Top Ten Reasons to Home School

[seachaser250]

It's very clear that you're more than qualified to administer home school for your children and they are excelling. That's an understatement.

I agree that public school is very different these days even in relation to someone like me that graduated from a public school in 2001. My child attends a private school that I, along with an entire community feel provides our children with a great education and all that comes with it. The test scores( good or bad it's the only way to objectively evaluate progress) and abilities I see my child demonstrate day to day prove to me he is a getting a fantastic education.

You feel what you're doing is superior to all the other options. That's ok, it's your opinion. However, it's fact that public and private schools are producing highly successful people every day. Home school is right for your family. It's not the right choice for everyone.

[Smalls]

Originally Posted by seachaser250

It's very clear that you're more than qualified to administer home school for your children and they are excelling. That's an understatement.

I agree that public school is very different these days even in relation to someone like me that graduated from a public school in 2001. My child attends a private school that I, along with an entire community feel provides our children with a great education and all that comes with it. The test scores( good or bad it's the only way to objectively evaluate progress) and abilities I see my child demonstrate day to day prove to me he is a getting a fantastic education.

You feel what you're doing is superior to all the other options. That's ok, it's your opinion. However, it's fact that public and private schools are producing highly successful people every day. Home school is right for your family. It's not the right choice for everyone.

It's clear this is an attempt to undermine public education. He pretty much said so much in his last post.

"One wonders if public school advocates and graduates have a habit of commenting before actually reading."

Then there is his comment about public schools churning out "vast numbers of graduates with an entitlement mentality". And that is the school's fault? When did it stop being the parent's responsibility to raise a child that did not have a sense of entitlement? How is that the school's fault? What are they teaching to give these kids a sense of entitlement?

Last I recall, schools were teaching math, science, english, art, and physical education. Where does social decorum fit into that curriculum? The molding of a productive young adult begins at home. If they are not taught at home how to behave and what is expected of them, how is that the school's fault? Afterall, from kindergarten to 12th grade, there is only one constant in most every child's life, and that is the parents. Teachers, administrators, even friends, change, but parents remain the same.



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[youmyboyblue]

Home school???? I send them to school so I can get a break. Kidding on this but, I am not prepared enough to educated my kids. I graduated from a great private college but in finance not childhood education.
Besides couldn't agree more on the atmosphere aspect of high school. Greatest 4 years of my life playing sports, flirting and enjoying friends.

[MathGeek]

Originally Posted by Smalls

It's clear this is an attempt to undermine public education. He pretty much said so much in his last post.

With an average ACT score of 19 or so for graduates, Louisiana is doing a fine job undermining public education without my help.

Yes, it is ultimately a parent's responsibility to ensure high school graduates accept responsibility for their choices and educational accomplishments. But it is increasingly difficult for parents to accomplish that if their children spend 35-40 hours per week in LA public schools.

[Smalls]

Originally Posted by MathGeek

With an average ACT score of 19 or so for graduates, Louisiana is doing a fine job undermining public education without my help.

Yes, it is ultimately a parent's responsibility to ensure high school graduates accept responsibility for their choices and educational accomplishments. But it is increasingly difficult for parents to accomplish that if their children spend 35-40 hours per week in LA public schools.

Because that is so different than any other point in American history?

Come on, MG. You might have pulled the wool over someone's eyes before, but that right there is pure garbage. Kids have been going to school for 35-40 hours a week for decades. So how is it any different now?

It's the parents, man. All these parents that let their kids do and say whatever they want are the problem.

I know quite a few hard working people that didn't score much higher than that on an ACT, by the way.

Don't EVER try and undermine someone because of a low test score on a standardized test!

I used to have a lot of respect for you. Now, you just come off as some ***** trying to preach his way to the masses, as if he is better than everyone else and knows best how others should lead their lives.

