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Educating Our Children: The Evolution of Home Schooling
Fox News ^ | February 09, 2011

Posted on 02/09/2011 9:07:21 AM PST by Sopater

Anne Gebhardt’s kids are learning about geography -- in her dining room in Bedford, Texas. It’s not your typical schoolhouse, but it’s one that Gebhardt says is serving her six children well. "We can teach our religious values to our children freely,” says Gebhardt. “We can teach anything that we want."

Gebhardt is part of a growing trend. Across the county, an estimated 1.5 million children are home schooled and that number's growing. In the span of eight years, home schooling has grown nationally by almost 75 percent.

The reasons parents choose to home school vary. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, 36 percent of home schooled children stay at home for religious reasons.

Twenty one percent don't like the environment in traditional schools. Another 17 percent are home schooled because their parents are dissatisfied with the academic instruction that’s available to them in traditional schools.

(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: frhf; homeschooling; learning; teaching
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6 percent of home schooled children stay at home for religious reasons.

Twenty one percent don't like the environment in traditional schools. Another 17 percent are home schooled because their parents are dissatisfied with the academic instruction that’s available to them in traditional schools.

Or "D", All the above.

1 posted on 02/09/2011 9:07:26 AM PST by Sopater
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To: Sopater

bttt


2 posted on 02/09/2011 9:09:42 AM PST by Mrs. Don-o (Point of clarification.)
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To: Sopater

Gotta bump this DVD here, as well, as it is entirely apropos:

http://agendadocumentary.com

The left has an agenda. One of the primary action items is to homeschool or Christian school.


3 posted on 02/09/2011 9:12:35 AM PST by MrB (Tagline suspended for important announcement on my home page. Click my handle.)
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To: MrB

I read that and it didn’t sound right -

action item to COUNTER the left’s agenda!


4 posted on 02/09/2011 9:13:57 AM PST by MrB (Tagline suspended for important announcement on my home page. Click my handle.)
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To: Sopater

You can also take vacations whenever you like. (When the crowds are gone and costs are less.)

My husband’s business kept him from ever taking a summer vacation.

If we hadn’t homeschooled, we could never have had a family vacation together.


5 posted on 02/09/2011 9:14:00 AM PST by Mrs.Z
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To: Sopater

Given that public schools don’t teach geography anymore the only way that kids will learn that subject is at home.


6 posted on 02/09/2011 9:14:29 AM PST by MeganC (Soli Deo Gloria)
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To: metmom

ping


7 posted on 02/09/2011 9:15:51 AM PST by tutstar
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To: Sopater

Our two daughters were home schooled. The are both grown and on their own. Both started going to a junior college at 16 before they went on to Universities after that. All in all I endorse home schooling, only if the parents are committed.

With hindsight I can see today lots of positives to home schooling. The only thing I can say we would have done different if we had the opportunity to do it all over again is we would have plugged into a local home schooling group for social activities than we did and even some far out adventures most public school kids would never have the opportunity to do.

It is not that our daughters actually missed anything in the “social” realm. Rather, it is that for years they thought they did because everyone outside the homeschooling movement told them they were.

Now that they are both older they are much more appreciative of the skills gained from home schooling for self learning and inquiry compared to their their government schooled peers, and how such skills have made them more independent and self starting.


8 posted on 02/09/2011 9:22:28 AM PST by kimoajax (Rack'em & Stack'em)
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To: MrB

I agree that the left has homeschooling in it’s sights, and would absolutely love to abolish or control it. However, I can’t imagine that they would be successful with the growth of support in this country. It just seems to me that they’d have quite a fight on their hands.... kinda like the takeover of healthcare.


9 posted on 02/09/2011 9:23:10 AM PST by Sopater (...where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. - 2 COR 3:17b)
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To: MeganC
They don't teach penmanship, spelling or times tables either.

Granddaughter taught:...Unions are good because they were result of NYC fire that killed many women.

The German wall was called....????(she forgot)

But she knew about hippies

10 posted on 02/09/2011 9:27:17 AM PST by Sacajaweau
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To: Sopater

I really messed up that post.
The Agenda documentary is about how the left/communists are attempting to destroy our country by destroying our culture and indoctrinating our kids.

The first suggestion it made at the end, in order to counter this communist trend, is to home educate or at least send kids to private Christian schools.

Indeed, the left WILL have to “deal with” homeschoolers, because those avoiding government schools will see their agenda and be of a caliber capable of resisting it.

However, when they attempt to drag kids out of their homes and force them into government indoctrination, there will be a lot of dead government agents as a result. The proverbial Blood In The Streets.


