MORE ON HOMESCHOOLING

HOMESCHOOL
by Chris Jeub

She innocently asked, "So, where do your children go to school?"
Of all casual questions one teacher could ask another, this one always creates butterflies in my stomach.

"Well, uh, my wife and I tutor them," I say. Then I try to think of something to change the subject. But I never think of anything quick enough.

"Tutor them?" she might say, squinting her nose and ruffling her brows as if I had held a cockroach up to her face. "You mean, you home school them?"

These situations inevitably lead to an hour-long apologetic on why we educate our kids at home. This should not surprise me. Home schooling is still unusual and a bit radical. Teachers and others in education--or in any field, for that matter--naturally question new, innovative practices.

But home education is not so rare anymore. Twenty years ago there were roughly 15,000 home-schooled students in the United States. By 1991 the U.S. Department of Education figured there were 350,000 home schools in the U.S. and 40,000 in Canada. Today estimates stretch over 2 million home schools nationwide.

The world of education has had to adjust to this exploding movement. There are many magazines and newspapers for home schools, numerous home-school curriculum distributors and countless home-school network and contact groups. Why do parents choose to teach their children at home?

Social Reasons
Home-schooling parents believe that children can learn basic life skills — working together, sharing, showing respect for others — without formal classroom experience. The students can develop social graces by being involved in community and church activities.
Pat Farenga, publisher of Growing Without Schooling, a catalog of home-school resources, has written: "Group experiences are a big part of education, and home schoolers have plenty of them.

They write to us about how they form or join writing clubs, book discussion groups and local home-schooling groups. Home schoolers also take part in school sports teams and music groups [in nearby public schools], as well as in the many public and private group activities our communities provide. These young people can and do experience other people and cultures without going to school."


Our children have many church and neighborhood friends. Our community has a home-school contact group where they often get together for field trips and outings that give our kids more than enough socialization. We have gone on camping trips, facilitated soccer tournaments, traveled to speech and debate tournaments and coordinated educational classes.
But not all socialization is necessarily good for a child. Certain social plagues like drugs, alcohol, premarital sex, violence and gangs damage a child's growth and development. A home-school environment frees the child from the increasingly persuasive peer pressure prevalent in many schools.

The positive side of socialization — building respect and communication, getting along with and relating to others — is wonderfully fulfilled in a home-school setting. Behavioral psychologist Urie Bronfenbrenner concluded that "meaningful human contact" is best accomplished with few people.




more to follow tomorrow...