TreeChild said:
I guess I never really LIVED. Maybe my parents just didn't love me enough.
<sniff>
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Home Schooling any thoughts???
- Thread starter jady
- Start date
I guess I never really LIVED. Maybe my parents just didn't love me enough.
<sniff>
TreeChild said:
Hmm... There is a reason for childhood. To me it seems like you wanted to rush through your childhood. I don't know why, maybe you didn't like it. I could be wrong.
TreeChild said:
I wasn't homeschooled and I lived.
Kinda funny how this thread doesn't deal with what's best for the original posters' kid and instead deals with preconceived generalizations.
Jady's child could very well flourish in either situation, depending on his individual make up, rather than fall victim to some of the mind numbing broad brush assumptions in evidence here.
IMHO, of course.....
Jady's child could very well flourish in either situation, depending on his individual make up, rather than fall victim to some of the mind numbing broad brush assumptions in evidence here.
IMHO, of course.....
In my opinion, a child's education always deals with a specific situation.Joshua said:Well put, and apologies for not noting that the thread was about a specific situation (I was responding to other posters more than the original).
I suppose from my posts however, Jady can tell what my advice might be.
Except in Public School debates on internet forums....
I dunno, this thread seems to be a great example of negative social interaction in a large population.Joshua said:
I probably complained when I was in public high school, too. Maybe some day your friends will have the same recollections that I do.TreeChild said:
Wow, insert can, twist to get worms.......I had no idea this was such a hotbed topic. I really appreciate all of your advice on this. My concerns have been validated here but I have also been shown that there are good paths around the problems I see.
I am concerned about my son and 2 daughters missing out on certain experiences I fondly remember form high school (school spirit, FB games, general goofing off, and oh yeah, lots of hot chicks my own age). I am also concerned about the shoddy state of schools in Modesto and Cali in general.
I am thankful to everyone here who has chimed in, thats the awesome thing about TB. Everyone cares about eveyone elses actual life outside of bass playing, kudos and blessings to you all!!!!!!
I am concerned about my son and 2 daughters missing out on certain experiences I fondly remember form high school (school spirit, FB games, general goofing off, and oh yeah, lots of hot chicks my own age). I am also concerned about the shoddy state of schools in Modesto and Cali in general.
I am thankful to everyone here who has chimed in, thats the awesome thing about TB. Everyone cares about eveyone elses actual life outside of bass playing, kudos and blessings to you all!!!!!!
Geoff St. Germaine
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Like anything, whether home schooling is good or not is going to come down to the individual case, just as it will with public or private schooling. I've seen it repeatedly claimed that home schooled children score higher on SATs than public schooled children. I'd like to see those statistics corrected for parental involvement in education, that is, whether or not the public schooled childrens parents bothered to ensure that their child was progressing properly or even if they cared at all.
When I was in elementary school my parents would always get a list of my tests and from time to time would take my notes/books and quiz me on material for upcoming tests. If it was obvious that I hadn't paid attention in class then I wouldn't be going to Clarke's to play pool or kick the can that night.
I will not home school my children, however, I intend to be very involved in their education and keep track of what they are learning.
When I was in elementary school my parents would always get a list of my tests and from time to time would take my notes/books and quiz me on material for upcoming tests. If it was obvious that I hadn't paid attention in class then I wouldn't be going to Clarke's to play pool or kick the can that night.
I will not home school my children, however, I intend to be very involved in their education and keep track of what they are learning.
There are some HORRIBLE educators out there, and even worse, some horrible curriculums. They'd rather teach sex ed in kindergarten than to teach your kid to read. My son is a bright kid but they never taught him phonics. They taught him that new-fangled word recognition. Instead of being able to dissect and figure out how to pronounce and spell words like I was, kids might recognize 'bat' and not have any idea about the word 'cat.' This isn't China, we don't need to memorize thousands of words as symbols. They don't get multiplication tables drilled into them, and gone are the days of writing your spelling words 10x each, and writing the ones you miss on the test 25x each. We had to buy the Hooked On Phonics set and help him ourselves.