11 posted on 02/09/2011 9:29:30 AM PST by MrB (Tagline suspended for important announcement on my home page. Click my handle.)
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To: MrB
...when they attempt to drag kids out of their homes and force them into government indoctrination, there will be a lot of dead government agents as a result.

You can bank on that.
12 posted on 02/09/2011 9:34:10 AM PST by Sopater (...where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. - 2 COR 3:17b)
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To: Sopater
An interesting study would be to determine the extent to which home schooling's improvement of the understanding of children of their nation's history has contributed to the Tea Party movement's phenomenal success.

As we know, for many decades, the government's school system certainly has not educated citizens in the founding ideas, so where did all the so-called "Tea Partiers" learn so much about the ideas of their Declaration of Independence and Constitution?

Clearly, many self-educated by using modern technology, but there was a core group of citizens who possessed enough understanding to be a catalyst for stimulating the minds of the millions who now are speaking out on behalf of their liberty.

Twenty years ago, Dr. Samuel Peavey, then Professor Emeritus of the University of Louisville's School of Education, was traveling the country testifying before State Legislatures on the merits of the home school movement. A Google search of Dr. Peavey's testimony in the late 1980's and early 1990's will reveal his enthusiasm for the achievements of home schoolers, and the learning performance of children they were educating.

Although Peavey had spent his life teaching teachers for positions in public education, he testified to that system's failure to properly improve the learning performance of children and stated that home schooling was "the brightest spot" in education at that time.

Fox's report is interesting, but the achievements of home schooling have been impacting this nation for at least a couple of decades now, and the political climate may just now be returning to that which the Founders intended in the beginning--"an enlightened citizenry"--one which can recognize "approaching tyranny" and preserve liberty for future generations.

13 posted on 02/09/2011 10:09:44 AM PST by loveliberty2
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To: Sacajaweau

Cursive writing is not at all taught anymore. If the power goes out we’ll have a population that will be unable to write. Spelling has gone out with the asinine ‘Look-Say’ BS, and multiplication tables are hated by teachers who think that ‘theory’ is more important than an accurate answer.

It’s also true that most of my education was of my own efforts. I lived in Sacramento and had teachers who could not tell the difference between the Golden Gate Bridge or the SF-Oakland Bay Bridge, I was once told that gold was discovered at Sutter’s Fort, and etc.


14 posted on 02/09/2011 10:35:49 AM PST by MeganC (Soli Deo Gloria)
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To: tutstar; 2Jedismom; 6amgelsmama; AAABEST; aberaussie; adopt4Christ; Aggie Mama; agrace; ...

HOMESCHOOL PING

This ping list is for articles of interest to homeschoolers. I hold both the Homeschool Ping List and the Another Reason to Homeschool Ping List. Please freepmail me to let me know if you would like to be added or removed from either list, or both.

The keyword for the FREE REPUBLIC HOMESCHOOLERS’ FORUM is frhf.


15 posted on 02/10/2011 7:41:30 AM PST by metmom (Welfare was never meant to be a career choice.)
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To: loveliberty2

This is why the left will have to “do something” about homeschoolers.

It’s not just that they’re learning “dangerous ideas”,
but the caliber of scholar produced far outpaces those that government schools produce (on purpose).

One thing they might do is to “channel” gov’t school kids that show promise and have the “right” ideology into special government schools, like “leadership academies”.


16 posted on 02/10/2011 7:50:05 AM PST by MrB (Tagline suspended for important announcement on my home page. Click my handle.)
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To: Sopater
They act like this is a brand new thing!! HA!!

We started HS'ing over 22 years ago...And there were lot's of others doing the same thing.

17 posted on 02/10/2011 8:01:59 AM PST by Osage Orange (MOLON LABE)
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To: MrB

Back in the days when it was illegal to teach blacks to read, there was homeschooling. It went on under the radar, and if it has to do so again, it will.


18 posted on 02/10/2011 8:06:07 AM PST by Oberon (Big Brutha Be Watchin'.)
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To: metmom

I would note that this article cites “1.5 million” homeschoolers while a recent study put the number at over 2 million - which number is almost certainly low, as it does not count underground/quiet homeschoolers, children too young to be officially schooled, and augmented-schoolers, ie, kids who are enrolled in public schools but whose parents use homeschool techniques and curriculumn nights and weekends to fix their education.


19 posted on 02/10/2011 8:28:55 AM PST by JenB
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To: Osage Orange

I started about 12 years ago, and didn’t know anyone doing it at the time. I thought I was a radical. However, since that time I meet people all the time who homeschool and many who have even been doing it much longer than me.


20 posted on 02/10/2011 8:43:08 AM PST by Sopater (...where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. - 2 COR 3:17b)
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