Report: Homeschooling Growing Seven Times Faster than Public School Enrollment

i find it interesting that homeschooling is on the rise (tho not quite as significant as some of the "percentages" would suggest but that is a problem of using such things to compare :@@

i actually have to wonder how many parents would like to home school their children, yet due to needing both parents incomes (or the single income of a single parent), literally can not "afford" to do it. that would also include alternative learning types such as a "Montessori school", small private schools or such. in fact it seems that many people seem to regard "school" as a "baby sitting service". this can be seen by the number of people who want "year round schooling" not because they think it will help students learn, (personally i think it would have the opposite effect, students need especially that summer break to destress and be able to have fun), but because things like "Christmas break, spring break and summer holidays are seen to be hardships on the parents who have to try to find a way to take care of their kids.

there are many reasons people would choose to homeschool their children (or other than "public education"), yes religious beliefs is one but ONLY one reason, (and that doesn't necessarily mean "christian fundamentalists"). other reasons include things like the fact the "normal schooling" has a bad habit of only teaching to one style of learning, where that style may not be the style that a child learns best (or even at all) from. way over-sized class sizes that mean a teacher does not really have the ability to help each and every student all the time. there really is not near enough time in a class of even 20 to do that effectively and still actually teach the entire class at the same time. differing standards of morals and accepted behaviors between parents and the public school systems. some due to the racist policies like grading differently for those of differing races (got to keep those grades up for certain groups so there seems to be nothing racist about student grade disparities). some "regular public schools are even dangerous especially for many reasons, things like bullying, drugs/alcohol (almost everyone i know personally that has a "drug or alcohol problem", [in fact i was personally told by many of my high school teachers i should "drink beer in order to make friends", right from grade 9] it seems to have started IN SCHOOL), gangs, etc. i would think there are more reasons as well.

one thing i can see happening in the future if the "homeschooling" phenomenon catches on in a huge way where more and more people choose to avoid the school system in favor of home/private schooling (where the government can't exercise control of what is taught), is that there will be a move to either abolish it or exert some sort of control on what is taught. i say this as it seems more and more schools seem to be almost more about indoctrinating students about things like politics, and accepting what their "betters" tell them without question, as well as molding them into the perfect "drones", including things like drugging up students who are seen to be "overactive". than to actually teach them.

what i would like to see yet severely doubt it would ever come to pass, is for that that choose alternate educations other than the public school system, they get at least some form of "school tax" break from their taxes. i know many would condemn this idea as it would ultimately hurt the public education system's funding, but if you think about it these very people are not using the system and so why should they pay both for that AND the way they educate their kids? and as most even that do use the public system realize that that public system is very broken, which is exactly why many do not wish to use it. just think that $10,000/student figure people have mentioned could very well mean that a parent that got that $10,000 would be able to quit work to be able to homeschool, or even pay or help pay for an alternate education system that they feel would provide a better education to their kids.


to be con't

con't from above

there is even one area that does something a little bit like this, even tho as it only is in place for one of many special interest groups and as such has even been condemned (and told to quit doing it), by the UN due to it being discriminatory as it is only for ONE specific special interest group. yet at the same time it being in place would suggest that this would not be an impossibility to expand it to cover all groups and even homeschool and private education.

The United Nations human rights committee says Ontario's policy of fully funding Roman Catholic schools, while denying full funding to other religious schools, is discriminatory. In moving to comply with the ruling Ontario could do one of two things; extend funding to other religious schools, or end funding to Roman Catholic schools. Anne Bayefsky of the Osgoode Hall law department brought the case before the UN. On Friday, in Toronto, she said the ruling means "Ontario's policy of refusing to fund anything but Roman Catholic schools is discrimination." Bayefsky argued the case on behalf of Arieh Waldman, who challenged the legality of the current school system. Waldman, from Toronto, spent $95,000 educating his son at Jewish schools. The decision is likely to bring extra pressure on the Tory government to fund other private religious schools. The UN ruling gives Canada 90 days to respond on behalf of the province. The committee expects to hear what steps will be taken to end the discrimination. Ontario is not compelled to change its policy to comply with the UN ruling. However, Bayefsky says Canada has always taken a leadership role in complying with international law, and this should be no exception.

