home schooling questions

Let me first say that I'm not trying to start a fight or offend anyone, I've asked this before in other forums and never really gotten an answer.

A little background, my wife teaches in the public school system in Texas, I'm a civil engineer. Before we had kids we talked about homeschooling. I felt very confident that my wife with her degree in elementary education could handle all teaching assignments up to middle school. In middle school I could help with the math and science, and we'd probably be good. However, we both agreed that while there were certain subjects we could teach at a high school level (math and physics for me, history and geography for her) there were just to many areas we aren't qualified to teach at that level.

Then our oldest son was born with Aspergers syndrome, and homeschooling would be about the very worst thing we could do for him, so all the discussion was pointless anyway.

So, here's my questions.
What makes you qualified to teach your kids? To what level and what subjects are you competent in.

I ask this because several of our friends homeschool, and, I can honestly say that 2 of the 3 couples I know very well are not well educated, and have horrid english and mathematics skills.

They often answer, "there our kids, we know them best" which honestly seems like either a cop out or an incredibly poorly thought out reason. You know your kid best, great! Do you do there dental work? What if they need an appendix removed? Why do you trust there education to someone with no training, but not there health care?

 

What makes me qualified! It is obvious that you are trying to start an argument. I would rather not get into it with your high intellect. What makes me qualified! Maybe if you came down off your high horse and talked to your two friends, you might get a better answer, but I can tell from your post that is not going to happen. What makes me qualified! What do you think they are teaching our students in school today, anyway? What makes me qualified! I will leave with this one thought. Teach a child the love to read and you have given them the world.

 

It's like Peggy Hill said about piano lessons- I just have to stay one lesson in front of the students.

I don't know. I don't feel qualified to teach my kids and I have a BS degree. Of course, most of it is like riding a bike. It just takes a bit to recall.

Wish I had an answer for you.

What I can tell you is this- home schooled students DO develop better study habits. Text books teach themselves IMHO. Public school teachers simply teach what's in the text book anyway (for the most part*).

The part I am uncertain about is interaction with other kids. That is typically overcome by joining clubs, church groups, or other outlets.

 

My wife and i both teach ... just at different levels... both of us have one or more graduate degrees... we believe that home schooling is something that everyone has to do ... especially when your child attends public schools...

The no child left untested educational process teaches the three R's... read remember and regurgitate... minimal critical thinking skills, and advanced learning techniques. Current classrooms are "dumbed" down to teach at the lowest common level possible... i'm fortunate all of my kids were tested at ther top end of the scale and were reading by four years of age...

Our home schooling included books for them to read, field trips to learn additional information not provided in the classroom, including them in conversations on politics when they grew interested, Museums, zoos, church activities, appropiate social activities, dance martial arts, swimming, hunting, taking care of pets and livestock... true we were not the only teachers in their lives and our version of home schooling is not followed by everyone.. but i have one at who has been accepted to Harvard graduate school, one at UNC , and one in the military in the Special forces... all work and are happy... i could not ask for more...

 

I have no dog in this fight except my local county taxes, and that portion of federal tax dollars that are spent on education. I was pretty much neutral on this whole thing until I became aware that a fellow prepper, a man I respect and converse with regularly, was home schooling his 3 children. We discussed it, along with our own experiences with the public school system, and how it had failed us, and I became a convert.
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The NEA is the largest Union in the Nation. FACT! They do a real crappy job when it comes to policing their own. They have all this monumental clout and yet they fully support the worst of the worst when it comes to teachers equally along with those outstanding teachers of the ilk of those who stand out from our own experiences as the best most rare individuals on the face of the Earth. I can count those teachers from my past on part of one hand. There have been main stream media revelations of teachers who have done outragious crimes and are awaiting trial, after arrest, and yet they continue to draw pay and cannot be dismissed until convicted. Yes, I know innocent until convicted. These teachers and others who are misfits who haven't actually committed a crime they can be charged with, yet obviously they have no business teaching children, .... are so well protected by the NEA, and feared by the local school boards, that they come to school and go to a room where they while away the day doing anything that entertains them in isolation while they draw a full paycheck.
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Some school systems have excellent systems in place where students and teachers and the administrators are all working in sync efficiently. Exceptional students are identified and encouraged to participate in advanced programs that allow them to excell and not be bored out of their minds by an average teaching program. They have remedial teaching programs and one on one tutoring for student who are having problems keeping up on an average level. They have general studies for the rest. Teachers are hand picked for the advanced and remedial studies as well. All teachers are evaluated and sub-performers are encouraged to seek employment elsewhere. In my area, both the very liberal city of Gainesville and the very conservative rural Gilchrist county have school systems that meet these standards. It pleases and amazes me.
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I am no fan of big Unions. (again, that is another issue for a different thread or a PM).

