Why do uneducated people homeschool?
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Anonymous
Furthermore, any group labeled like that is going to tap into a disgruntled population. You can find haters of a public school system, haters of their private school experience. There is typically a more global, nuanced picture. I teach at a research university and was never homeschooled, and my children are in public school. I have students who were homeschooled (some for a few years, some until college). Some of these students are the best “outside the box” thinkers and problem solvers. It’s definitely given me pause. I’m sure there are some train wreck homeschooling families, but I’ve also had my share of unprepared, poorly adjusted students who attended regular high schools. |
Anonymous
Tim Tebow left college with a bachelor's degree, which is more than can be said of most elite football players. |
Anonymous
(I have not read any of the other posts in this thread.) The primary reason that people homeschool their children is to maintain control. A secondary reason is fear of what their children will be taught in a public school. |
Anonymous
To be clear, my quoted response is not limited to "uneducated people" as even educated folks have fears, concerns, and issues--some of which are reasonable and some of which may not appear to be reasonable. |
Anonymous
Actually there are hundreds of reasons people choose to educate their kids at home. I tutor homeschool kids in the dmv and the families I've worked with homeschool: Primarily to provide an excellent education for their kids. Secondarily to extend the length of their children's childhood. Ex., My nephews, who attend public school learned about oral sex on the school bus. Nephews were 6 and 8, the kids showing sex videos on their phone to the young kids were in 5th grade. |
Anonymous
To you, perhaps. |
Anonymous
Is it possible they are merely homeschooling elementary aged kids? I'm sure they can handle that material with a high school diploma. |
Anonymous
All the homeschoolers I know (in the DMV, and they are a pretty well educated group of people so not comparable to what OP is talking about) did it for very child-specific reasons. Usually it's that there is something about the child that is not being well-served by the schools, or can't be well-served by the schools. Like we know one kid who is a virtuosic musician and has had opportunities to perform and study on their chosen instrument but it's not compatible with public school. They home school so he can do thinks like a 6 week intensive in a foreign country in the middle of the spring semester if he wants. I know another family that chose to home school because their early elementary kid was socially immature and academically advanced, a problem that was compounded by Covid closures. As other kids returned to school and settle quickly back into their social environment, their child developed serious anxiety and regressions. At the same time, she was testing several grade levels above her peer group and was doing pull outs for multiple subjects to higher grades, which didn't help with the social issues at all. Moving to home school actually helps their kid socialize more because they are part of a homeschool collective and the environment is smaller and more approachable than a large public elementary school, and since everyone is on a slightly customized curriculum, there is less concern about needing to be in lock-step with same-age peers. It sounds like it's a good solution in their case. And there are others. I'd say the main goal of these families was to find flexibility, not control. I don't know anyone who feared what their kids were learning in public school, though some families do worry that their kids aren't getting enough of certain things (outdoor time, arts education, writing practice, etc.). |
Anonymous
Clicked on the Homeschooling thread by mistake, but fascinated by this specific question. Why is it that so many of the well-educated folks that homeschool their kids are unable to grasp the theme of this thread? The OP specifically wanted to know why parents that only finished HS decide to homeschool their kids. She understands why highly educated parents (who ostensibly are qualified) might decide to homeschool their kids. We all read the stories of the kids that are homeschooled (usually by highly educated, PhD parents or equivalent) and win the Scripps Spelling Bee and attend Harvard. However, I have a sister who completed one semester of college, became a religious fanatic and homeschooled her kids. Their outcomes, and as far as I can tell when hearing about their homeschool peer group, have been TERRIBLE. She is in the South, so don't know if there are any standards in the DMV area for homeschoolers. She homeschooled for religious/morality reasons (to answer the OP's question) but honestly didn't have training or patience for it. |
Anonymous
Why is it so hard to grasp that teaching an elementary kid (or a few) at home is completely different than teaching an AP high schooler? Nobody needs more than a high school education to teach elementary kids. At least that’s the case if you graduated long enough ago that a high school education actually meant something. At the high school level, most homeschooling parents, and certainly most of the less well educated homeschooling parents, use co ops and private tutoring for the difficult subjects. There are really just a few religious nuts here or there who insist on educating their kids themselves even though they don’t know the material well enough. Personally, I’ve never met one of those, and I know quite a few homeschoolers. |
Anonymous
| the bigger challenge I've seen for homeschooling, especially with smaller kids, is parent temperament (especially for certain kids). A lot of parents who homeschool and don't have great outcomes, it doesn't seem to be an issue of parent education but parent temperament, especially if the child isn't naturally the hyper-focused studious kid type. |
Anonymous
| Many homeschoolers use curriculum and lessons that they buy that are aligned with what is typical at each grade level. Not only can parents who have no college use these materials to teach their kids many kids can move through it on their own with minimal supervision. Many homeschoolers want to control the environment, peer group, opportunity for outdoor activities and opportunity to focus on particular topics for longer periods of time, etc. |
Anonymous
| Because they’re bigots. |
Anonymous
What an absurd overreaction. |
Anonymous
Public school children don’t need to show mastery in coding. |