www.cbc.ca...
note nothing has ever been done to correct this issue. (goes to show how much Canada pays attention to UN decrees, yet expects other countries to do as the UN wishes ). so in all honesty Ontario should actually be doing something along these lines. the way it works is that with your taxes you check either to pay for the "public school" system, or the "catholic school" system. it should also at least include Christian schools, Jewish schools, Islamic schools etc, if not any type of homeschool or private school that people wish to support. figure people supporting homeschools without kids In any school could be used to help those of lower income with homeschooling.

i guess the biggest reason i like homeschooling or some of the "private school" options is it can allow for appropriate small class sizes as well as, "at your own pace" type learning. i was a very poor student for most of my school life barely passing classes. yet the ONE YEAR i spent in a "special ed" class was my best "learning year" ever. instead of just scraping by, i excelled thanks to both a small class (6 or 7 students, from at least 3 different grades), and teaching to MY "learning skills". the small class size meant that even though most of us were all over the place when it came to what we knew and how we learned, even what we needed to learn, the teacher was able to give EACH of us the help we needed, pretty much WHEN we needed it. it was a rare thing in fact for any TWO of us to even be doing the same work, at the same time as we all had different needs. personally i went from being WAY behind to at least where i should have been and beyond. yet put back into a "normal class" and i immediately went back to barely passing.

in fact i passed most of my high school classes just due to tests and exams. if i could have only been marked ONLY on tests and exams i would have been an a+ student. one of my biggest problems was in fact the sheer load of "work" especially "homework" that was required that because of the volume i never had enough TIME to do it all. you see one of my biggest problems was extremely poor writing speed and legibility of that writing which slowed me down even more. heck one of the reasons homework was an issue was just because the teacher didn't give enough time for me to even copy the homework assignment down before i would be late for my next class, or shall i say copy it down so even i could read it. sure it was fine for everyone else, but due to my problems not for me. then with the actual homework, i "might" be able to "partially" complete one out of four subjects worth of work. yet even so i ACED tests and exams without DOING that work. i'll always remember one science teacher standing in front of the class accusing me of cheating on the mid term exam. you see he KNEW i cheated because as he knew my binder was full of incomplete diagrams and very little else of worth, and the fact that he had collected the textbooks at least a month before the exam. yet i scored the SECOND highest out of that course in the school. now how in the world could i have gotten the second highest mark (the highest was in another class) by cheating? :lol

reply to post by smyleegrl

What I would LOVE to do....teach home schooled kids. Say, about five or six. I could do it in my own home, charge $100 a week (less than the cost of daycare)...provide a real education AND make more money.

Dang. I just might look into this.

If you live in Missouri, legally you can teach up to 4 children who aren't related to you.

Originally posted by marg6043
I am glad that this is a new trend, parents needs to take care of what their children are learning this days, schools are full of agendas and those agendas are base on each individual counties and states.

Most children that are homeschooling seems to have a better and broader understanding of education.

The do better in test, some complain about social interaction, but is better to know who are the ones around your children influencing them that sending them to a place where you have not control.

Wouldn't it be neat to have one room schoolhouses in neighborhoods again? One every couple of blocks.

Why can't parents who homeschool their own children also homeschool others from the neighborhood??? Seems like it would be feasible and help the problem of social skills.

A recent report in Education News states that, since 1999, the number of children who are homeschooled has increased by 75%. Though homeschooled children represent only 4% of all school-age children nationwide, the number of children whose parents choose to educate them at home rather than a traditional academic setting is growing seven times faster than the number of children enrolling in grades K-12 every year. As homeschooling has become increasingly popular, common myths that have long been associated with the practice of homeschooling have been debunked.

The picture painted here with these percentiles is a bit skewed though.

Why would you compare this percentile growth of the homeschooling to the percentile growth of public schooling?

If 100.000 children were applying for homeschooling 10 years ago, and the number has grown with 75% there are a 175.000 now.

But the number of children applying for public education is much larger and since the population growth rate is 1.3% it can never grow as much in percentiles like homeschooling can. And public education is the standard so there is no room for growth.

I think that the 7 times less fast growth in the public schooling still respresents more people than the 75% growth of the home schooling.

The comparison is an invalid one, I mean why did they come up with this instead of just giving us the actual numbers?


I am in no way arguing against or for public education. Just pointing out this fallacy.

reply to post by terriblyvexed


Many home school parents tap into the larger community of homeschooling. If you look around your community, you might find many other parents who are all working together to teach their kids. This has a two-fold benefit: it allows parents to teach from their expertise and it gives the kids a chance to socialize with other kids.