I am no fan of big government. (think, Constitutionalist ... another issue).
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I understand your premise that poorly educated parents may not be a good choice for home schooling. In Gainesville or Gilchrist county I probably would encourage such parents to make use of the public school system. As they say, "It's all about the best interests of the children".but, playing devils advocate, I have to say that there is State manditory testing for home schooled children in Florida. If the parents aren't capable of providing what the state considers minimal acceptable teaching for their children, they can lose the right to home school.
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There was a post here recently about the Public school system of Detroit Michagan where on a per student basis they are receiving $11,000 dollars per student to attempt to teach them. That's $2,000 more than the National average. Their graduation rate is 25%.
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In a situation like Detroit, if the marginal home schooling parents were friends of mine, I would try to get close enough to the situation to offer assistance and encouragement to steer them to online programs and a monitored, structured teaching style that would benefit the children.

 

I really tried to ask a legitimate question as non offensively as i could. I have talked to my friends about this on several occasions. Right now both of them only have very young children, so I could see where they could do an acceptable job. I asked them when they were going to either need to re-evaluate or get some outside help, and neither of them had thought about it. I just think it's a bad idea to fly by the seat of your pants on something this important.

I also think that me being in a small conservative town in Texas colors my judgement quite a bit. At least through elementary I haven't seen any of the wacko liberal stuff being taught where I live. While I agree with you that a love of reading is not being instilled in schools, in general the math skills of our nation suck, and these include my generation that are now starting homeschooling. Maybe I'm overly sensitive to this as an engineer.

 

A good leader needs to know how to manage and utilize his assets. Ditto a good instructor. While it helps to have a vast or specialized personal knowledge to draw from to teach, it isn't necessary. With a vast personal hard copy library or the internet an instructor can direct a student in what to persue or study to advance their knowledge. As someone else said, "as an instructor I only have to be one step ahead of the student". I agree with that to a point. Eventually, hopefully, the student will exceed the teacher. At that point the teacher can still direct the student via the internet. Even MIT has free online classes in science and math. Were you aware of that? Would that put your engineers mind at ease a little.

 

The "one step ahead" idea has merit, but also real drawbacks. When I was in Afghanistan I spent my spare time tutoring math and science classes for the military on the base. The university of maryland had a branch campus that allowed them to take classes while deployed. for the basic math and calculus I had no problems, I had far more math than was needed to understand all the concepts completely and be able to explain the bigger picture for those classes. However, i had a captain that was trying to take a graduate level business statistics course. I had completed a roughly equivalent course myself, but I really struggled with tutoring him because I didn't have the over arching mastery of the subject to see where this lesson and the previous connected, if that makes any sense.

 

Luke, here is some additional info you may want to share with your friends.
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I have a few links you may find helpful. Two are basic, one is advanced.
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The basic one; http://thepioneerwoman.com/homeschoo...ing-textbooks/
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The advanced one is for free online courses at MIT. It is extensive in the Math and Sciences areas of study. Free Online Course Materials | MIT OpenCourseWare

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Last but not least, you may or may not have visited Backwoods Home Magazines online site and forum. They have an open "Education and Homeschooling thread," you might want to peek at now and then for ideas. Here is that link; http://www.backwoodshome.com/forum/v...splay.php?f=68
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I hope you can use some of this.

 

Thanks for the help, my wife and I are helping out our friends with there math and science curriculum, and it's been interesting!

 

calm down people, I surely didn't mean to offend any of you, even though I knew it would happen. I know full well having a college degree doesn't mean you are not an idiot, and my original question had nothing to do with that. I know for a fact that I am not qualified to teach high school english. Math, sure, physics no problem. If you are getting offended at my question, let me rephrase it.

I don't believe there is ANYONE that is qualified to teach all the subjects that are offered in a typical high school setting, regardless of education. it's just to much ground to have a firm grasp on.

How are you at calculus? is your kid shows an aptitude towards math, how are you going to teach him? If you are good at calc, great, if not how do you reach outside your competency areas.

 

I think the question should be - What is it home schoolers do that is so effective?
http://www.hslda.org/docs/study/comp2001/HomeSchoolAchievement.pdf

Are these guys really qualified to teach our children?
The Associated Press: 82 percent of US schools may be labeled 'failing'

Maybe we should rethink our ideas on what it means to be qualified.

 

Classic intro, I don't want to stir the pot but I'm going to anyway.

Did you ever think that there might have been a reason you never really got an answer?

I apologize for not addressing this yesterday, I did not mean to leave you hanging.

I'll address the rest of your questions this evening after I get home from teaching all those Plumbing Apprentice's that I am trying to turnout as Journeyman.

ETA: Just because you did not get the answers you were seeking at first does not mean you offended anybody. It certainly did not offend me, whatsoever.

 

There was just one person that seemed really steamed. I've been very impressed in my short time here how level headed everyone has been.

Has anyone ever seen a study for home vs public with parental involvement?

I have read several studies that showed for public schools parental involvement was the only factor that really mattered in predicting kids academic achievement.