Talk: Homeschooling

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Reorganization on 11/10/04

I moved facts about home-schooling to the front, and moved the for and against sections to the rear, since they are not substantive, i.e. do not describe the substance of the subject at hand. Describing the subject is not advocacy.

I tried to move advocacy so that for and against are clearly labelled, and a summary of the critics' values is prepended to each section. Please add counter-arguments to the appropriate section, rather than immediately following an opposing argument.

The NPOV turn of phrase is "This person says X."

I've actually read the supreme court opinion, as well as summaries by uninvolved (i.e. not affiliated with the Home School Legal Defense Association) constitutional scholars. It's not a controversy, it's the law. So, I changed the text to reflect that, but I left it in advocacy because it necessarily reflects some degree of approval of the activity, even though the official approval is rather grudging, and almost unintentional.

Since the article is substantively organized, and advocacy is better-labelled, I removed the not NPOV warning.

The article probably needs a more careful reading for advocacy, and more editing to move (not REmove) advocacy and rephrase it in NPOV.

Article Snipped

Here is an edited version that 213.122.165.xxx reduced the original article to:

Home schooling (teaching children at home) also known as home eduation or elective home based learning.

The advantages usually cited by proponents include: individual attention, customized curricula, efficient use of children's time, a safer environment, freedom from harmful peers, religious instruction, privacy, parental control, and improved socialization to adult society among others.

In the U.S. in 1999, homeschoolers scored about 23% higher than publicly-schooled children on refereed nationally-normed tests. Most employers find home-schooled persons work with less need for supervision. In 2001, public school grades are deprecated by many college-entrance procedures, and a GED taken at less than 18 years of age, combined with good scores on the SAT and ACT permit entrance to most colleges and apprenticeships. The individualized instruction and customized curriculi may compensate for other disadvantages.

In the UK around 1% of school aged children are home educated. There are no controls on what is taught or how it is taught. Nor is there any right for the state to test a child. Though if a local authority requests it the parents should indicate in what way they are providing an education suitable to the child. De registration is by right not permission (except in scotalnd and northern Ireland)

Home Educators address the socialasation issues through local community organisations and their own dedicated Home education support structures.

Most homeschooling families make substantial economic sacrifices to educate their children at home. Because one parent refrains from working in order to give instruction often a second income is lost though if there are preschool children, homeschooling can be a better economic use of a parents' time than combining low-paying work with child-care and poor public schooling.

Education can proceed flexibly, at students' own paces, year-around, even with frequent traveling. Vacations and other family activities all become part of the families educational life. Education occures every waking hour.

for links to other organisations look at www.home-education.org.uk where you will find links to UK, US European and Australian Home Edcuation organisations.

213.122.165.xxx , you probably don't realize that it is considered extremely impolite on Wikipedia to delete large amounts of content without explanation on the /Talk page. We really need to make this policy clearer in a few different places. --LMS

Unit studies

Unit studies are not just found in home schools. I had to suffer through them in middle school. Perhaps it should just be given its own page. -- Eean

Move to Home Schooling (US)?

Given that this is almost entirely about the US, would a move to Home schooling in the US or similar be a good idea? jimfbleak 08:58 24 Jun 2003 (UTC)

This isn't necessary. If the article starts including information on home schooling in other countries and becomes unweidly, we can split into seperate articles. The generally agreed upon correct Wiki approach is to leave it as is until a conflict arises. —Frecklefoot 15:56, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Cleaned up External Links

I know this is going to ruffle a few feathers, but I deleted significant portions of text from the External Links section. There was a huge paragraph summarizing the first web site: information which can be found on the site itself. I trimmed all the entries to make them conform to Wikipedia guideline. The links are just that links—not propaganda sections for individual organizations. If you feel the need to discuss each links at length, do it in the article proper. Peace. :-) —Frecklefoot 15:56, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Sections

Just a reminder, if you're going to start a new topic here, use a title (like this section does) so user's can contribute to just that discussion instead of having to edit the entire Talk page. —Frecklefoot 15:56, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Removed Conspiracy

