Yesterday, Matt Walsh reposted an article he had written on homeschool at The Blaze. He is very supportive of homeschool, but both the article and the usual acrimonious arguments following the article were pretty depressing. The arguments for and against both homeschool and government school followed the standard pattern. They included the socialization canard, arguments about homeschool versus government school academic performance, anecdotes about über homeschoolers who graduated from college years early and reclusive, uncivilized homeschool acquaintances incapable of functioning in society.
I have been in those kinds of discussions about homeschool. All homeschoolers have engaged in them. They always depress me. There are as many different kinds of homeschool styles as there are homeschool children. When someone argues about the relative merits of homeschool over other methods of schooling, I immediately want to know what kind of homeschool they have in mind when they are arguing. Our homeschool was very academically oriented with a focus on math, science and history. If the measure of a homeschool is academic performance in those areas, than we would probably be judged as having done pretty well.
Some homeschools are more oriented toward the arts or vocational training or any number of other foci. If judged with respect to those areas, we probably would not fare so well. We worked hard at music, art, literature and athletics. I would like to think we did an adequate job in those areas–probably pretty average. We did not work so hard on auto repair, welding, plumbing, construction and sewing. I know some homeschool kids who learned how to do those things extremely well and are gainfully employed as tradesmen who contribute greatly to society, but our kids were probably below average in those areas.
I also know personally of failed homeschools. The kids truly are unsocialized messes. Of course, we all know people in all of the categories I have described from government school, especially the unsocialized messes. I have decided I no longer want to engage in arguments about the kinds of homeschools about which I know very little. I know there are plenty of studies out there that purport to measure how well homeschools do in the areas of socialization and academics. I have bought into those studies in the past, but when I consider what I know about homeschool, I realize that I really only have in-depth knowledge about what we did in our homeschool. I know that worked for us way better than the government schools our kids attended for a couple of years, but that is all I know. I do not know whether what we did would work for anyone else.
On the other hand, I have seen the research that shows the government schools, as a whole, are an abysmal failure. There are very good alternatives, but there is no universal right answer on what is best for any given child. I do believe the one best suited to choose between the available good alternatives is almost always a caring parent. It should never be the government or a government worker who makes the decision except in extreme cases of abuse. Certainly the “professional educator” class (government school teachers and administrators) should not be involved in any of these kinds of decisions. As a whole, they seem to know less than anyone what is in the best educational interest of most children. There might be some cases where government school is best, but the parent should get to decide and I am not willing to second guess them.
Betty Blonde #190 – 04/08/2009
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Yep, people are usually surprised when this government school teacher says ” You have to do what is right for your family or child.” They are more surprised when I say “If I had children I would most likely home school them.” The past 5 years I have been working in a variety of Government Schools. There are some that are better than others obviously. I just don’t think I’d want my children exposed to what is going on in Government Schools. There are bad teachers, administrators, etc that make decisions about education that are frankly terrible. Then the “socialization” that is occurring is often quite scary. There are some things your 2nd grader doesn’t need to know. For example all the details of a “horror flick” they watched with their parents and much worse. I LOVE teaching and feel like I have an opportunity to give a lot of students a chance at being successful in life. Sometimes though… I think WHY AM I DOING THIS??? The reason I ask myself that has nothing to do with children. They are why I stick with it. Anyhow, I may just have to write a screenplay because who else has seen a child get stuck under the rocking chair in class and have to remove it, or read amazing tattle tales with crying “frowny faces” that say “Please move me I don’t want to sit next to that bossy girl anymore!!!
Trisha, this is exactly why you are my favorite government school teacher!