So, what if you don't feel confident enough to teach your kids? There are books, audio programs and videos that can help you to expand your knowledge. Please keep in mind that colleges teach their teachers to teach. Most school teachers only have 15-21 credit hours in their chosen subject. The rest of their program is composed of education courses.

Originally posted by smyleegrl

Originally posted by terriblyvexed
Homeschooling might be cheap if you can teach them yourself, but what about people like me?

One of my girls just passed 3rd grade, and got an award for being top of her grade. She's been a strait A student since she started school, and is way better at math than me, and to my frustration constantly correcting my grammar I use to argue that I think I know how to speak (according to google I don't) now I just let her educate me...

How much would someone who could teach your kids cost? I think I'd like that if I can afford it.

What I would LOVE to do....teach home schooled kids. Say, about five or six. I could do it in my own home, charge $100 a week (less than the cost of daycare)...provide a real education AND make more money.

Dang. I just might look into this.

You got a supporter here in me. Would love to help and would donate books and some funds to help start this.

I think its important to philosophically break down some kind of constitution so that there is no bias or stereotyping by teachers based on cultural factors.

If you get a kickstarter going and organize this, i will donate

Originally posted by SeriouslyDude
So no one is going to call out this BS?
NO ONE?!?!
I signed up just for this

Originally posted by smyleegrl

Originally posted by terriblyvexed


How much would someone who could teach your kids cost? I think I'd like that if I can afford it.

What I would LOVE to do....teach home schooled kids. Say, about five or six. I could do it in my own home, charge $100 a week (less than the cost of daycare)...provide a real education AND make more money.

Dang. I just might look into this.

actually what was said was a perfectly good idea. as was pointed out would be cheaper than daycare, a good point. many people would be able to afford it, another good point.

the proposed class size in the statement of 5 or 6 is almost the perfect size for effective teaching even if the children are at different levels and leaning styles. a third good point.

it implied they knew something about education and teaching by saying "provide a real education". now that is something that would come out in an interview before sending a child to you, and if missed then would become apparent after a little while in which case you would loose the child. but even then for an actual trained teacher or someone who is just good at teaching it would work. so i guess we can call that a good point. there are lots of teachers without a job that this would be good for. teachers who are only out of work due to the lack of teaching jobs available. i know one teacher who was looking for work in BOTH several STATES in the US, and even in a couple provinces in Canada. they finally did find work but required moving from Canada to the US to take it, in other words finding a teaching job required moving to a different country.

"provide a real education AND make more money", nothing wrong with making yourself a job that pays well it's called being entrepreneurial, something most people would agree is a good thing. so yet another good point.

not so much B.S. is it?

LETS DO SOME MATH:
100 dollars a week is 400 a month. A lot of money for most people. More then you spend in taxes a month on education. So with 5 kids, at 400, its 2000 a month, and 24k a year. Welcome to the upper lower class!
BUT
5 kids in a class? Unrealistic.
Lets take a trip to reality land. where class size is at least 20. Let us use twenty five cause it's a fun number, but also less then what most teachers have to deal with.
So, 25 kids at 400 a head a month, that is ten thousand dollars a month, ONE HUNDERED AND TWENTY THOUSAND A YEAR, you are paying to someone who is not trained to do this task. And if you hired smyleegrl, someone who wouldn't be able to teach your kids math. Or critical thinking. The majority of teachers make anywhere from a quarter to half of that. HALF IF THEY ARE LUCKY.

actually as i said 5 or 6 kids is almost a perfect number of students/teacher ratio, even fewer say 2 or 3 would be even better.

a class size of 20 would actually defeat one of the reasons that parents want to homeschool in the first place. that is likely where a BIG chunk of what is wrong in education in the first place. unless of course you were to have FOUR teachers working with the class at a time. that would even help cover any "deficiencies" any of them may have in a given subject. after all nobody is good at EVERYTHING.

you have i believe inadvertently brought up a good point. $400/month x 10 months (taking summer vacation into account, would be even less once other holidays are figured in), is $4,000/ year. now is that not CHEAPER than the $10,000/year that has been given in this thread of the cost of the public school system per student (nces.ed.gov... actually $10,694 in 2008-2009 likely even more today)? or look at it this way that $10,000 times 20 students is $200,000, yet an average teacher salary is only $40,000-$45,000 (www.payscale.com...), which leaves $155,000 to $160,000 per CLASS. so in say a grade k-6 school with one class each of 20 students/grade that is $1,085,000 AFTER teacher's are paid, OVER 1 MILLION dollars. now THAT is a HUGE chunk of cash, just WHERE does it go?