I removed the addition by 128.172.208.126 of:

Homeschooling was originally the primary form of education in the USA. Many of our former presidents such as Jefferson and Lincoln were self-educated or had tutors growing up. Public schools were not created by our government to further the education of Americans. Actually the literacy rate in this country has never been as high as it was before they were created. The reason they were created was the “Melting Pot’ theory; to insure that the immigrant children coming into the country were assimilated into the existing culture rather then corrupting it with their own traditions. Because the school system was created not to educate but to indoctrinate students many parents today find that they can better instruct their children at home.

It is highly POV and sounds like a conspiracy theory. It is not backed up by any references whatsoever. The facts about Jefforson and Lincoln are fairly benign, but the rest is speculative. Unless someone can back it up with facts (not more speculation), I vote to leave it out. Actually, I'll re-add the first two sentences, but the rest will need some facts to back it up. —Frecklefoot 15:30, 6 Feb 2004 (UTC)

My understanding is that there is evidence of an extremely high literacy rate before compulsory education. I agree the rest is conspiracy stuff, though, and needs to be left out or NPOV'd. (Perhaps a separate article on conspiracy theories about the origin of public education in the U.S. would be in order?) Unfortunately, the only reading I've done about the extremely high literacy rate is in the works of John Taylor Gatto, which are so replete with conspiratorial stuff as to be too suspect to prove the assertion. (In other words, I'm not even fully persuaded myself and am looking for more evidence.) Jdavidb 17:07, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

The deleted paragraph is not "factual", hence its deletion. But it is an oft-expressed POV, so we might want to track down a home-schooling proponent and quote him on the matter. A lot of homeschooling, er, loudmouths, are Christians who feel that government-run schools in the US foist anti-Christian propaganda upon children. Perhaps we could write about WHY they feel that way. --Uncle Ed 15:38, 6 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I'm up with that. It could be NPOV'ed and put in the "support" section, e.g. "Some homeschoolers beleive that public schools were not created by our government to further the education of Americans..." I'm not a big fan of this subject, so someone else may want to NPOV and re-add it. —Frecklefoot 15:59, 6 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Um, not quite the POV I've read. But I like your use of Some homeschoolers believe that as a way of attributing the POV. If you don't have time to research this, then I'll add it to my lengthy to-do list... :-) --Uncle Ed 16:06, 6 Feb 2004 (UTC)

No more teachers, no more books

(no homework, detentions, bells, bullies, or potentially bossy teachers)

The Robinson Curriculum is premised on the idea that ALL schoolwork can be homework. That is, after the kids are mature enough to keep going without adult supervision, learning just becomes another chore for them to do on their own.

This article needs a lot of work.... --Uncle Ed 16:11, 6 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Criticism of forms of homeschooling

I removed the following comment: "Like any industry, the home education world suffers its own fashions," leaving it here if anyone wants it back. IMO, this comment relegates unschooling to being a less-valuable "fashion" or "fad" that is currently taking the homeschooling world by storm by may fade away tomorrow to be replaced with the next best thing. That's not NPOV.

It would be better to clean up the article and make a section on different approaches to homeschooling, including arguments for and against. There's plenty of arguments for and against unschooling, as well as classical education, school-at-home, unit-study approaches, Montessori (why is there no link to Montessori in this article), and others I can't remember at the moment. Each method deserves its own section in this article.

In case someone from outside the homeschool mindset reads this, be aware that in addition to the friction between "the homeschooling community" and the rest of the world, there is also friction within "the homeschooling community" between proponents of different methods.

Jdavidb 17:08, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

How many?

I find it conspicuously lacking a figure of homeschoolers. How many homeschoolers are in the US (since it seems the only place with enough drive)? 0,1%, 1%, 10%? Even a wide margin would be better than nothing.