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[scott craft]

For anyone interested here's a link on average ACT scores nationally:

http://blog.prepscholar.com/act-scor...highs-and-lows

From what I gathered from this article due to percent of students that don't take the ACT varying by state in favor of the SAT determining the quality of a states education by ACT scores isn't that accurate. It's not a big secret though that Louisiana is on the lower end of the spectrum in quality of education. From reading through this thread socialization is what's influencing most people's opinions on home schooling, not quality of education. I tend to think people skills and how you get along with people are extremely important. I somewhat disagree with most in this thread that home schooled kids are automatically going to be at a disadvantage socially with all the resources that are available to parents today. Yes, some will have poor social skills, but judging by my interactions with college and teenage kids at restaurants and other public places and adults in the workforce public school isn't a guarantee of adequate social skills either.

Homeschooling is definitely not for everyone. Some parents don't want to do the work involved to do it right and it is a financial sacrifice in this era where both parents usually work. Everyone has to make an educated decision on what they think is best for their own kids.


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[noodle creek]

Originally Posted by MathGeek

Lots of interesting feedback. Sure, there probably are still some good schools where parents can depend on their children being well prepared academically for college. But having taught at both the Air Force Academy and a big state school (physics and calculus), I can tell you that in most states, the majority of students with ACT scores near and below average are poorly prepared for these college courses both in their study habits and in their skills and knowledge in science and math.

Sure, students also need to be well prepared for the onslaught of temptations that await them in college. An 18 year old college student should be better prepared to face temptations to common excesses of college years. However, in many public schools direct exposure to these destructive behaviors can become very common in middle and high school. Home school provides a way to reduce exposures to destructive behaviors and related temptations until the student is sufficiently prepared to resist them. Having taught in several public schools, my wife and I have seen that these schools' efforts and abilities to provide learning environments with manageable levels of these destructive behaviors and temptations is far, far less than it was when we attended public schools 30-40 years ago.

The view of home schooling that assumes that parents and siblings are the only peers is skewed and demonstrates that those commenting did not even read the original article. One wonders if public school advocates and graduates have a habit of commenting before actually reading. Most home school students have increasing amounts of peer interactions through middle school and high school. 10-20 hours per week is typical for high schoolers, including sports, youth groups, college classes, high school coursework, clubs, and other extracurriculars. In addition to lots of extracurriculars and sports, our approach is for our students to gradually acclimate to college work and life starting with at least one college course in 10th grade and increasing to five college courses in the 12th grade.

Having taught both high school and college, I am surprised at the high esteem many posters have for the socialization skills of public school students. Public schools are churning out vast numbers of graduates today with an entitlement mentality and woefully inadequate comprehension of personal responsibility as well as woefully inadequate communication skills. Even now, nearly every time I drop my students off at a local college campus, I see tons of public school products walking around with their heads buried in a cell phone. Is that the social diversity and skill set my home schooled students are supposedly lacking? No thanks.

I'm sure you're a great parent and it sounds like you're raising some wonderful kids, but I can't weigh the pros and cons of homeschooling vs public or private school and give homeschooling the win. There are simply too many life lessons to be learned in middle/high school that I feel can't be replicated by sheltering children from society. At some point, these children are going to be thrown out in society, and yes, some will be fine, but others will be faced with situations that they may not be able to cope with as easily as someone else who has faced these types of situations while growing up in school.

I was fortunate enough to go to Catholic schools growing up, but I have just as many friends who went to public schools. I'm halfway through my second college degree (mechanical engineering) and I can tell you that student's schooling background means very little at this point. Some of the best students I know were not great student's in high school and did not make above average grades on ACT tests. Parenting and one's own determination to get through school are the two most important factors.

You seem to put an emphasis on math and science, but in all honesty, 90% of real world jobs are not going to require vast knowledge of either subject. I hear that people interviewing engineers for jobs and internships would rather have someone with average grades and great personalities/people skills than a brainiac who is socially akward. To me, this is the point where attending regular school over homeschool comes into play.

Like many have previously posted, there were just too many good times and too many lessons I learned growing up going to school and playing sports. I couldn't imagine having it any other way. Bottom line is that if parents do a good enough job, sending their children to public or private schools should not be an issue whatsoever.