Well, all that being said, I have lost all respect for this site. It is a complete sock-puppet circle jerk. Try to keep it out of each others eyes.

i'm sorry you feel so. just because you may not agree with ONE set of posts, is no reason to condemn the entire site. but hey if you feel so strongly don't let the door hit you on the way out. i would actually rather you stay, and learn to be a bit nicer in regards to others would be good. differing opinions is a big chunk of "denying ignorance", it lets one see differing viewpoints on which they can base their own opinions on.

This report is completely misleading so it's essentially bogus. When you have a miniscule amount of something, even a small increase is statistically large. Public schools can only grow as much as the population increases because almost all kids are already in them there's no way for them to grow much.

This is like those idiots who condemn Obama for having more people on food stamps when the population is increasing by a million people a year, so obviously there's going to be more on food stamps than ever before.

Originally posted by SeriouslyDude
So no one is going to call out this BS?
NO ONE?!?!
I signed up just for this

Originally posted by smyleegrl

Originally posted by terriblyvexed


How much would someone who could teach your kids cost? I think I'd like that if I can afford it.

What I would LOVE to do....teach home schooled kids. Say, about five or six. I could do it in my own home, charge $100 a week (less than the cost of daycare)...provide a real education AND make more money.

Dang. I just might look into this.

LETS DO SOME MATH:
100 dollars a week is 400 a month. A lot of money for most people. More then you spend in taxes a month on education. So with 5 kids, at 400, its 2000 a month, and 24k a year. Welcome to the upper lower class!
BUT
5 kids in a class? Unrealistic.
Lets take a trip to reality land. where class size is at least 20. Let us use twenty five cause it's a fun number, but also less then what most teachers have to deal with.
So, 25 kids at 400 a head a month, that is ten thousand dollars a month, ONE HUNDERED AND TWENTY THOUSAND A YEAR, you are paying to someone who is not trained to do this task. And if you hired smyleegrl, someone who wouldn't be able to teach your kids math. Or critical thinking. The majority of teachers make anywhere from a quarter to half of that. HALF IF THEY ARE LUCKY.

Would you pay me to be an amateur surgeon? Are you sure? I cost less than those "Med School" people. I'm not sure what an Aorta is, but I think I may know better then them doctors.

YES, there is a huge problem with the current education system, and if you knew anything about teaching, The System knows there is something wrong. Most teachers are real people, dedicated to their jobs. They want to help people. It isn't all their fault kids dislike school (because yes, school can be one of the ridiculously mind numbing activities possible, BUT LEARNING, as opposed to schooling, SHOULDN'T BE THAT WAY), especially with parents at home talking about how awful the school and teachers are. Maybe there is a little bias, as teacher, who really likes his public school students. Even the little snot nose you send to school with a superiority complex.

And I'll skip the part where in a school, they are exposed to a variety of opinions from a variety of people. Part of school is dealing with different people. You are just indoctrinating your child, worse than schools do. At least at a school, they can be exposed to something new, come home, discuss it with you, and come away with their own viewpoint.

Well, all that being said, I have lost all respect for this site. It is a complete sock-puppet circle jerk. Try to keep it out of each others eyes.

Wow.

Teacher here...taught for ten years. Have a masters in education and was working on a phD (on hold now). So yeah, I'm qualified. But I'm sure the parents would properly vet anyone taking care if their children.

The math doesn't work though, you're right. I based the 100$ off my after tax income. Oops. After seriously looking into this with my husband, in order to make the same $ I do now, I would have to either raise the price or take in more kids. Still, it's feasible.

Last year I had 21first grade students....in a reduced classroom school. Think about that for a moment. My school deliberately uses discretionary funds to hire extra teachers and reduce class size. Here in NC the average class size for first grade is 26. I have taught that many kids before. It's not a good idea. He'll, 21 six year olds isn't a good idea. To be really effective, you have to work with groups of 5-6 kids. That's optimal. I have reading and math groups this size, but I can only get to four groups a day so do the math and see how much one-on-one time that is in a class with 20+ kids.

