First of all... interesting point of view... and.. I'm happy to see that no one seems to have ulterior motivations for why their children are homeschooled. As BKB mentions below... I come from an area where there are groups... who under the guise of religious reasons.... homeschool their children simply to have them available for forced labor.
I find the social vs. academic environment arguments interesting... but.. in my mind they aren't mutually exclusive at all.
In fact, and maybe this is merely a personal experience... but... I know the quality of my public school education was top rate. Of course, that's because my public school education was supplemented and encouraged by my parents... they went to great lengths to interest me in academic subjects and to think for myself about subject material. I think to a great degree, I was helped by having both of these influnces in my life in that my parents would have focused on interesting me in (more often than not) the same things they were while I was exposed to a whole different "curriculum" at school and my parents could help me with those things as well.
So, I tend to think I would have missed out if I didn't have both a public school experience as well as good parents. And, my parents were divorced for a very good portion of me growing up... so... 3 perspectives on that stuff.
As to the social aspect of things, I found the asshole home schooled kids flag football story amusing, and not pointing any fingers here, but, I have run across a section of parents that want to homeschool their kids because other kids are mean, and were mean to them, and this kept them from learning or some such bullshit. They don't use this as a primary reason... but... it comes up usually. Its my experience that these kids probalby need to have public school social interaction more than most. As most of us can probably agreee, the apple is notorious for not falling far from the tree, and for that parent that had the bad public school experience, ummm, the fault might not lie "with the other kids" if you get my meaning. Sometimes its a good policy to ask, "Whose the asshole?"
Buckeyeskickbuttocks;1109433; said:
Point is, and one with which I agree (Surprised?), the school setting has the advantage of teaching kids subtly about the "real world" It's like a job, and I've learned how to deal with reporting here every day and so on owing to lessons I learned from schooling. I wasn't with a bunch of people I liked all the time. I had to deal with people I thought were assholes... I had to improvise when I forgot my lunch... shit like that. Just like the real world, where I don't get to hang out with my buddies and loved ones all day long singing songs and cleaning up parks.
To this point... I don't know if there's a socialization issue or like a job. But, I kind of wonder why everyone here thinks schools are for "learning." Sure, there are bad thigns to be learned from the other kids. Sure the teachers are inconsistent... yes there is time wasted. But, like BKB says, that's life. It might be best to learn the best way to teach your kid, then do it. But, on the other hand, it might be best to teach your kid to be able to adjust to different kind of people and viewpoints.... if these are distractions, they aren't going away once we're "through calculus."
I guess, my point is, we can talk about reading techniques and grammar and rote vs phonic learning... and maybe everyone gets this... but... seems to me that learning itself is a skill, not a set of skills. I'll be the first to sing the praises of a braod based liberal-arts-esque type knowledge background. But, I don't really, as a parent (and, I am a rookie, I'll admit) don't really aspire to teach my kid(s) anything. Its going to happen, sure... there are things that I think are neat and important that I will want to share with her. But, the primary goal for me is to provide a support system for her to learn on her own... for her to be able to acheive things, to learn on her own, to know she's loved and to know she'll have a hand to pick her up when she inevitably falls. I have no desire to actually create the environment of her world, Just the tools she needs to operate in it. I don't understand the point of "teaching her to think for herself" and then have mine be the only point of view in her life. These ideas seem at odds to me.
(This may of course be because I've read my posts on here and acknowledge myself to be an idiot...)
