4PackGirl
12 years ago
the idea of home schooling my kids has crossed my mind several times over the years & i'm looking for some input from you guys. one of the twins HATES school...HATES it with a passion. he gets straight A's & i'm beginning to think he's bored out of his mind. the other guy enjoys the social time with his friends at school. i casually brought up the idea of home schooling & one said "yes that'd be so cool" - the other one "i'm not sure". i didn't say i was going to do it or anything like that - just that i was curious what they thought about it.

now that i have their input, what do you guys think? they'll be entering 4th grade this year & i'm a bit hesitant to do it yet because i do think social interaction is important. i don't know - HELP!!
Porforis
12 years ago
My opinion is that a good school trumps homeschooling 100% of the time. The social interaction is key, even if your kids are socially active outside of school... After all, we not only learn how to make friends in school, but we learn how to deal with people that annoy us/don't like us/treat us like crap. Especially in a world where face to face interaction is becoming more and more rare, I think it's important to be sure your children are exposed to manageable levels of social adversity.

I had a particularly bad time in middle school and high school, I switched from a traditional middle school to a charter school with a focus on technology and the arts in the middle of 7th grade. During high school I did have a couple classes at home with a teacher that did homeschooling provided by the district, I think it was important for my development but despite all of my issues in school I think it would have been a disaster to take me out altogether. I begged my parents to homeschool me because I was overwhelmed with the negative social attention I was receiving, but without being forced into having to deal with these problems myself I don't think I would be the person I am today, and in retrospect I am glad I stayed in a public school. I did have the benefit of a lot of good teachers in high school, though... Not all public schools are so lucky, and I never felt like nobody was willing to provide me with chances to succeed despite my difficulties.

Ultimately it's your decision and I have no business telling you what you should do with your kids, as I don't know them and I certainly don't know them as well as you do. I guess I would recommend examining WHY the first twin you mentioned gets bored out of his mind. Are the teachers just bad making learning interesting? Is he just that much smarter than everyone else? Does he learn in different ways than most kids and thus doesn't get drawn in? Or is it more of a social thing?
Pack93z
12 years ago
My Nephew this last fall was pulled out of school and tried it for the spring semester.. by the end of that semester HE decided that he would like to go back to school.

My Sister and her Husband agreed that the thought of home school sounded good to start with... but the value of classmates trumped what he gained in terms of flexibility in the curriculum.

I will update you if you wish on his transition back into school.

In terms of being bored.. my Son was that way in Mathematics.. so I had a conversation with his school since he got into middle school.. they allowed him to hop up a grade in Math.. example this year he will go over to the High School for math and computer science and then come back for the remainder of his classes.

That resolved his boredom with classes... it also has grew his social skills as he expanded the interaction with a different group of students.
"The oranges are dry; the apples are mealy; and the papayas... I don't know what's going on with the papayas!"
4PackGirl
12 years ago
cole is the one who hates school. i don't think he's incredibly smarter than the other kids but he's a very mature kid. cory doesn't mind school & he gets a's & b's & his maturity level is that of a kid his age...normal. cole's teacher last year told him she wanted to have him in scholastic bowl when he gets old enough because his math skills are very high. then she went on to say that she'd like to add him to a group that she tries to get together during the recess period, that she would give him more excelled papers to work on, & she didn't do one of those things. she completely dropped the ball with him.

the problems i see with public schools is this 'no child left behind' BS. they have kids in class that are disruptive every single day, taking precious time away from the teachers that should be spent on everyone - not one kid. the teachers are overwhelmed most of the time so i can't blame them. but i know my education was far from stellar when i was a kid so i've been mulling this around in my head for many years.
zombieslayer
12 years ago
I'm with the others. Not too fond of homeschooling as the kids miss out on what's really important with school - learning how to deal with other people.

As far as I'm concerned, the education is secondary.

But I think Cole should be pushed harder. Bump his math up to a higher level. It's much better to be challenged than bored.
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Porforis
12 years ago

I'm with the others. Not too fond of homeschooling as the kids miss out on what's really important with school - learning how to deal with other people.

As far as I'm concerned, the education is secondary.

But I think Cole should be pushed harder. Bump his math up to a higher level. It's much better to be challenged than bored.