Why my post makes ATS ridiculous is beyond me.

Originally posted by dominicus

Originally posted by smyleegrl

Originally posted by terriblyvexed
Homeschooling might be cheap if you can teach them yourself, but what about people like me?

One of my girls just passed 3rd grade, and got an award for being top of her grade. She's been a strait A student since she started school, and is way better at math than me, and to my frustration constantly correcting my grammar I use to argue that I think I know how to speak (according to google I don't) now I just let her educate me...

How much would someone who could teach your kids cost? I think I'd like that if I can afford it.

What I would LOVE to do....teach home schooled kids. Say, about five or six. I could do it in my own home, charge $100 a week (less than the cost of daycare)...provide a real education AND make more money.

Dang. I just might look into this.

You got a supporter here in me. Would love to help and would donate books and some funds to help start this.

I think its important to philosophically break down some kind of constitution so that there is no bias or stereotyping by teachers based on cultural factors.

If you get a kickstarter going and organize this, i will donate

What a nice gesture!

iF my husband agrees and we get the logistics of this figured out, it will take a couple of years to get it up and running. I want to thoroughly research the feasibility of making a living before I try it, if that makes sense.

I have 100s of books I've purchased for my kids over the years....Goodwill and thrift stores are an awesome place to pick up classroom books.

If you truly want to help a teacher out, consider donating to the donorschoose projects. You can contribute just a few dollars or fund an entire project. Two years ago I got a $500.00 classroom listening library funded through them. It's an awesome website.

I mentioned 'aquaponics' before but I want to make some additional thoughts clear;

I truly feel aquaponics has the potential to change the world and the way we eat; the whole flap going on now with Monsanto, food prices ever-rising, climate change, etc., is not going to end; it's going to increase in severity exponentially. Things are going to get really nasty in the lifetimes of these children we're talking about, and more and more jobs are going to be outsourced right out from underneath them, and us.

Very briefly, aquaponics is the idea of having a fish tank of sorts (you can raise either fish for food, or ornamentals) and pumping their water thru tanks with plants growing in rafts. The plants clean the water, uptake the nutrients and return cleaned water to the fish. A natural cycle, in other words. You can further make it self-sufficient by growing your own fish food, earthworms and duckweed. There's huge amounts of info available on line and it's really pretty simple. There's basic chemistry and a few minutes of work involved every day but not much. NC would be a perfect climate for this, but it's doable anywhere.

So, that said; what if you have a 'classroom' of kids ages 4-5 and up who are not only being taught the basics and more educationally, but are also learning and participating in helping grow food? And that organic, healthy food is given for free, to the families to take home to augment their grocery supplies, thus saving them money? And the money saved pays, or at least helps to pay, for the schooling itself? Win-win-win.

It further teaches a very realistic and viable skill set that could be a wonderful career choice for those kids that would be interested. I wish I could take every out of work person out there and set them up with a hoop house, a tiny bit of land (even a parking lot will do, 'good' farm land isn't necessary) and get them started on helping feed themselves, their neighbors and eventually, commercially enough to make a good living.

If Smyleegrl has the space and is interested, adding this idea to the Kickstarter might help move things along and increase funding. If word got out locally, I'm willing to bet you'd have more students than you could handle.

As to mine and other comments about the 'fundies' I lived for a while in a town that was literally being taken over by "Apostolic Lutherans". It was truly scary. Kids running around unsupervised all year round, little ones without shoes on and dirty being 'watched' by ones hardly older than themselves, girls pregnant right out of high school and 8-10 kids by the time they were 30. The teenagers were naive to an extreme. Most of the males seem to get jobs within the church community (they owned several construction, plumbing and electrical companies in town) but their employment possibilities outside the community were probably very limited. I've worked with the Amish and found them fine, intelligent, hardworking folk, but the Apostolics scared me... too narrow a world view, too separationist.

reply to post by Tribunal

The actual figures can be derived.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

reply to post by signalfire


I have a 55 gallon African Cichlid aquarium in the classroom. We use a biological filter and run the filtered water through moss before it returns to the tank. We also do an experiment where we use regular tap water versus aquarium water to water the classroom plants, and see which plant grows more quickly. The cichlids raised a hatch last year and we traded the babies to a local pet store for the fish food. The kids love the tank and the plants.