[Goooh]

Originally Posted by MathGeek

With an average ACT score of 19 or so for graduates, Louisiana is doing a fine job undermining public education without my help.



Yes, it is ultimately a parent's responsibility to ensure high school graduates accept responsibility for their choices and educational accomplishments. But it is increasingly difficult for parents to accomplish that if their children spend 35-40 hours per week in LA public schools.

I do pretty well with my private school education that landed me a solid 19 ACT score, and zero college education. My parents were solid, and my kids will do just as well because of solid parenting.

We put too much emphasis on "education", teach kids to live and be hungry for more and they will find their way happily and successfully.

[Duck Butter]

Need a study on how the weir openings affect ACT scores. Probably a significant factor

[DannyI]

Once again, if parents are educated enough to teach homeschooling, fine, but I personally know many who homeschool their kids and they definitely have no business doing it, because they can't figure it out themselves! Public education always has and always will begin at home, how you raise your kids to respect teachers and adults as a whole. But again, I know too many that can't socialize even with other Christian kids, or adults, they will only socialize with other homeschoolers. Everyone's choice, it's not the education system, it's all in the parenting.

[Baychamp1]

Originally Posted by DannyI

Once again, if parents are educated enough to teach homeschooling, fine, but I personally know many who homeschool their kids and they definitely have no business doing it, because they can't figure it out themselves! Public education always has and always will begin at home, how you raise your kids to respect teachers and adults as a whole. But again, I know too many that can't socialize even with other Christian kids, or adults, they will only socialize with other homeschoolers. Everyone's choice, it's not the education system, it's all in the parenting.

I couldn't wait to get out of my old mans house, I wanted my own truck, my own house, my own family, don't get me wrong my father was the greatest man I ever knew, I just wanted to make my own way. My house, my rules, His house, his rules, but he was a great role model, that's probably all we can strive for. Just my simple way of thinking.

[PathfinderNI]

awkward since I don't know that any of them attended public school? Most of them had private tutors so no peers to learn with either. Guess Tim Tebow missed out on more than he thought as well. I think most folks are scared of what they are not familiar with, and therefore look for reasons to support their methodology whatever it may be. To each his own as each parent is ultimately responsible for the upbringing of their God-given children, but there is no question that the social rot consisting of no bible or prayer in public schools, sex education without proper morals, teaching of evolution, political correctness, revisionist history, man-made global warming, aka climate change and other far left liberal lunacy have done much to undermine the moral fabric of this country. I've got three boys the oldest of which is in 8th grade this year, and home school with daily classroom videos of master teachers is all they know. They seem to be doing well....course, suppose I should watch out for that all important "socially awkward" thing. I do agree though that the biggest issue facing kids today just as it always has been is MIA parents.

[Baychamp1]

Originally Posted by PathfinderNI

awkward since I don't know that any of them attended public school? Most of them had private tutors so no peers to learn with either. Guess Tim Tebow missed out on more than he thought as well. I think most folks are scared of what they are not familiar with, and therefore look for reasons to support their methodology whatever it may be. To each his own as each parent is ultimately responsible for the upbringing of their God-given children, but there is no question that the social rot consisting of no bible or prayer in public schools, sex education without proper morals, teaching of evolution, political correctness, revisionist history, man-made global warming, aka climate change and other far left liberal lunacy have done much to undermine the moral fabric of this country. I've got three boys the oldest of which is in 8th grade this year, and home school with daily classroom videos of master teachers is all they know. They seem to be doing well....course, suppose I should watch out for that all important "socially awkward" thing. I do agree though that the biggest issue facing kids today just as it always has been is MIA parents.

Those are all good points, but you can only hold them under your wing for so long then their gonna have to learn how to fly

[B-Stealth]

I somewhat understand the home school idea; your children will be isolated from many negative experiences (and you must admit positive as well) and sheltered until you send them off to College.

This is my real beef with homeschooling:
You can live anywhere in the world; but yet your so mistrusting of the general public you must isolate your children from the community you choose to reside.


I just don't understand the mindset of isolation. Many parents make tremendous sacrifices to educate there kids, maybe you should move.

