AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP
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Post by AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP on May 27, 2015 16:04:58 GMT -5
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happyhoix
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Post by happyhoix on May 27, 2015 16:43:52 GMT -5
Well, only 3 percent of the kids in the nation are homeschooled, so if you look at the actual numbers of kids, I don't think you can call that a massive surge.
I would speculate that the reasons (in no particular order) are 1) homeschooling has become easier, due to computer based learning and prepackaged learning programs that parents can purchase - not just mommy having to wing it, 2) for political or religious reasons, more parents are wanting to control the information their kids have access to, (e.g. to avoid sex education or evolution, for example) and 3), thanks to #1, if your kid is struggling in school due to learning disabilities or a bullying situation, rather than trying to change schools, home schooling is a more viable option, and 4) home schooling used to have more of a stigma attached to it (only the religious cranks home school their kids) but is now becoming mainstream, and maybe even something helicopter parents can gloat about (I love my kids so much I quit my job to home school them.)
I don't have a problem with it, if it's done right, but I wouldn't have wanted to homeschool my kid. Don't have the patience for it, plus he was a shy kid, so I wanted to push him into situations where he was forced to interact with other kids without mommy or daddy there to help.
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TheHaitian
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Post by TheHaitian on May 27, 2015 16:55:23 GMT -5
With the majority (yes 97% is a majority) still attending "regular" school, I am not worried about homeschooling becoming mainstream anytime soon.
Great to those that can make it happen, it is not something that my wife and I are interested in. School to us was more than just learning math, it was learning to deal with different situation, different people, getting outside of the box that is your home/church that share the same idea, maneuver the social cliques and standards.
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billisonboard
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Post by billisonboard on May 27, 2015 17:01:13 GMT -5
The National Center for Education Statistics uses a statistical adjustment for estimates of total homeschoolers in 2012. For more information about this adjustment, please see Homeschooling in the United States: 2012 (NCES 2015-019, forthcoming). All other estimates about homeschoolers do not use a statistical adjustment. nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d13/tables/dt13_206.10.asp It will be interesting when this report comes out.
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mroped
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Post by mroped on May 27, 2015 17:07:59 GMT -5
My wife in fact DID quit her job to raise the kids and homeschool them. And she's not a helicopter either. We just felt that the public school system is getting bogged down by so many rules and regulations that was hard for a teacher to in fact teach anything. DW used to teach special Ed.
tommorow in fact we have an ART DAY at our place and about 50-70 kids will be here over a two days period. And their group is one of the smaller ones. There are some groups arround here that are much larger. Most of them are organized arround some faith.
Contrary to many believes, the homeschooled kids have plenty of interaction with their peers so there is no awkwardness or anything. We tought our son might have a problem because he was shy but he was that way just arround adults but not arround those of his or closer to his age. Now at 16 there is none of that. And no, we are not that selective with what we teach them: politics and religion are getting fair shares in their education with no preference or partiality of any kind. We teach them to make their own decisions, to think through, for themselves. We keep telling them that if they let someone else making decisions for them in anything then that makes them sheep that follows. Ofcourse their education has a scientific basis. Again religion we teach them all so they can make an informed decision at any time they wish. So far, our son is an atheist and our daughter believes from all things in reincarnation.
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weltschmerz
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Post by weltschmerz on May 27, 2015 17:20:44 GMT -5
My wife in fact DID quit her job to raise the kids and homeschool them. And she's not a helicopter either. We just felt that the public school system is getting bogged down by so many rules and regulations that was hard for a teacher to in fact teach anything. DW used to teach special Ed. tommorow in fact we have an ART DAY at our place and about 50-70 kids will be here over a two days period. And their group is one of the smaller ones. There are some groups arround here that are much larger. Most of them are organized arround some faith. Contrary to many believes, the homeschooled kids have plenty of interaction with their peers so there is no awkwardness or anything. We tought our son might have a problem because he was shy but he was that way just arround adults but not arround those of his or closer to his age. Now at 16 there is none of that. And no, we are not that selective with what we teach them: politics and religion are getting fair shares in their education with no preference or partiality of any kind. We teach them to make their own decisions, to think through, for themselves. We keep telling them that if they let someone else making decisions for them in anything then that makes them sheep that follows.Ofcourse their education has a scientific basis. Again religion we teach them all so they can make an informed decision at any time they wish. So far, our son is an atheist and our daughter believes from all things in reincarnation. I sincerely hope your wife's spelling and grammar is better than yours. You can't teach what you don't know.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on May 27, 2015 17:22:20 GMT -5
my son was moved from a private school to a public one this year, and i could not be happier. it really just depends on the public school, Paul. incidentally, my son's girlfriend is homeschooled, and she is a really terrific girl. no problem with the concept. at all.