We also raise a small garden outside the school. The kids plant the stuff every spring, we teachers tend it over the summer, then the kids harvest the "crops" in the fall. Then we use the crops to make meals for the kids to sample (the garden isn't that big).

I really believe hands on learning is the way to go....practical, educational, and fun!

Originally posted by SeriouslyDude

I signed up just for this

Then sign out just for this:

LETS DO SOME MATH:
100 dollars a week is 400 a month. A lot of money for most people.

But not all. Especially for those who care about their child's education. You can get lucky and get a well paying job without much of an education, but without knowing how to spend/save money.........a fool and his money are soon parted. Which is why an inheritance of knowledge will always trump an inheritance of money.

More then you spend in taxes a month on education.

No it's not. Are you trying to tell me that the Feds and the state take 100 dollars out of my weekly 400 dollar paycheck? Remember that education is only a small percentage, 25% on average, of all the taxes taken. At the rate you're trying to tell people, after all the taxes are taken I wouldn't have anything left. Even with publically approved tax hikes for education, everything a person buys during the course of a week that's taxed isn't going to total up to 100 dollars a week.

So with 5 kids, at 400, its 2000 a month, and 24k a year. Welcome to the upper lower class!

The average salary of a teacher is roughly 45k per year. A person who is serious about teaching kids on their own will take a temporary cut in salary to get their name and services known as being legitimate in the field. In time, more parents will be using their services. This is what people who run their own business expect, a temporary cut in pay while they build up their clientele doing something they enjoy.

BUT 5 kids in a class? Unrealistic.

Again, no it's not. Not for the teacher who's thinking long term with a plan. Or who has a spouse who makes money as well.

Lets take a trip to reality land..........

Lets

.......Where class size is at least 20. Let us use twenty five cause it's a fun number, but also less then what most teachers have to deal with.
So, 25 kids at 400 a head a month, that is ten thousand dollars a month, ONE HUNDERED AND TWENTY THOUSAND A YEAR,

Hold that thought, I have to go to the store to buy a can of beans for a dollar. Meanwhile, my idiot friend is going to Sams Club to buy one hundred. And I can guarantee you that when he gets back he's going to tell me that he saved 25 dollars on the purchase because he bought in bulk. He must think I'm gullible.....................

Let's backtrack a bit to those numbers you threw up. 5 kids equal 24k per year. 10 would bring up the total to the industry standard. Anything over that, if the teacher isn't greedy, then the parents can start saving tuition costs when the business owner/teacher starts cutting their costs. People start saving money and the teachers still make a decent living at a steady 48k per year. In other words, if 10 kids at 100 dollars per equal 48k per year then 15 kids at 75 per equals the same thing. (A little more actually)

you are paying to someone who is not trained to do this task.

How so? A teacher is certified to teach in a public school. They do that for 5 years, renew their certifications to meet the standards for teaching in a privately owned institution, assuming they're different, and says bye to the public system so they can operate their own business/school. You seem to be in the same boat with numerous others, in that you're confusing homeschooling children with schooling children in someone's home. The average Joe or Jane homeschool their OWN kids, a teacher with certifications teaches children out of their home. See the difference?

And if you hired smyleegrl, someone who wouldn't be able to teach your kids math. Or critical thinking.

I'd really like to know how you know that.

YES, there is a huge problem with the current education system, and if you knew anything about teaching, The System knows there is something wrong. Most teachers are real people, dedicated to their jobs. They want to help people. It isn't all their fault kids dislike school (because yes, school can be one of the ridiculously mind numbing activities possible, BUT LEARNING, as opposed to schooling, SHOULDN'T BE THAT WAY)

And yet it is, and that's the way it's going to be. The system is broken and it's not getting fixed because the people at the top like it the way it is. It pays THEM well. Sitting around with like-minded individuals saying "It shouldn't be this way", hoping that it will get better while doing nothing to change it.................where's that circle jerk again?

Continued................

especially with parents at home talking about how awful the school and teachers are. Maybe there is a little bias, as a teacher, who really likes his public school students.

And the truth comes out. You're a teacher. You're a teacher who knows that the more seats that are filled in a school, the more Federal funding there is. As the number of students get smaller, the funding gets smaller making your job even harder for the same amount of pay. Don't slam the private schooling angle because you feel as though you've painted yourself into a corner within a system that's broken. I've given you the paint thinner, the information you need to get out of a losing proposition, it's on you now to put down the paint brush and start walking.

