I have several education-oriented blogs that I subscribe to. Most of them are not homeschooling blogs, but have a lot to think about on education issues. Today I read one by a public school teacher that was titled
"The Case Against Homeschooling". This one screams for a rebuttal, so here goes. Italics are the original post, regular text mine.
Here are my top ten reasons why homeschooling parents are doing the wrong thing:
10. “You were totally home schooled” is an insult college kids use when mocking the geeky kid in the dorm (whether or not the offender was home schooled or not). And… say what you will… but it doesn’t feel nice to be considered an outsider, a natural outcropping of being homeschooled.10. I attended both public (K-9) and private (10-12) schools. I was a geek in both places. And I never minded being called one, because in my opinion those who were the antithesis of geek-dom were generally shallow, immature, and often cruel. I'd rather NOT be included in their exclusive popularity club, and am perfectly content that my children aren't either. Being dependent on the group opinion is a result of peer-dependency and a lack of self-confidence. Peer-dependent children and teens will attack ANY quality that is different from the accepted "norm", whether it's school background, religious differences, or choice of clothing. I would consider the above "insult" as a compliment.
9. Call me old-fashioned, but a students’ classroom shouldn’t also be where they eat Fruit Loops and meat loaf (not at the same time I hope). It also shouldn’t be where the family gathers to watch American Idol or to play Wii. Students–from little ones to teens–deserve a learning-focused place to study. In modern society, we call them schools.9. Why not?? Why should "education" be an exclusive act instead of a natural part of our day? We are capable of learning in any place and at any time, and the BEST learning takes place in settings that do NOT include rows of desks and uninterested classmates. Just for the record, our family DOES have a separate schoolroom, but it's mostly a dedicated storage area so I can have easy access to all our paraphernalia. We use the desks there so the dining room table stays cleared off, not because the kids learn "better" in a specified area.
8. Homeschooling is selfish. According to this article in USA Today, students who get homeschooled are increasingly from wealthy and well-educated families. To take these (I’m assuming) high achieving students out of our schools is a disservice to our less fortunate public school kids. Poorer students with less literate parents are more reliant on peer support and motivation, and they greatly benefit from the focus and commitment of their richer and higher achieving classmates.8. Three points to argue in this one.
A) How is it selfish to want the best for my kids? We all make choices that are intended to give our kids every advantage possible- be it where we buy our homes, what foods we buy, or what sports programs we enroll them in. That's what parents are FOR- to ensure the success of our children. I'd argue that the parents who DON'T make such choices are the negligent ones.
B) By this logic we should all send our kids to the worst school district just so they can encourage those who are less fortunate. From what I have read about inner city schools, and remember from my own public school experience, those "less-fortunate" kids tend to ATTACK those among them who excel academically, so how is putting my kid in that environment going to help anybody?
C) You are assuming that only the BEST students are being homeschooled. A large percentage of homeschoolers are dealing with learning disabilities, or are simply very active little boys. The schools do NOT do these kids much good. The kids who learn differently are stigmatized, left behind, and often quit school before graduation because it is totally pointless for them to be there. I'd much rather teach my kids through their strengths and give them an education that can truly benefit them, than let them flounder in a system that does not know how to handle them and thinks the best way to teach an active little boy is to drug him.
7. God hates homeschooling. The study, done by the National Center for Education Statistics, notes that the most common reason parents gave as the most important was a desire to provide religious or moral instruction. To the homeschooling Believers out there, didn’t God say “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations”? Didn’t he command, “Ye shall be witnesses unto me”? From my side, to take your faithful children out of schools is to miss an opportunity to spread the grace, power and beauty of the Lord to the common people. (Personally I’m agnostic, but I’m just saying…)7. That a self-proclaimed agnostic claims to understand God's desires for MY kids is the ultimate in arrogance. Those verses you quote were given to ADULT believers. More appropriate quotes:
Mark 10:14 "But when Jesus saw it, he was much displeased, and said unto them, Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God." If anything, the public schools definitely "forbid" the teachings of Christ.
Deuteronomy 6:6-8 "These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads." This verse is one that many families take as their primary reason for homeschooling. How can we possibly teach our children to live Godly lives when they spend the majority of their day in a very UNGodly environment. Statistics show that the majority of kids from Christian families that attend public school abandon their faith as adults. My children will be very well-grounded in what they believe, and therefore better able, when they are adults, to follow the commands to witness.