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mroped
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Post by mroped on May 27, 2015 17:44:46 GMT -5
Weltschmerz, I just got of a skid-steer after eight hours on it. I'm surprised that I can read, my head is spinning so bad. And to put you at ease, no I don't teach them spelling, the wife does but as a matter of fact I am quiet good at it. And yeah! There is this thing they have on computers where you write a word and gives you all sorts of options. Thesaurus or so but who has time for that? Anything else that I may be of assistance to you today? And if you need to know what a skid-steer is, all you have to do is ask! But nicely!
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weltschmerz
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Post by weltschmerz on May 27, 2015 17:48:39 GMT -5
Weltschmerz, I just got of a skid-steer after eight hours on it. I'm surprised that I can read, my head is spinning so bad. And to put you at ease, no I don't teach them spelling, the wife does but as a matter of fact I am quiet good at it. And yeah! There is this thing they have on computers where you write a word and gives you all sorts of options. Thesaurus or so but who has time for that? Anything else that I may be of assistance to you today? And if you need to know what a skid-steer is, all you have to do is ask! But nicely! Lol! Apparently not.
In any case, I think kids should be able to spell without relying on spellcheck, but that's just me.
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AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP
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Post by AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP on May 27, 2015 18:02:18 GMT -5
my son was moved from a private school to a public one this year, and i could not be happier. it really just depends on the public school, Paul. incidentally, my son's girlfriend is homeschooled, and she is a really terrific girl. no problem with the concept. at all. I keep getting this same response: It depends on the school or the school district. But it really doesn't. Government run schools are truly one-size-fits-all.
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mroped
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Post by mroped on May 27, 2015 18:12:34 GMT -5
Ultimately, this is English we are talking about. The only rule is "there are no rules"! And ones education is not just spelling. There are other far more important(to me) things than spelling: math, physics, chemistry, history, geograph, biology just to name a few. Yes, I agree that they should be able to spell without a thesaurus but if they don't care than so be it! Fun fact: the Great of The Greats, William Shakespeare himself spelled his own name in many different ways. He either didn't care or maybe he just simply didn't care! What the Hell! It's english!
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whoisjohngalt
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Post by whoisjohngalt on May 27, 2015 19:38:34 GMT -5
My wife in fact DID quit her job to raise the kids and homeschool them. And she's not a helicopter either. We just felt that the public school system is getting bogged down by so many rules and regulations that was hard for a teacher to in fact teach anything. DW used to teach special Ed. tommorow in fact we have an ART DAY at our place and about 50-70 kids will be here over a two days period. And their group is one of the smaller ones. There are some groups arround here that are much larger. Most of them are organized arround some faith. Contrary to many believes, the homeschooled kids have plenty of interaction with their peers so there is no awkwardness or anything. We tought our son might have a problem because he was shy but he was that way just arround adults but not arround those of his or closer to his age. Now at 16 there is none of that. And no, we are not that selective with what we teach them: politics and religion are getting fair shares in their education with no preference or partiality of any kind. We teach them to make their own decisions, to think through, for themselves. We keep telling them that if they let someone else making decisions for them in anything then that makes them sheep that follows.Ofcourse their education has a scientific basis. Again religion we teach them all so they can make an informed decision at any time they wish. So far, our son is an atheist and our daughter believes from all things in reincarnation. I sincerely hope your wife's spelling and grammar is better than yours. You can't teach what you don't know.
Wow!!! Harsh!!!! And that's coming from ME, not the nicest person in the world
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on May 27, 2015 19:42:06 GMT -5
my son was moved from a private school to a public one this year, and i could not be happier. it really just depends on the public school, Paul. incidentally, my son's girlfriend is homeschooled, and she is a really terrific girl. no problem with the concept. at all. I keep getting this same response: It depends on the school or the school district. But it really doesn't. Government run schools are truly one-size-fits-all. if you keep getting it long enough, maybe you will look into it more?
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AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP
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Post by AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP on May 27, 2015 19:51:27 GMT -5
I have, and I chalk up that response to ignorance. The schools are not what they once were- they are NOTHING like when we were growing up. I lead a local stop common core group, and we are quite well informed on the state of education and we have a tremendous number of liberal allies in the fight. It's a common-ground issue. www.stopcommoncorefl.com/
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mroped
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Post by mroped on May 27, 2015 19:52:33 GMT -5
Well, I'll put it this way : not everybody can be as smart as the one next to them. It would be boring! I'm not taking any offense in any of it because I simply don't care. As I said it before, on a different tread, English is my third language and I don't make my living writing or filling up papers all day so... My maternal language is as far from English as Chinese is. Never had even a basic, introductory English class until I got to US. I am mostly self taught except of some help from the missus while in college.
