Posted in Homeschooling
The reasons to homeschool are as varied as homeschoolers themselves. The most popular reasons seem to be rooted out of the social experience within the public school system. In fact, it could be said that the modern homeschooling movement would not exist if it werent for the deplorable social conditions within the public schools.
Take bullying for example. It is a problem that has plagued public schools almost since the inception. The strong prey upon the weak. It happens naturally when you have a plurality of students with little supervision from teachers or parents. Teachers--and parents--cannot be in every location at every time, but there are some foundational differences that give parents the advantage in combating bullying and other social problems.
First, theres the ratio. Frequently, the ratio of students to teachers is between 20 to 1 and 40 to 1. Parents of even the largest families have approximately half that ratio, between 8 to 1 and 12 to 1. It is unreasonable to expect any adult to manage more than seven children at a given time. Yet, quadruple the load and you have a good, small class size. This is the only way schools are able to economically function. Give one teacher seven students, and, if the teachers any good, those students will beat the national average every time.
Second, parents have more of an opportunity to manage their kids. They manage their kids bedtime, what they eat, what clothes they wear, and even what toys they play with. That is their job as parents. The trouble comes when parents are forced to share their responsibilities with a teacher. The child, for one, now has to distinguish between two different parenting styles. The differences can be mild or severe, and this puts stress on the child. Likewise, the parent must manage expectations in light of the fact that they are not the only authoritative voice in their childs life. For example, it is difficult for an authoritative parent to manage their child when their teacher is permissive. Conversely, a permissive parent may have to provide more direction than usual if their childs teacher is more authoritative. This is unlikely, but possible.
For these reasons, its plain to see that schools are a compromise. They give rise to all sorts of complications too. A child who needs extra love and attention is unlikely to find it in a classroom, regardless of the teachers intentions. Additionally, the morality taught in the classroom is guaranteed not to match up with the morality taught at home. For example, in contrast to my conservative Christian upbringing at home, I learned to tell a white lie in first grade. Christians teach that all lies are wrong, even the white ones.
Homeschooling is one clear solution to these problems. By it, we remove the disparity between parent and teacher. Additionally, we remove the unrealistic burden of supervising 40 children from the teacher. A friend and longtime homeschooler told me just this summer that the bulk of what teachers are taught in college is crowd control. They are training for the impossible task of managing 20 to 40 children. Its time to realize that regardless of technique, class-based schooling is a painful failure and that regardless of what laws are passed, some children are left behind. Children are wounded in this experiment of modern schooling. More and more parents are waking up to this fact, and some of them are actually doing something about it.
Rethinking Our Reasons To Homeschool, Part I, Part III, Part IV
Take bullying for example. It is a problem that has plagued public schools almost since the inception. The strong prey upon the weak. It happens naturally when you have a plurality of students with little supervision from teachers or parents. Teachers--and parents--cannot be in every location at every time, but there are some foundational differences that give parents the advantage in combating bullying and other social problems.
First, theres the ratio. Frequently, the ratio of students to teachers is between 20 to 1 and 40 to 1. Parents of even the largest families have approximately half that ratio, between 8 to 1 and 12 to 1. It is unreasonable to expect any adult to manage more than seven children at a given time. Yet, quadruple the load and you have a good, small class size. This is the only way schools are able to economically function. Give one teacher seven students, and, if the teachers any good, those students will beat the national average every time.
Second, parents have more of an opportunity to manage their kids. They manage their kids bedtime, what they eat, what clothes they wear, and even what toys they play with. That is their job as parents. The trouble comes when parents are forced to share their responsibilities with a teacher. The child, for one, now has to distinguish between two different parenting styles. The differences can be mild or severe, and this puts stress on the child. Likewise, the parent must manage expectations in light of the fact that they are not the only authoritative voice in their childs life. For example, it is difficult for an authoritative parent to manage their child when their teacher is permissive. Conversely, a permissive parent may have to provide more direction than usual if their childs teacher is more authoritative. This is unlikely, but possible.
For these reasons, its plain to see that schools are a compromise. They give rise to all sorts of complications too. A child who needs extra love and attention is unlikely to find it in a classroom, regardless of the teachers intentions. Additionally, the morality taught in the classroom is guaranteed not to match up with the morality taught at home. For example, in contrast to my conservative Christian upbringing at home, I learned to tell a white lie in first grade. Christians teach that all lies are wrong, even the white ones.
Homeschooling is one clear solution to these problems. By it, we remove the disparity between parent and teacher. Additionally, we remove the unrealistic burden of supervising 40 children from the teacher. A friend and longtime homeschooler told me just this summer that the bulk of what teachers are taught in college is crowd control. They are training for the impossible task of managing 20 to 40 children. Its time to realize that regardless of technique, class-based schooling is a painful failure and that regardless of what laws are passed, some children are left behind. Children are wounded in this experiment of modern schooling. More and more parents are waking up to this fact, and some of them are actually doing something about it.
Rethinking Our Reasons To Homeschool, Part I, Part III, Part IV
Posted by Green Darner
