i graduated three years ago and let me tell you, what i learned in high school went way beyond the books. i learned street smarts. i would sit in school for 8 hours a day with all kinds of people (rich, poor, black, white, etc) learning anything and everything (good and bad) besides math and science. then when i would get out of school i would take what i learned and apply it to the real world as that what high school is trying to teach you besides the books. sure some days i would take something wrong i learned in school to the real world and i would eventually get in trouble, but that's exactly what i needed. it's teaching you how to get by in the world. the negative parts of it as just as beneficial as the positive parts, if not more. they teach you how to take a punch (realistically and figureatively) and it teaches you how to get up when you get knocked down. these types of experiences you just can't give a home schooled child really. i met quite a few kids that were home schooled growing up. they all just tended to be very timid and reserved. the type the would flinch for anything. that's because they don't get that negative experience in school that they desperately need. then when they get to the age where they're still home schooled, but old enough to drive around and interact with others they get into a hindering situation where they haven't seen that darker side of life and they just can't begin to cope with what's happening to them. just my 2 cents.

 

No two kids are exactly the same. Why be so black and white about this?

Vtec9s findings are specious. . . what you actually see is that once you get the class size to under 20 students, a certain amount of acceleration happens, under 15, even more. . . but under 10, it begins to plateau. There is one philosophy that many professional Educators (myself included) learn, but are NEVER allowed to utter.

That aside, homeschooling is no better than classroom schooling K-8. There are best practices for both, and worst practices for both. Either method will get you great successes, and absolute failures.

In the secondary realm, there is rarely a substitute for a good professional Educator in the secondary subjects, especially if the student is already a solid scholastic performer.

Once again, parental involvement and correct assessment are the primary keys to successful schooling, regardless of environment.

 

THAT was pathetic. "im not gonna tell you what i know. go look for it yourself." if you have something to say, say it. if you're all facade, then keep saying what you said.

 

He said it. You didn't accept it. What more do you want? You disagree and he's not going to spell it all out for you with notations and credits...

 

. . . and 8x10 color, glossy photographs with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explaining . . . .

 

The biggest problem with home schooling is the only girl you can take to the dance is your sister.

 

I think Saki pretty much sealed the casket for homeschooling.

 

My kids are 26 and 23. I home schooled the older for 4th grade, and part of 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th. She choose the subjects she thought her teachers taught well and I taught her the others. I started teaching her in the 4th grade because she was barely reading. At the end of 4th grade she was up to grade level. She is a reserved person and we all thought the socialization was important so she spent at least 1 hour a day at school. In high school she went full time, except when she took classes at the local JC instead of the high school classes. She finished 2 years of college and then decided to just start working. She is happily married, and is still fairly reserved.

I was afraid learning disabilities (really different learning styles) might run in families, so I taught my son from first grade. I didn't want him to have the problems his sister had. He took to reading very well. By the end of first grade he was reading at the 6th grade level. He didn't want to go to school. He had neighborhood friends, played on sports teams and had a happy go lucky personality, so he was totally home schooled until he went to public school in 6th grade. He loved school, he had a great teacher, he met kids from many cultures. He was very excited about going the Jr High and getting to change classes. It was a disaster.
He had the witch from hell for 4 periods! She flunked him in 3 of the 4 classes. I got the school to move him to a different teacher for one class and thats the best they would do. He demanded we do something more, so I and his grandmother home schooled him except for PE which he took at the Jr High and math which he took at the highschool through the rest of 7th and 8th grades. He went totally to the public highschool except for a few classes he took at the JC. He has just graduated from UC Davis and is working parttime and looking for a career job. He has lots of friends and gets along with people of all ages and cultures.

I'd say that homeschooling worked very well for my kids. Most kids could benefit from a judicious addition of temporary or part time homeschooling in addition to public or private school. While I was homeschooling my kids, I got friendly with some other local homeschoolers, with kids the same ages. Homeschooling is more common with special needs kids. Some examples: blindness, attention deficit disorder, learning disabilities, high IQ, extreme ability in one area. Many people have trouble in 7th and 8th grades. This is a crucial time, in a person's development. Our local Jr. High certainly did a bad job dealing with these children, so the number of homeschoolers almost doubled in that age-range.

 

what exactly did he say, guys? its like some of you never left grade school.

 

^
I'm gonna assume you mean Kerry. What he said seemed pretty clear to me.

To measure success, we need some sort of representative, in his case money. Most successful people I know, have at the minimum, a high-school education. Now I'm not talking absurdly rich people, but management types. To be a good manager/boss you have to know how to deal with people and high-school teaches you how to deal with people and everything that comes along with it, at a very basic level. If you've been sheltered you're whole life and are unaware of how the real world works, how can you expect to survive in it?

You can teach a person mathematics and grammar, but you can't teach a person how to interact with other people. I dunno whether or not high-school interactions are essential to a person's development, but I'm willing to bet they're pretty helpful.

I still remember the first time I rounded 3rd base and was headed home...