Yes, this would be nice to know. —Frecklefoot 17:30, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

According to the U.S. Statistical Abstract for 2002 (the one I have to hand), these are the official figures for school enrollment vs. homeschooled kids in 1999 (the latest year for which figures are given for both):

Kids in school (K-12): 52,876,000
Kids being homeschooled: 850,000

That's around 1.58% being homeschooled, yes? I expect more recent figures could be obtained from the website of the U.S. National Center for Education Statistics, but I haven't checked that. ---Michael K. Smith 21:38, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Having worked for a publisher with access to reams of education statistics, I can tell you that no one really knows. The estimates are all over the map. It would be difficult to settle on a safe percentage. The NCES is closely aligned with the public education community, so I would take their statistics with a grain of salt--Waterygrave 18:52, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Age

Is there a increase or decrease of the percentage as grades increase? Why? Do parents feel that some ages are better suited for a certain kind of schooling than others? Or do they think that homeschooling works for every age? We only have a mention of pre-scholars.

I am not a homeschooler, but here is my opinion: there should be a decrease of homeschooling as ages increase. Why? Because subjects get more complex as children's ages increase and homeschooling parents find it hard to be an expert in all subjects.

This is an opinion not backed-up by any kind of data, but it seems logical to me. When I went to high school, my history class was taught by a man who had a master's degree in History. My math classes were taught by people who had degrees in Math. Likewise for my Drama, French, English, Science. P.E. and Art classes. How can one parent compete with that spectrum of specialized education? This is just one of my many criticisms of home schooling... —Frecklefoot 17:29, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Much appreciation for keeping your criticism here rather than expressing it on the main page. I get upset that people want to criticize homeschooling -- for me it seems people just have too much desire to control what other people are doing. It all feels like busybodiness to me. But I digress. It is true that statistically homeschooling declines in the later grades, but it is also true that homeschoolers tend to be much more autonomous learners. In general, a high school age homeschooler may be able to just sit down with a textbook and teach him or herself. It's great preparation for college, too (my fiance was homeschooled and is currently in college; it blew her mind that so many people in college couldn't learn from a book). So it's not as if the parent has to become an expert in every subject the student learns. A family where each child is independently pursuing his or her own interests at a high school or higher level can be a very interesting family indeed. (I spent Christmas break my junior year of high school teaching myself Physics from my textbook. Pathetic, I know, but I was a geek. :) Besides, it was fun.) If the child does need an expert teacher, there are many options including early enrollment in a few college classes (our public schools in this district recommend that as an option for gifted and talented students) or hiring a personal tutor. My fiance's family once pooled resources with several others to hire a science teacher, for example. Homeschooling just means you're pulled out of the government compulsory education system; it doesn't mean you cut yourself off from all educational resources except your parents. Jdavidb 13:37, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Homeschooling, as such, does not eliminate access to expertise. Cooperative schools are sometimes established to spread around the talent in the community: nothing prevents some parents from being experts in an academic field, and some parents teach the children of others in the fields where they are strongest. Choirs and orchestras, history seminars, math clubs, competitions, etc. all are ways of overcoming limitations. College lectures can be monitored, correspondent relationships can be established with experts in a field. Homeschooling does not necessarily involve withdrawal from resources - it can, in fact, provide greater freedom of access especially for teens who have an early and realistic idea of where they are headed. It is not identical to parent-only education. It does not necessarily require that the parent knows as much as the child is expected to learn. Mkmcconn 17:45, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

(In reply to Frecklefoot) - I am a home educated 13 year old in the UK, and I find that it's no problem being home educated as I get older. My parents research in order to facilitate my learning. Both my parents and myself look on the Internet for more information (esp. Wikipedia :P), in the library. We ask people who know the answer to our queries. You see, home education is not necessarily restricted to the _home_, it's everywhere. Home education is not always about teaching, it's about a gathering of knowledge of all, for all to participate in. We're all learners, and learning is lifelong - for everyone involved. --Spe88 10:10, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I moved this - can we say who predicted this, and when this is anticipated? I'm a littel uncomfortable otherwise. Mark Richards 20:00, 2 Mar 2004 (UTC) It is predicted that by the end of the Culture Wars, the better parts of unschooling will be synthesized into more traditional methodologies.