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NastyWoman
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Post by NastyWoman on May 27, 2015 20:07:00 GMT -5
See that is a good situation (in my opinion) for homeschooling if you want to go that route. So many people are not suited to teach and I am on or near the head of that list. I gave birth twice for a total of 2 kids) and to this day have two kids. And I firmly believe that I would have zero today and free room and board for the rest of my life had I tried to homeschool The kids managed to get good degrees despite my lack of patience anyway and along the way very rarely needed my help with anything study related. And yes, I did help when needed and asked --- I do have a couple of degrees myself so it's not like I was incapable Homeschooling can be a wonderful tool for the right parent and the right kids, it just isn't for everyone and that includes some parent who do "homeschool"
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mroped
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Post by mroped on May 27, 2015 20:08:47 GMT -5
Paul, the "one size fits all" is true only when you talk about standardized testing and so on. Each district is as you know I'm sure, independently run. The School Board does hiring/ firing and salary negotiations. who gets hired or fired is in many cases a preference(sometimes nepotism) or a grudge. Who suffers? At the end the kids.
True, in many if not most cases, teachers have to put up with weird/stupid regulation, sometimes the pay is way, way under what it should be and their contracts suck but there are many teachers that became teachers because it was an easy degree and the conditions on the job didn't seem that bad at the time. And they go to work in the morning for the sole purpose that they are not staying home and at the end of the day they have somewhere to return from.
Homeschoolers still have to do some testing to prove their advancement and progress but at least they don't have to put up with No Child Left Behind or the likes of it, overcrowding in classrooms, bullying and so on. Those are just a few reasons why more and more people choose to homeschool.
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weltschmerz
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Post by weltschmerz on May 27, 2015 20:09:12 GMT -5
For the record, English is my third language, as well.
The point I was trying to make, however, is that I don't think most parents can teach all things. For example, I suck at math. Homeschooling a child and teaching him math would be a Very Bad Idea. Understand that I REALLY suck at math.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on May 27, 2015 20:09:26 GMT -5
Expelling kids for stupid nonsense is one thing. Who respects a school that would expel a student for biting a pop tart in the shape of a gun or accidently bringing a pocket knife to school and asking a teacher to take it, etc.
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EVT1
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Post by EVT1 on May 27, 2015 20:17:38 GMT -5
my son was moved from a private school to a public one this year, and i could not be happier. it really just depends on the public school, Paul. incidentally, my son's girlfriend is homeschooled, and she is a really terrific girl. no problem with the concept. at all. I keep getting this same response: It depends on the school or the school district. But it really doesn't. Government run schools are truly one-size-fits-all. There is a reason you get that response- because it is true. I know it for a fact- I have attended both private and public schools and when I look back to the best teachers I had they were in both. The worst teachers were also in both.
One thing that may support your theory- is that the HS I went to (private) was very rigorous compared to the public school- at least it was comparing the amount of work I had to do vs. friends of mine. Then again I was in honors courses and have no idea what that looked like in the public schools.
But it must have been hard- as English composition in college was a hell of a lot easier than my senior English was in HS. Same went for oral communication. Math on the other hand moved faster in college.
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mroped
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Post by mroped on May 27, 2015 20:33:17 GMT -5
"What's fueling the uptick in home scooped kids?"
Around here I see that many of those that have homeschooled kids, one of the parents(typicaly the mother) stays home with the kids. That can mean one of the two things: the bread winner makes enough to support a family or they are making due with less than in the past-no splurging, no fancy vacationing or new vehicles every other year...
Many of those that I know are not necesarily "well off". Not dirt poor either. But they manage. Could it be that people started realizing that having the latest toys or gathering riches is not as important as the education of their children? Or the fact that at least one parent is there for them at any point during their childhood?
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tallguy
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Post by tallguy on May 27, 2015 21:16:29 GMT -5
Anyone want to bet that there could be a companion article: Massive Surge in Unqualified Home-School Teachers - Up 161.8% in 10 Years?
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saveinla
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Post by saveinla on May 27, 2015 21:19:24 GMT -5
For the record, English is my third language, as well.
The point I was trying to make, however, is that I don't think most parents can teach all things. For example, I suck at math. Homeschooling a child and teaching him math would be a Very Bad Idea. Understand that I REALLY suck at math. You are not the only person who will be teaching your kid. There are co-ops, trading off with subject matter experts, taking one class in a private school if no other option is available etc.etc. Home schooling is not what it used to be and it's very advanced now with a lot of subjects available online. As long as the parents understand they need help and know where to find it, home schooling is not hard. You just need to be patient.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on May 27, 2015 21:52:40 GMT -5
Maybe I'll have time to give my thoughts on potential increases in Saturday
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zibazinski
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Post by zibazinski on May 27, 2015 22:51:10 GMT -5
I'd do it now. My kids wasted the first 6 weeks of every school year reviewing the stuff they learned last year because of other kids. Didn't seem much at the time but those weeks added up. 5x6 is 30 weeks of education wasted being bored It's only gotten worse. Too Much testing too much inclusion too much wasted time on feel good things instead of learning and feeling good about not being stupid Add in the kids who don't behave so time gets wasted trying to civilize them. Thanks but no thanks.
