a Methodist pastor -- how she juggles this with her pastoral schedule I can't imagine) -- usually highly educated people themselves who get so frustrated with the limitations of the public school system, and/or with their children's boredom with non-rigorous or creative curricula, that they simply decide to take things into their own hands. (Which, I understand, was the impetus for the contemporary homeschooling movement in the US -- it was a couple of angry Berkeley professors, not anti-intellectual fundies, who caused a stir by moving up to the mountains with their kid and defying the authorities by homeschooling him. He wound up going to an Ivy League university, BTW.)

On the other hand...while wandering down an Internet rabbit hole en route to searching for something else I once wound up on a forum for Christian homeschool mothers. I was absolutely appalled by their grammar and spelling. How does someone like this teach English to a child? Or even if they had limited education themselves, how could they go through all their teaching materials without some of the spelling and grammar information actually sticking in their heads. Good Lord A'mighty. I don't even want to know what they had to say about teaching mathematics or science. But for them it's not really about education, but rather about raising up ideologically untainted soldiers for their culture war and keeping their female children in fundamentalist-Christian purdah.
 
Posted by justlooking (# 12079) on :
 
There are groups in the UK which are like that. There are also 'Christian schools' which conform to the US model. OTOH, like Curiosity I've taught in the state school system and the kind of values I've met there make me glad my son took another route.
 
Posted by tclune (# 7959) on :
 
quote:
Originally posted by LutheranChik:
On the other hand...while wandering down an Internet rabbit hole en route to searching for something else I once wound up on a forum for Christian homeschool mothers. I was absolutely appalled by their grammar and spelling. How does someone like this teach English to a child?

I know what you mean. My son took AP English in high school. His senoir year AP English teacher gave him an A on his first paper of the year, and wrote in big letters across the top of the paper, "EXCELLANT." Tonstant weader fwowed up...

--Tom Clune
 
Posted by Emma Louise (# 3571) on :
 
Thanks for the discussion. We will probably use the local school but I do keep veering back and forth through the various arguments. Unfortunately what puts me off tends to be other homeschoolers...

However, I first became interested in homeschooling when a couple in my Oxford church homeschooled as they moved countries a lot. (They have continued to home school even though they've settled). They are an amazing family and have some wonderfully well brought up children. Meeting them certainly challenged my pre-conceptions when I was younger.

I have since met a variety of homeschoolers, and certainly wouldn't want to replicate the very-freaky-christian ones or the completely unschooled ones but I guess the joy of homeschooling is it is tailored to your own family.
 
Posted by LutheranChik (# 9826) on :
 
Here in the States, on the Food Network, there's a series called "Pioneer Woman Cooks" starring Ree Drummond, a writer/photographer who exchanged a fast-paced career in the city for life on an Oklahoma ranch with a real cowboy spouse. She's became a nationally popular blogger and cookbook author.

The show is about cooking, of course, but each episode features some aspect of her family's life. One intriguing aspect of this is her homeschooling her several children. Now, she and her husband are churchgoers but don't seem to be flaming fundamentalists at all -- I think they're MOTR Presbyterian -- so that doesn't appear to be her motivation. Maybe the local public schools don't measure up. Whatever the reason, she homeschools, and a recent episode showed her and a couple of homeschooling in-laws/friends having a "co-op" day with their children, making jam together (while learning about measuring, food safety, the mechanics of canning, etc.) and then going on a field trip to a stream and doing water quality testing and studying pond life. It seemed far more interesting and relevant than anything I ever did in grammar school.
 
Posted by angelfish (# 8884) on :
 
Emma Louise, you can do both! Send the children to the local school and spend weekends, holidays and homework time finding creative ways of improving their knowledge and learning skills.
 
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
.... and invite your friends' and neighbors' kids to join you!
 
Posted by Moo (# 107) on :
 
I think the greatest value of home-schooling is that the child can go at his own pace. If he grasps a certain topic quickly, he can immediately move on to the next topic. If he has trouble, he can spend as much time as he needs. Since the teaching is one-on-one, it immediately becomes obvious whether a child gets something or not. Also, there is no stigma attached to a failure to understand.

Moo
 
Posted by Janine (# 3337) on :
 
"Homeschooling pros and cons"?

Most cons wouldn't BE cons if they'd had the blessing of a homeschooling experience. [Razz]
 


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