[Renegade]

That "social awkwardness" thing is a real concern. Particularly if it's combined with arrogantly assuming home schooling or their religious upbringing is superior to others.

These kids could end up as annoying as their parents.

Socialization is important for any child. The ability to adapt to environments and opinions that may be different from what they know will help them in their journey through life.

A dose of humility and respect for others may also be helpful.

[MathGeek]

Originally Posted by B-Stealth

This is my real beef with homeschooling:
You can live anywhere in the world; but yet your so mistrusting of the general public you must isolate your children from the community you choose to reside.

It takes a village to raise a child. - Hillary Clinton

It's not so much a distrust of the general public, so much as a recognition of the failure of government in the area of education.

If you don't trust government with your children's healthcare, why trust them with your children's education. Please, if you have signed up for Obamacare, please let us know, so we can't unjustly consider you inconsistent. In what other areas do you trust the government to do a better job than motivated individuals or the private sector?

Home schooling is not isolation at all. Our children all spend 10-20 hours each week with their peers outside of our home. But it's the inadequate education and supervision in the government schools that is problematic for us.

We have a great church and have also found a wide variety of sporting and extracurricular activities that our children participate in. Our children also attend courses at a local college. I often tell my wife and children that I don't think a college degree from that school would be worth very much, but it does make for a good high school experience. In areas where the local college is weak, we've had our children do distance learning courses through UC Berkeley, Rice, Duke, and other institutions.

Why not move? Louisiana has a tremendous amount to offer both adults and children in just about every area of life other than public education. We can easily make up the education gap by home schooling, but the other quality of life gaps are much harder to make up in other places. We may relocate to qualify for in state tuition in a place with better universities. But I'm sure we'd work hard to return to LA as soon as that is squared away.

Ultimately, I'd like to live either on Holly Beach or Grand Isle. I recently turned down a job offer that would have provided living accommodations on Holly Beach, because it would have been unfair to my children who really need a bunch of closer recreational activities (their favorites, not mine) and college classes.

[swamp snorkler]

What school District do you live in Math Geek?

[MathGeek]

Originally Posted by swamp snorkler

What school District do you live in Math Geek?

My wife is rather insistent I keep that private. I can say that the public school we most closely considered was Baton Rouge Magnet, and after some of their teachers met our students at the science fair they really wanted our children to enroll there. We had a close look and discussed the possibility with our children, but ultimately decided to continue home schooling.

Our family has some close connections with Christian Life Academy, and since they have an average ACT score of 28 and a pretty good environment, we also had a strong look and some careful conversations. Ultimately, we felt we could do better continuing to home school for academic reasons more related to how government regulations and accreditation requirements are holding them back combined with our students' desire for real accredited college classes and the scheduling and transportation difficulties arranging that when attending any brick and mortar school compared with flexibility of home school scheduling.

In the end, home schooling has been a family decision after weighing the available options.

[MathGeek]

Yet another advantage in home schooling is that the scheduling flexibility opens up employment opportunities that are generally unavailable to public school students. The laws of supply and demand being what they are, public school students face significant employment disadvantages since their availability is limited to times when there is a huge oversupply of other public school students also available for work in a local market (after school, weekends, over breaks). Home school students seeking work have the schedule flexibility to provide needed services at times when the supply of available labor is much smaller.

[MathGeek]

Schedule flexibility is also huge and supports family trips and vacations any time of year. There is no need to risk confrontations with the truant officers to take your children on longer hunting or fishing or hiking or camping trips during the school year. Weather and hunting seasons don’t carefully follow the breaks in the public school calendar. Home schooling allows breaks to be taken at any time, or it allows the educational process to go mobile as long as state mandated requirements for subject matter and the length of school day are met.

In addition to preserving our faith-based values, home schooling has empowered our children to travel much more and have both academic and sporting accomplishments that would have otherwise been much harder. Just as the most competitive tennis players and gymnasts are often home schooled to allow for their travel and practice schedules, we’ve found home schooling allows a much higher level of focus on our children’s chosen sports.