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happyhoix
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Post by happyhoix on May 28, 2015 7:42:09 GMT -5
I have, and I chalk up that response to ignorance. The schools are not what they once were- they are NOTHING like when we were growing up. I lead a local stop common core group, and we are quite well informed on the state of education and we have a tremendous number of liberal allies in the fight. It's a common-ground issue. www.stopcommoncorefl.com/Paul there are 50 states. I don't know how many thousands of schools, some of them in very wealthy school districts, some in very poor ones. You can't possibly make a blanket statement that is completely true across such a diverse population. You hate the government and feel it is intrusive in your life. You want to be 100% in control of everything, and that includes what your children learn. That biases your perception of public schools, because you lose control to the classroom teacher and to the state and federal agencies that select the course of study for the school, and to you, anything you aren't completely in control of is automatically bad. DS went to public schools, did a lot of AP classes in HS, went to college and is now a well paid industrial engineer. Could he have done better if I home schooled him? I doubt it. I have no patience, which is why I chose not to be a teacher in the first place. I'm 100% sure our personal relationship is stronger now because I chose not to try to home school him. I'm also 100% sure that he's a more independent, self sufficient human being because we made this shy child get out in the world and learn how to get along with fellow students and teachers without mommy there to smooth things out for him. But that's just me and my kid. I'm 100% sure that home schooling is the right answer for lots of other kids and parents. And that private schools work for a lot of other kids. As a parent, you have to find the best environment for your kid to succeed, and not be blind to the possibility that other options might be better suited to him. You also can't ignore the fact that every kid is different and needs to find their own best environment to thrive in. Home schooling isn't the single best answer, anymore than public schooling is.
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AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP
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Post by AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP on May 28, 2015 9:27:23 GMT -5
You are posting wild speculative wishful thinking. You are not posting from a place of being fully informed. The main place of differentiation is with the purpose / objective of education. Government run schools are literally madhouses. They are training for the insane asylum that our nation is becoming. If you don't see this, there are two possible reasons: you don't know; you don't want to know.
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billisonboard
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Post by billisonboard on May 28, 2015 9:31:22 GMT -5
... They are training for the insane asylum that our nation is becoming. ... And people say schools are failing to prepare young people for the future.
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AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP
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Post by AgeOfEnlightenmentSCP on May 28, 2015 9:33:49 GMT -5
The answer to the question posed in the OP is self-evident: it is because fewer people have confidence in the ability of government run schools to effectively give their children the basic life skills they need as a foundation for future learning in the areas of reading, writing, mathematics, science, and the arts. Many people are better informed about the indoctrination of students into a godless, amoral worldview without clear standards of conduct that make sense and work in the real world. Schools are concerned with things like birth control, and gender-neutral bathrooms, and these are not only inappropriate topics, and just plain inappropriate- but they are deliberately designed to create moral confusion so that the government may introduce a substitute moral code; where for example, individual rights to life, liberty, and property are no longer virtuous. It is not difficult for a well-informed, completely objective person to see. However, it is difficult to accept if one is already sympathetic to big government, and they share the politician's and bureaucrat's frustration that there are free-thinking, independent-minded, and untrainable souls which they cannot yet full control.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on May 28, 2015 11:51:04 GMT -5
The answer to the question posed in the OP is self-evident: it is because fewer people have confidence in the ability of government run schools to effectively give their children the basic life skills they need as a foundation for future learning in the areas of reading, writing, mathematics, science, and the arts. Many people are better informed about the indoctrination of students into a godless, amoral worldview without clear standards of conduct that make sense and work in the real world. Schools are concerned with things like birth control, and gender-neutral bathrooms, and these are not only inappropriate topics, and just plain inappropriate- but they are deliberately designed to create moral confusion so that the government may introduce a substitute moral code; where for example, individual rights to life, liberty, and property are no longer virtuous. It is not difficult for a well-informed, completely objective person to see. However, it is difficult to accept if one is already sympathetic to big government, and they share the politician's and bureaucrat's frustration that there are free-thinking, independent-minded, and untrainable souls which they cannot yet full control. i think that is a jaundiced and biased view of both the problem, and what "other people think". i am certain that some fraction of the problem is just as you see it. and it is quite true that MOST homeschooling is done by evangelical Christians who want a more parochial approach to education. there are, of course, religious schools. but the COST of these schools are quite high. i think your failure to analyze the economic aspect of the situation is a serious flaw in your argument, Paul.
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