6. Homeschooling parent/teachers are arrogant to the point of lunacy. For real! My qualifications to teach English include a double major in English and education, two master’s degrees (education and journalism), a student teaching semester and multiple internship terms, real world experience as a writer, and years in the classroom dealing with different learning styles. So, first of all, homeschooling parent, you think you can teach English as well as me? Well, maybe you can. I’ll give you that. But there’s no way that you can teach English as well as me, and biology as well as a trained professional, and history… and Spanish… and art… and counsel for college as well as a school’s guidance counselor… and… and…6. You're right...to a point. But very few homeschoolers even attempt to be the authority in all these areas. There are MANY options for teaching the advanced subjects other than Mom attempting to do so. There are video and on-line courses, community colleges (who happily take homeschooled high-schoolers), co-operative classes, private tutors, and in many states we can pick-and-choose classes at the local public schools. I would also argue that not all students need highly-trained teachers for all subject areas. Homeschooled students are usually taught to seek out resources and learn for themselves from the best they can find. Motivated learners do not NEED a "trained professional" to force-feed them in a subject they enjoy.
5. As a teacher, homeschooling kind of pisses me off. (That’s good enough for #5.)5. Lots of things in this world piss me off too, but that doesn't give me the right to condemn other's rights to choose that option.
4. Homeschooling could breed intolerance, and maybe even racism. Unless the student is being homeschooled at the MTV Real World house, there’s probably only one race/sexuality/background in the room. How can a young person learn to appreciate other cultures if he or she doesn’t live among them?4. In many parts of the country, the schools are just as segregated as the homes. The schools reflect the population of the community, and many communities are pretty homogeneous. Personally, I have lived in at least 8 states and 2 foreign countries. Only ONE school district I lived in was anything near "multi-cultural". And that district had the MOST racially prejudiced population. My kids will grow up to be less prejudiced in a home where they are frequently reminded that skin color is irrelevant, than they would in a school where racial divisions are evident in the lunchroom and where the social pressure of the various "cliques" forbids the inter-mixing of the students.
3. And don’t give me this “they still participate in activities with public school kids” garbage. Socialization in our grand multi-cultural experiment we call America is a process that takes more than an hour a day, a few times a week. Homeschooling, undoubtedly, leaves the child unprepared socially.3. How do you define social preparedness? My kids are empathetic, friendly, able to converse with anyone. They are the kid on the playground who is helping the injured toddler, or including the "social outcast" in their game. My daughter just graduated from college, and on more than one occasion her stating that she was homeschooled resulted in "Really? but you seem so normal!" (or something to that effect). Obviously homeschooling didn't hamper HER social development. My own experience with the snobby, cliquey, hurtful, social hierarchies of public school is more than enough to convince me that school is NOT the place to learn the KIND of socialization I want my kids to learn.
2. Homeschooling parents are arrogant, Part 2. According to Henry Cate, who runs the Why Homeschool blog, many highly educated, high-income parents are “probably people who are a little bit more comfortable in taking risks” in choosing a college or line of work. “The attributes that facilitate that might also facilitate them being more comfortable with home-schooling.”
More comfortable taking risks with their child’s education? Gamble on, I don’t know, the Superbowl, not your child’s future.2. Though that quote might apply to some homeschoolers, it certainly does not apply to all of them. For starters, I don't know ANY homeschoolers that qualify as "high-income". Most are one-income households who clothe their kids from garage sales and thrift shops. Our budget for school books is generally in the "hundreds" for the entire year. Many homeschoolers would choose a private school if they could afford it. As for risk-taking, we generally feel that to homeschool is LESS of a risk to our kids future than putting them in the hands of the public school. We ARE less afraid of public opinion, which is NOT the same thing.
1. And finally… have you met someone homeschooled? Not to hate, but they do tend to be pretty geeky***.
*** Please see the comments for thoughts on the word ‘geeky.’ But, in general, to be geeky connotes a certain inability to integrate and communicate in diverse social situations. Which, I would argue, is a likely result of being educated in an environment without peers. It’s hard to get by in such a diverse world as ours! And the more people you can hang out with the more likely you are to succeed, both in work life and real life.1. I refer you back to reason #10. This is hardly an insult in my book. Homeschoolers may be less able to "integrate and communicate" in the world of popular (Hollywood) culture, but they will be more able to carry on a coherent conversation on history, or politics, or other subjects of REAL significance. They WILL be naive in subjects that kids SHOULD be naive in. (What idiot decided that kindergarteners should understand homosexuality???) Homeschoolers are proving themselves to be valuable assets to colleges and businesses, who like their self-sufficiency and their work-ethic. THESE are much better goals than knowing who is dating who, and what happened last night on the current R-rated TV show. Public schools turn out their own fair share of geeks. This is largely genetic, NOT taught!
