Posted on 01/05/2010 2:18:36 PM PST by christianhomeschoolmommaof3
While the number of people in academia who are openly critical of homeschooling are few, every now and again an article will be published in a university periodical which attacks homeschooling.
The critics in academia come from the far left of the political spectrum. One such critic, Robin L. West of the Georgetown University Law Center, recently published an article titled “The Harms of Homeschooling,” which appeared in the Summer/Fall 2009 issue of the University of Maryland’s Philosophy and Public Policy Quarterly.
Before we answer the specific charges Ms. West makes against homeschooling we’d just like to give you a flavor of her perspective.
In the article she says, “Education, after all, is typically described as a core, and possibly the core, state responsibility.” We hope you’d agree that anyone who can entertain the idea that education is the core responsibility of the state (even though education is not mentioned as a state responsibility in the U.S. Constitution) and neglect to recognize that defense/national security is the core responsibility of the state is clearly out of the mainstream.
Later in the article Ms. West says, “Homeschooling is now such an entrenched practice, recriminalization is not a viable option in any event.” It appears that Ms. West is suggesting that she would not oppose regarding homeschoolers as criminals?
While Ms. West’s views are far from the mainstream, it is still important to challenge the erroneous statements made in her article.
(Excerpt) Read more at hslda.org ...
My friends grandson is being home schooled. At 16, he’s smart but no clubs, no sports, no real idea of what’s out there....
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I bet Laura Ingram Wilder and nearly all of the children of my great grandparents generation had no clubs or sports either. Gee! It is amazing how they managed to survive a Great Depression and win WWII and build the Golden Gate Bridge.
Gee! How did they **do** it. No clubs or sports! Poor dears!
Tell me.
I was wondering when you would join the party.
http://www.hslda.org/about/history/lessons_hr6.asp
HR6 was a bill introduced into Congress to try to regulate homeschooling.
They woke a sleeping giant. The incoming calls shut down the Capitol switchboard for a couple days. The Congressmen were stunned by the response. It was the biggest response they had ever got to any proposed legislation in history and just blew them away. It was soundly defeated; a real victory for homeschoolers and homeschooling.
Funny thing is, I think that because at that time homeschooling just just really getting off the ground and growing quietly, nobody really had any idea what kind of movement it had really grown into. They likely thought that they had enough power to control it and failed to realize either the numbers involved, or the quality of the parents. Stereotypes (lies) aside, homeschoolers are not pushovers. People who are independent enough to buck the system as the earlier homeschoolers did, will not just roll over and play dead because some politician says so.
We are used to fighting for what we believe is right and it took a lot of intestinal fortitude to buck church, family, friends, the school district, etc, and do something so revolutionary.
We dealt with enough from our families until we produced the kids standardized test scores. That shut them up quickly enough.
They went up as well.
(Like you expected any other answer?)
Further in the article Ms. West lays out her reasons for strictly regulating homeschoolers. Her first charge is that homeschoolers could be abusing their children.
Gee, does she mean like the things that we read about that make the *Another Reason to Homeschool* ping list?
Does she seriously think that kids are safe from abuse by going to public schools? Or that public school parents don't abuse their kids?
If the kids are safe from abuse in public schools, why do they need to go to them to learn to fight the thugs they'll meet later in life?
So, in order for kids to be safe from abuse at home, they should be sent to public schools? What kind of rainbows and ponies world does she live in that public schools are better than home?
So, when the public schools fail to provide an minimal level of education, then what? Who regulates them?
To whom do you send them for remedial work? Home?
The dropout rate in some cities is greater than half and those that remain are barely literate, and she thinks that homeschooling is harming kids?
The assumption should be that parents love and care for the best interest of their children. That shows the messed up worldview of liberals. They assume that all parents are dangerous to their children.
Likely because they would be.
Projection reveals a lot about what a person is really thinking or what they’re really like.