In ten years or so, some Elementary Ed professor will 'rediscover' phonics and start teaching it as a new way to learn to read to all of the undergrads, and it will come back around in a cycle.
Some schools are little more than juvenile detention camps, and teachers are reduced to being wardens. Failure is assumed (bigotry of low expectations).
Unfortunately, the teachers' unions in the US tend to protect the weak and incompetent teachers. I have experience with this. My mom, dad, sister and uncle are or have been teachers. My dad was the one who got you excited to learn. My uncle should have been fired a long time ago, but they couldn't get rid of him because of the unions. And they all work in an environment that nowadays makes it difficult, if not impossible, for the kids to learn. I am all for teacher skill assessment and making sure they are teaching the kids. Teachers complain, but hey, if I don't do my job... no matter how difficult it is... I get fired. If you're a manager and you can't get your people motivated, you're fired. You work with the cards you've been dealt.
If you don't have decent schools around and can't afford private schools, and you have the self-discipline to follow through and make sure that your kid is well-educated AND gets the socialization he needs, then go for it. I believe that your kid should be allowed to join school sports teams and such since you will still pay taxes to the school (for a service you're not using, no less) but you'll have to check into it.
We considered home-schooling after seeing how pathetically the school was teaching our son (and we are considered to live in a good school district) but realized that it wasn't for us. It can be done properly and be an asset to your child if you do it properly, but you have to follow through in all aspects; it's a tough job.
In ten years or so, some Elementary Ed professor will 'rediscover' phonics and start teaching it as a new way to learn to read to all of the undergrads, and it will come back around in a cycle.
Some schools are little more than juvenile detention camps, and teachers are reduced to being wardens. Failure is assumed (bigotry of low expectations).
Unfortunately, the teachers' unions in the US tend to protect the weak and incompetent teachers. I have experience with this. My mom, dad, sister and uncle are or have been teachers. My dad was the one who got you excited to learn. My uncle should have been fired a long time ago, but they couldn't get rid of him because of the unions. And they all work in an environment that nowadays makes it difficult, if not impossible, for the kids to learn. I am all for teacher skill assessment and making sure they are teaching the kids. Teachers complain, but hey, if I don't do my job... no matter how difficult it is... I get fired. If you're a manager and you can't get your people motivated, you're fired. You work with the cards you've been dealt.
If you don't have decent schools around and can't afford private schools, and you have the self-discipline to follow through and make sure that your kid is well-educated AND gets the socialization he needs, then go for it. I believe that your kid should be allowed to join school sports teams and such since you will still pay taxes to the school (for a service you're not using, no less) but you'll have to check into it.
We considered home-schooling after seeing how pathetically the school was teaching our son (and we are considered to live in a good school district) but realized that it wasn't for us. It can be done properly and be an asset to your child if you do it properly, but you have to follow through in all aspects; it's a tough job.
Diggler said:
Got link? I'm curious as to which schools give sex education priority over learning to read in kindergarten. Seems like a risky proposition to me, given the propensity of people to sue the public schools.
Best of luck, jady. That's got to be one of the biggest decisions you've ever had to make with regards to your children. Whatever you choose, at least you are getting involved and trying to do the best you can for your kids. That's worth a whole lot in my book.
jady said:
Is the solution to all of these problems to find a couple of similar minded parents down the block and set up a pool-home school where you each take the three kids of a couple of days each week?
You get peers (both you and the kids!), differnt opinions and strenths (I can teach maths no problem, but languages are a non-starter!), you can't play favourites to your own kid, and best of all YOU GET DAYS OFF!
Ian
Diggler said:
According to the article, the district was "debating" the plan. Did they actually put it into practice?
More disturbing to me is the additional information in the article that two elementary school students got pregnant. ***?