Even the little snot nose you send to school with a superiority complex.

That would be me, thank you.

And I'll skip the part where in a school, they are exposed to a variety of opinions from a variety of people. Part of school is dealing with different people. You are just indoctrinating your child, worse than schools do. At least at a school, they can be exposed to something new, come home, discuss it with you, and come away with their own viewpoint.

www.essortment.com...

There's a difference between indoctrinating and teaching. It's the same as the difference between being useful and being valuable. When you're indoctrinated into society, you become useful to it. When you're taught about society and what it takes to succeed, you become valuable. Very few people are taught things these days. You have 99 1 dollar bills. Individually, they are useful. you can buy a small, cheap item with it. Collectively, they are valuable. You can buy a cell phone. But then you have that extra dollar bill sitting off to the side that's a misprint from the mint. It fell through the cracks of all the checks and balances put in place to keep misprints like that out of the general population. Go to a web site that deals with appraisals of items like that and you'll find that that one dollar bill that doesn't fit in with the others, is quite valuable. The thing is, more and more of those misprints, people who are educated outside of the public system, are seeping into the general population. Seriously Dude, the tide is starting to turn. Learn to swim or you're going to drown.

For the record, I spent 12 years in the public school system, but I'm not a product of it. Their attempts at educating me failed. How I know what I know isn't important to this discussion, but I will tell you that as each year passes, the public system is getting less and less relevant. More and more colleges and businesses are learning about the quality of education home schooled kids get as opposed to their public school peers. This is why home schooling and private schooling on a small level like Smyleegirl is on the rise. People are waking up.

Well, all that being said, I have lost all respect for this site. It is a complete sock-puppet circle jerk. Try to keep it out of each others eyes.

Seriously Dude, there's the door. Use it.

My opinion comes from a bit different perspective, as I am not American.

Everything on the public school system. If the public school system is weaker, homeschooling might give one better education, although there are several flaws in it when the public school system is stronger.

Nearly no parent alone is able to teach the materials, as most of them are even weaker at science subjects. In higher grades 7-12th, it is not easy to find people who are able to teach different subjects at the same time, as it requires more specialisation in different fields. This would cost a lot of money for a parent to hire separate teacher for most subjects (especially sciences).

Here, there is no home schooling systems, except for special ed kids and kids who can not socially adapt in schools (not ADHD; but mostly Aspergers or just a lot of problem with bullying). There is also no private schools, although there are so-called elite schools, public schools were the education is very strong and strong competition to get in. It is nearly impossible to create a private school with stronger education than there.

I have noticed people here talking about lowered class sizes, mor efficient learning. I do not argue that it is more efficient, although that is not the reasons behind the education problems.

In 1st grade I personally had 30 children. In 2nd- 9th grade between 24-30. In high school 36 per class. Yet the education system works well... It is very hard to understand how it is possible in some countries for 5th-8th graders not to know how to read well. I remember clearly how in 3rd grade there was one kid who could not read well. He knew how to read, although more slowly and struggling a bit with longer words. He was mocked because of it... It is hard to get by without reading. There is obligatory reading from 1st grade on. In 1st grade kids books around 50-100 pages. In 2nd grade mostly Astrid Lindgren style books (around 200 pages). In summer vacations there is a lot of reading. I remember between 2nd and 3rd grade we had reading diary. Every kids had to read 10 books during the summer, minimum of 50 pages, no comic books. I personally read 30 books during this summer, more than 3000 pages total.

End of middle school/high school math was much harder than it was in university, for example. The problems were much more difficult. In university we just learned more about proofs (how everything is connected) , but the practical part came from high school. Same is about physics. The high school problems were harder. The only difference in university was the requirement of knowing the proofs behind the formulas, but all the formulas we got from high school. Although we did not learn integrals, matrices in high school, just no time. We had 6x45 minutes of math every week, but did not manage that far. Although these were easy compared to harder things in high school. Also after high school kids should be able to speak 4-5 different languages. Minimum of 4.