NPOV dispute

I've placed an NPOV header, as I don't feel that this article follows Wikipedia:NPOV. Someone more knowledgeable than I needs to fix it. Best, Meelar (talk) 19:11, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)

From a homeschooler's point of view

The section titled "Homeschooling from a homeschooler's point of view" doesn't belong here, it's essentially an anonymous opinion. Rhobite 01:28, Jul 5, 2004 (UTC)

I agree; I've deleted it. Rosemary Amey 16:14, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Too many extern links!

This article has more external links than I've ever seen in any other article. Do we really need a list of homeschooling sites for every friggin' state? How about every nation and every town too? Wikipedia is not a collection of just links. If someone really wants these links, let them make their own web site with them. I don't think this article should have so many of 'em. It should have information on homeschooling, thorough and NPOV. The links belong elsewhere on the web. Just MHO. Peace. :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 19:32, Jul 8, 2004 (UTC)

Emphatically agree. Jdavidb 20:08, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I have eliminated the entire homeschooling support groups section. I presume if the general consensus is against this, my change will be reverted. I believe some of the other links should be pruned as well.

Far better than a link to every homeschooling organization in existence would be a section on homeschooling support groups describing their general features and services. A link to a list of these groups might be appropriate (but not a link to every list of these groups). Jdavidb 20:17, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Thanks Jdavidb, I agree. Rosemary Amey 21:59, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Possible outline

This article does need a lot of work, so I've created a draft outline for what it might eventually look like. Please feel free to revise, improve, extend.

Introduction

Basic definition, note extent to which it's practiced, and very basic history. Note criticism, if controversial enough. Total 5 sentences or less?

Types / Justifications of homeschooling

Break it down--who does this, and why?

Religious

Gifted

Others?

Criticism

Explain criticism, sources and claims.

Methods

How the mechanics of homeschooling work

Again, these are just my thoughts--I don't know enough to even start filling this in. Hope this helps, and let me know what I can do. Meelar (talk) 21:58, 2004 Aug 4 (UTC)

This looks good to me, and I am familiar with much of it (at least, from a United States perspective, and my knowledge of the situation outside of the state of Washington is admittedly shaky in some ways. Shall I work on it at Talk:Homeschooling/Temp or in the article itself? I'm inclined to go with a temp page. And it will take me a day or three to get my thoughts and ideas together on this -- if anyone feels more urgent than that, by all means, get going on it and I'll catch up! Jwrosenzweig 22:25, 4 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Temp page is probably best. I'll take a look in a few days, then. Good luck. Meelar (talk) 22:26, 2004 Aug 4 (UTC)

"Schools which use mass-production techniques"

I feel this change winds up introducing unnecessary inflammatory wording. We can explain lower down why (many) homeschooling parents reject traditional schooling. Putting it up in the top section sort of throws it "in your face," which is not good, IMO.

It's true that not all public schools are this way, so we could say "most public schools" instead of just "public schools." It's also true that many parents feel private schools are the same way, so we could say "most public and private schools." I think I'll change the article to say that. Or we could say "traditional education choices," or "most traditional schools," or "most traditional schools, public and private," or something. Jdavidb 15:27, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Some POV Correction

I tried my best to neutralize the objections section, give me reviews! I just put in arguments and deleted the pro-HS comments that didn't belong in the oppostion section.

Crown Copyright

The extract from the Education Act, 1996 is Crown Copyright. I have edited the article to reflect this.

Note from the website:

© Crown Copyright 1996

Acts of Parliament printed from this website are printed
under the superintendence and authority of the Controller
of HMSO being the Queen's Printer of Acts of Parliament.

The legislation contained on this web site is subject to
Crown Copyright protection. It may be reproduced free of
charge provided that it is reproduced accurately and that
the source and copyright status of the material is made
evident to users.

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