> Russ I have no doubt that both you and your wife are much
> more capable of teaching your children up through junior high
> than many teachers. What happens when they’re ready for the
> higher math and sciences?
What, an adult can’t learn new subjects? I never passed my college calculus, but you can bet when my kid hits fourteen and has mastered algebra and geometry and trig, I’ll be studying ahead of him and learning the calculus. And if I can’t, what’s stopping me from enrolling him in a college class for credit? I’ve got no problem with the higher education system, just the public elementary and secondary ones.
> Another question that arises about home schooling?
> Are home schooled children ready to step out of the glass
> house and into society with their much more hardened peers
> and compete easily in the real world?
> Learning to deal with assholes is tough if you’ve never
> learned how. I don’t have any kids, but all of us survived
> in public school and it didn’t kill us, it only made us
> tougher. Don’t you worry that you might be stunting their
> social growth?
That’s always trotted out when you mention home schooling, even South Park made an episode of it. But grade school and high school are the most non-realistic settings when compared to the real world. Where else in life are you segregated by age and forced to compete in social cliques like high school? When you go to work, how many jocks, stoners, goths, votards, and band fags are you making fun of or being picked on by?
Besides, it’s not like public school is the only place to gain social interaction. There’s little league, swim team, optimist football, gymnastics, as well as many volunteer and civic opportunites available for youth. Hell, when I was 12, I was in a genealogical society with a bunch of blue-haired old ladies, swim team with a bunch of youngsters of various ages, and little league where I most certainly didn’t belong (except one glorious day…) When I was 16 I was in college computer courses at NNC.
And yes, all of us survived public school, but we didn’t have any sort of special needs or glaring social defects. Would we have survived if we didn’t have the great parents (OK, good parents. OK, parents.) that we had? What if one of us was gay? Geez, one of my friends had to defend himself daily for just dyeing the bottom of his hair blonde, and he’s the straightest flute-playing male cheerleader I’ve ever known.
Other than the social aspects of public school, what about the educational? I see public school as something that holds back the potential of a child to the standards that apply to the median child. I was kicked up a grade from Kindergarten to 1st, which was a lifesaver because a year of learning A-B-C’s and fingerpainting at age five would have bored me to death and set a very negative tone to my initial opinion of education. Then, in 7th grade, after I placed 2nd in Nampa on the Iowa Tests my parents were offered to kick me up from 7th to 9th grade, but they were afraid of the “social ramifications”. Now, don’t get me wrong, y’all are a great bunch of guys, and according to my wife my high school experience totally rocked compared to most, but if I could’ve graduated by 15, I might be Doogie Howser by now. As it was, I never cracked a book in public school, made up three-week research assignments the night before, and treated schooltime with no respect, as it wasn’t the least-bit challenging. That sure came back to bite me in the ass when I did get to college with my lousy study habits and found out that, shucks, real learning is *hard*!
Of course, homeschooling is something I want to do for my kids, but I fear the reasons most people do it for their kids. Like the hypoChristians who teach their kids the Earth was created 6,006 years ago, evolution is a myth, that homosexuality is equatable to pedophilia, bestiality, and moral turpitude, and certain books and records need to be burned. But, if I want that right, I have to extend it to them as well.
“Radical” Russ — I don’t want my kid to have to deal with metal detectors, gang violence, drug dealing, math-teaching football coaches, harassment, low expectations, and school lunch just to get his education…
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