Originally Posted by: zombieslayer 



Agreed here. One thing I forgot to bring up earlier that ZS reminded me of - are there college classes he's eligible for? I'm sorry, I have no idea how old your kids are, maybe it's way too early... but if he's not sufficiently challenged and people aren't mature enough for him in high school, maybe he can take a college course and get some elective credits in high school in the process.
zombieslayer
12 years ago
That brings up a great idea Por. The first HS I went to was pretty close to a community college. Some of the kids knocked off a college course or two while still in HS.
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4PackGirl
12 years ago
they'll be 10 in september - just going into 4th grade so not quite ready for college classes. BUT i think i will discuss bumping up his math classes with the school for this year. having a kid who WANTS to be challenged & WANTS to push himself is something they really need to embrace. let's hope they feel the same way i do.

now one thing that may be unique to our situation is that they are twins so they always have someone to play with, fight with, & have fun with. they rarely go to other kids houses & are not involved in any sports at this point which are VERY available around my area. they're just not 'little joiners', so to speak. they're NORMAL kids who aren't being pushed to be the next pro qb, baseball player, or soccer player. they get to play whatever games they come up with around the yard...ya know, like MOST of US were brought up?!?!? in that way, they've been somewhat left out by their school friends because they don't do all the sports things. they're good at them but would rather just play them in their own backyard.

lots to think about & i thank you guys for all your thoughts as well. keep em coming!
Zero2Cool
12 years ago
My mom wanted to home school my brother. I told her it was the biggest mistake she'd make as a parent. Homeschooling your child misses out on working as part of a team. They lose out on learning how to work with people they don't like, in settings they might not like. They lose out on learning how to learn with people they DO like and learn how to focus on the project, rather than the friend/s they like.


I also had "home school" in college, via an online course. It pissed me off. Two classes specifically, one was "group team dynamics" and the other was statistics. I thought it was stupid to have a college course for working as a group outside of school and trying to learn statistics online without being able to get an instant response to a question... frustrated the shit out of me.


School is the way to go. Kids NEED those experiences, good and bad to help define who they are growing up.
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Wade
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12 years ago
I think the "socialization" argument is over-stated. (How about that, zombieslayer, you and I disagreeing twice in one week?) I agree with John Taylor Gatto and others: American primary/secondary education's primary function is to create conforming, deferential, superficially-thinking citizens. It is no accident that most high school graduates cannot see the absolute poverty of current political discourse and well on the way to Me!Me!Me! life. The accident is that anyone at all comes out of that system otherwise.

Moreover, the great myth is that homeschooling is just "the child and his parent(s)." Well-designed home-schooling has at least as much productive socialization (other kids, other adults, as the typical public school.

If one is lucky to go to a top tier school, the school education can of course be much better, particularly in high school. But let's not fool ourselves. The gap between those top schools and the typical public school is huge and getting bigger all the time.

I do agree with zombieslayer's point about the importance of challenging the young person. And, unfortunately, unless, again, one is at one of those top schools, most public schools don't challenge the young anything near enough. How can they? Most of the people who teach in public schools were ed majors in college. They're conscientious, they're well-socialized, they're hard-working -- but they are not often the ones who are going to do what it takes to challenge individual students.

And even if they want to, the system is going to do everything it can to prevent them from providing those challenges. They're going to have student caseloads that are far too big, and far too many other constituencies (can you say athletics that now start in the early primary grades!) to be satisfied.

Julie, if I had kids -- which I don't, which I won't, and which I don't want to have, because I'm not that kind of responsible -- I would strongly lean toward homeschooling at least until 9th grade. I've encountered homeschooled kids in my college classrooms many times, and they are invariably at the top in the terms of self-discipline, commitment, and maturity. AND they are at the top regarding their social/people skills as well. It doesn't matter whether they were homeschooled in a deeply fundamentalist religious household, or a liberal, highly educated and socially conscious one. They tend to be more ready for college than your typical public school kid. And it doesn't matter whether youre comparing them with public school kids from "at risk" households or with the ones who come from affluent suburban professional households.

Of course, the reason why homeschooled kids tend to be so good is that the parents doing and organizing the homeschooling put in a lot of time. Homeschooled children tend to have a lot more free time and time to create/challenge themselves, but they also tend to have a lot more one-on-one or tutorial type time.

That's really the biggest reason against homeschooling -- does the parent(s), either working alone or with other homeschooling families, have the time to commit to the kids' education. Homeschooling isn't something that can be done after work and on weekends. It isn't something to work around the job(s). You don't have to be an expert (or even "good" at the subjects the student is learning. But you do have to be available, and available a lot. And you have to take responsibility for choosing the curriculum, for organizing field trips and interaction with other home schoolers or other parts of the community. Between their employers' expectations and their own career aspirations, most parents simply won't be able/willing to make that commitment.

IMO



And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
Romans 12:2 (NKJV)
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