From: Mischa_Sandberg@mindlink.bc.ca (Mischa Sandberg)
Newsgroups: misc.education
Subject: Re: Homeschooling as abuse: a rebuttal
Date: 17 Apr 92 04:56:30 GMT
Article-I.D.: mindlink.11476
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada

> Al Jagnow writes:
> 
> Personal Opinion:
> Parents who indulge in 'homeschooling' are guilty of child abuse.
> Very rarely are they qualified to teach. Even more infrequently can they
> provide an education that comes close to what is provided in public schools.
> (I'll admit to a bias here - Iowa schools are better than average.)
> The real reasons for home schooling seem to be racism, religous bigotry, or
> laziness on the part of the parents. (they want the children at home to act
> as
> their slaves)
> Disclaimer: This has been a personal opinion. Flames will be ignored.


Not flames, but an answer based on personal experience, experience
with parents and children of thirty local homeschooling families,
and reflection on the questions and stories related on the home ed.
mailing list.

I have yet to meet a homeschooling family where any consideration
entered into the decision to homeschool, other than what would give
the children the best chance at self-motivated, self-aware life
with a life-long love for learning. I'll take you anecdotal experiences
regarding slavery, delinquency and attempted suicide into count
for the future; and though such things might occur among children
institutionalized in schools, I would take that as a sign for high
alarm if it was documented for homeschooled children, as would
any of the other parents I know.

Regarding the acceptability of homeschoolers' educational skills:
the admissions office of Harvard University has expressed an active
interest in homeschoolers as consistently more functional university
students. My children are only 5 and 8; but my wife and I have
inquired at the two local universities and a local college, which
have all stated that homeschoolers are welcome; two of the oldest
kids in our group are currently attending university and college now.

I don't know what is a necessary qualification for slinging burgers.
I hope my kids never think in terms of having to rise to that level.
With a bit of providence (small-p providence; our family is devoutly
secular humanist :-) they'll carve their own careers or businesses
in what interests them. It's been done before.

I cannot speak for everyone in the homeschooling movement; its
diversity is its strength. I do know people who homeschool for
religious and/or moral reasons, as well as those whose kids have
been really burnt by petty sadists, or by systems and curricula
that put into force some pretty dim assumptions about the uniformity
of human beings. But I have yet to meet a homeschooler who did not
think it was important for kids to have contact with people of
all ages --- adults from whom there may be something to learn
(for better or for worse, sometimes), peers with shared experience,
youngers who can learn from them and teach them in turn to take
pride in helping others. Schools are the antithesis of this.

As for your statement regarding homeschoolers' delusions about
doing in twenty minutes or two hours what it takes day-long
repetition to do in a school: my own experience runs right
against this. There's nothing like a *motivated* child when it comes
to soaking up something. My daughter thinks that mathematics is
*fun*, because it is always a game. Negative numbers are funny,
fractions are like Tinker Toys, and complex boolean statements
are a way to trick me into agreeing to something when I think I'm
objecting to it. Yes, both my daughters do "exercise books";
we make them available, and they approach what other kids might have
forced on them for homework, as you might approach doing crosswords.
There is no dearth of good material to help homeschooling along.

So, I am indeed sorry that the only homeschoolers that you've had
exposure to, and it's not clear from your posting as to whether
that's first-hand, were the sorriest cases I've ever heard of.
I can't believe you'll take my opinions as unbiased; I would
only hope to convince you that, believing as I do that diversity
is strength in any open system, that I would not attempt to
actively convince others to try homeschooling. It's not for
everyone. But as one option for producing sane and well-educated
contributing citizens, it has a proven track record, and it deserves
a chance to exist with a little less harassment than it now receives.
--
Mischa Sandberg ... Mischa_Sandberg@mindlink.bc.ca
                 or uunet!van-bc!rsoft!mindlink!Mischa_Sandberg
*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*
Engineers think equations are an approximation of reality.
Physicists think reality is an approximation of the equations.
Mathematicians never make the connection.