I do not know why US kids have more trouble. One of the reasons is the lower standards. The requirements are much lower than round here, which is in some ways because of parents. Parents do not like when the courses are too hard and their kids struggle. Here parents can not say much about the difficulty of schools. If the school is too difficult, your kid isn´t working enough, easy. The standards are made harder, instead of easier. Now it is harder to get by, than it was during my time, around 7 years ago. Although the drop out rates are low, around 10% for high schools or less, more if we take vocational schools into account. In total, for the millennials the university graduation is about 70%, 70% of millenials get university education (although many of them not worthful fields:/)

Although the culture, the psychology of children plays a lot of role too. Kids in this area have more discipline, there is much less ADHD than in US. Kids are kids everywhere, but for some reason, here is much less problems with discipline. As the standards are high, everybody has to learn more, do more without questioning. If you don´t do your homeworks, you´ll get F and at the end might drop out, if there is too many of those. If you doń´t work with others during the lesson, you get F, which affects the final grade. No cellphones/laptops are allowed before high school during lessons. If you use one during lesson, teacher can just take it away and keep it until parents come to pick it up.

There is much less kids can choose on their own, for example curriculum. Nearly every subject is involuntary. I had one option during high school, whether I want Spanish or French for my 5th language, every other subject was obligatory. In first grade there were 2 languages (now there will be programming also there), in 5th grade 3rd language was added. In high school two more. Even with foods there is nearly no choice, just healthy ones (for free until 10th grade) or nothing. Health/environmental education is stronger.

Home schooling would not work, at least round here. I do not believe home schooling having much advantages over public schools (besides higher cost for parents) if the public schools are strong enough. There are very good teachers and very bad teacher out there (just like here), but at the end what matters the most are the standards and the habits of the kids themselves. Even if the teacher is not good, kid has to learn on his own if he/she does not want to drop out. It just come down to parents. If the kids struggles, they need to push him/her more. In earlier grades parents should be able to teach on their own, in higher grades google can be a good teacher for kids, there are many high-quality free information out there. It just requires more discipline for individual work then. Home schooling is good when the education system is weaker...

Originally posted by Phage
reply to post by Tribunal

 

The actual figures can be derived.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Ok, I see you had already pointed out the issue.

I saw your post on page two and was wondering why you didn't adress it, I thought how did he not notice the issue.

Can't help noticing that people believe that in home school a parent HAS TO KNOW everything in order to 'teach it'. it doesn't work that way. The child and parent learn together the subjects that the parent is not so strong in. Personally, I had a good education and find all the subjects more or less easy to teach BUT i can see how a parent without a strong education but with a GOOD mind can teach and learn with the child.
I am still toying with returning to home school as I see it is more 'efficient' only problem being that I cannot provide the 'exam factory' situation that schools do. Schools are fantastic for helping a child to pass their exams........education is another thing altogether! In the UK however, the curriculum is dictated by the government and is sadly lacking in depth, width, height, meaning and anything else that gives education value.

Originally posted by Cabin
My opinion comes from a bit different perspective, as I am not American.

I do not know why US kids have more trouble. One of the reasons is the lower standards. The requirements are much lower than round here, which is in some ways because of parents. Parents do not like when the courses are too hard and their kids struggle. Here parents can not say much about the difficulty of schools. If the school is too difficult, your kid isn´t working enough, easy.

Much of that mindset from parents come from their desire to not want their kids to struggle as much as they did. That's a parental instinct and that's all and fine, but when they apply it to education they're not doing their kids any favors. At some point in everyone's life, they're going to have to struggle with something. No one gets a free ride. May as well get it over with as soon as possible and let the hard work be education. After that, everything else will fall into place quite easily. Without that, you're going to be working hard at whatever you do because your ability to comprehend the easy way will be lost due to a lack of education.

People in that position need to understand that it's through no fault of their own though. They were raised being coddled and taught that everything will come easy. The people who taught them that cannot undo that. They're going to have to live with that decision they made all those years ago. The person whom it was taught to however always has the opportunity to change course and get an education at whatever phase of their life that they're in. You never stop learning. This is why I find it hard to understand why so much emphasis is put on public schooling. As if when you graduate from the 12th grade, that's all there is besides college. Both of those institutions are structured. Look at the world around you. (Not you specifically, Cabin) Do you see much of anything that's structured? A system with a solid foundation? I don't. It's all a house of cards poised to go at any time, which makes a structured learning environment pretty redundant.

You're learning environment should reflect the world in which you have to apply that education to in order to make a seamless transition form learning to doing, and public schools simply don't do that.