“Wow do I feel humbled. I feel proud to make it through our school day and get dinner on the table. :)”
So do I! Her mother, or Supermom as I call her, is one of my dearest friends. If I told you about *her* activities and accomplishments, you’d feel even more so, as I always do when I am with her! She is really amazing. She grinds her own organic grain, and then makes not only her own bread, but also waffles, muffins, tortillas, etc., and then freezes it, so they always have homemade baked goods. She teaches yoga and spinning classes at the Y very early in the AM before her children get up and before her husband leaves for work. She runs a monthly support group for special needs parents, where she gets speakers for the parents to learn from, and therapists to keep the kids entertained and occupied while the parents attend. She and her husband are a team which helps train other couples at Marriage Encounter weekends. She does triathlons. She volunteers at church for several ministries. On top of all of that, she looks like a Barbie doll! And she is a sweetheart who is always second guessing whether she could be doing more. She is truly amazing! And it is clear that her daughter takes right after her, she is a very special and loveable kid.
Children in government schools **know** on some level that they **are** prisoners, and they are treated in many way like prisoners. They have no First Amendment Rights. It is the state that regiments their day and even tells them when to use the restroom and where, when, and what to eat. The chain linked PE areas look like prison exercise yards.
When a child ( who has committed no crime) rationally rebels he is treated like a Soviet work camp prisoner and sent to do hard time in a government building with tighter lock down ( “reform” school) or drugged with stupefying chemicals that rival the psychotropics given to Soviet dissidents in the old Iron Curtain psych wards.
The other state prisoners ( oops! “students”) manage the best they can by forming prison protection gangs ( “cliques”) and just zoning out.
They entered college at the ages of 13, 12, and 13. All finished the general college requirements and Calculus III by the age of 15. Two finished B.S. degrees in mathematics by the age of 18. One had a masters in math by 20.
The oldest has taken a different course. He has been a full-time athlete and part-time business student. He also worked ( as an older teen) for a few years for our church in Eastern Europe and is fluent in Russian. He will soon finish an MBA ( accounting) at an age that is typical for young adults.
I hate her! Lol!
We tried Saxon and we all hated it. I am not math minded so I needed a program that guided us through. We found Right Start Math which is very guided. It has helped us all to have a strong math foundation. Math finally makes sense to me. We will probably use VideoText for higher level. We had heard so many good things about Saxon math and that is why we tried it. It is a wonderful program though.
It does seem to make a difference. Our family is very mathematically minded and that may explain it. We used it because it went all the way through Calculus and Physics and we could use one curriculum and know that we didn't miss anything because of switching.
It helped me tremendously. Even though I had taken Calculus in college, there were still some areas of math that I was weak in. I got through calc with the help of a wonderful calc prof who helped me with enough of the math I was deficient in to get me through the course. As she was explaining the math to me, I couldn't believe how easy it really was. I asked her why they didn't make it this easy when I was in school.
Really, it seemed like those math teachers went out of their way to make it difficult.
It's even worse these days. I've seen the math curriculum that the schools are using. There's a popular one called *Everyday Math* that's just abominable that the schools seem to love.
Gone are the days of memorizing addition facts and multiplication tables, unless you get some rogue, old school teacher.
The thing that I really like about Right Start is that it is 95% comprehension and 5% rote memory. They don’t put pencil to paper until they understand how to do it in their heads. When introducing a new concept the students have to come up with their own formula for solving it before you introduce the easiest way to do it. It makes sure they understand what they are doing and that they haven’t just memorized a formula.
They do have them memorize all their facts which I like. I was never taught this in school. We don’t use flashcards though. We learn our facts through playing math games. We all enjoy them immensely.
To say the least, I no longer feel intimidated by math. I was terrified of it before I found this program.
I suspect that dad can take over for the self defense classes. What are you, a public screwl teacher?
Do you get all your phrasing from talk radio or just some of it?
Only by people ignorant about education and the powers and responsibilities granted the government by the Constitution, you know, liberals. This is all I can comment on because I couldn't read any farther. My head was about to explode.
[...head...exploding...]
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.