Maybe they do need to start sex ed earlier. Somehow I still doubt it receives priority over teaching kids how to read.
BartmanPDX said:I guess I never really LIVED. Maybe my parents just didn't love me enough.
<sniff>
I love you Bart!!!
Wanna come over and do seom Algebra?
To the OP:
As bad as schools are in that area (I know) as long as you suplement their education and engage them you'll be doing great.
You also have to consider why schools in that area are so bad. It could be financial, too many kids, second language students, poverty, etc... then you have to consider what is going on in all these children's outside lives that contributes to their poor schooling.
Best of luck to you. I would solicit the advice of a teacher you respect or can level with.
As bad as schools are in that area (I know) as long as you suplement their education and engage them you'll be doing great.
You also have to consider why schools in that area are so bad. It could be financial, too many kids, second language students, poverty, etc... then you have to consider what is going on in all these children's outside lives that contributes to their poor schooling.
Best of luck to you. I would solicit the advice of a teacher you respect or can level with.
Joshua said:Again, I disagree. A spirited discussion? Absolutely. But not even close to the adversity one has to learn to face in the real world.
An ironic difference of opinion given the subject matter...
By the way, when I was home for lunch just now I told my daughter that I wasn't a good enough educator to teach her kindergarten-level skills. She looked at me funny and went off to read a book.
As for the test scores thing, you have to think of a few other things. First, considering all home schoolers and all kids in public schools (if you could get such a statistic...), kids who are in a lower socio-economic group tend to have lower test scores, no? I think if your data was say, 5000 homeschoolers and 5000 public schoolers from the same socio-economic group, the scores would be pretty close.
And although a parent is going to be perfectly qualified to teach to a certain point, it gets a little more complex in high school. I've done advanced calculus, advanced physics, some intense music programs, and journalism stuff. I wouldn't be comfortable with my parents trying to teach that, they simply aren't qualified. They'd be as much teaching themselves as teaching me, and that isn't the best situation.
I thank public schooling for giving me the opportunity to get other peoples opinions and making me a lot more tolerant and free thinking. 'Course, if I was being homeschooled, I'd be forced into one of those super religious programs that preach more than they teach. That's not even an exaggeration, my mom is forcing me to do a homeschooled english curriculum by this Seton company, and as well as being stupid busywork (Most of what I've done so far is bs'ed interpretations of ambiguous, 900 year old english poetry) it's completely religiously biased. It basically says that in pre-norman-invasion england, everyone was happy because they were Catholic and its only when people stopped believing so much in God that bad things happened.
Yeahhhh.
Don't worry, I already have more faith (HAH! UNINTENTIONAL PUN!) in you doing homeschooling than in these radicals around here. But I'm incredibly biased against it, I'll admit, from the flavor of homeschooling I've been around.
And although a parent is going to be perfectly qualified to teach to a certain point, it gets a little more complex in high school. I've done advanced calculus, advanced physics, some intense music programs, and journalism stuff. I wouldn't be comfortable with my parents trying to teach that, they simply aren't qualified. They'd be as much teaching themselves as teaching me, and that isn't the best situation.
I thank public schooling for giving me the opportunity to get other peoples opinions and making me a lot more tolerant and free thinking. 'Course, if I was being homeschooled, I'd be forced into one of those super religious programs that preach more than they teach. That's not even an exaggeration, my mom is forcing me to do a homeschooled english curriculum by this Seton company, and as well as being stupid busywork (Most of what I've done so far is bs'ed interpretations of ambiguous, 900 year old english poetry) it's completely religiously biased. It basically says that in pre-norman-invasion england, everyone was happy because they were Catholic and its only when people stopped believing so much in God that bad things happened.
Yeahhhh.
Don't worry, I already have more faith (HAH! UNINTENTIONAL PUN!) in you doing homeschooling than in these radicals around here. But I'm incredibly biased against it, I'll admit, from the flavor of homeschooling I've been around.
