The History of Homeschooling

I saw this at Ramblings of a Dysfunctional Homeschooler, and had to share it. It's a very interesting look at homeschooling statistics prepared by OnlineCollege.org.

Via: Online College Source

My comments, for what they're worth...

Does it seem a little silly to say that Alexander the Great is the first "known homeschooler?" What, did they eschew the local p.s. and send in an intent form? I don't know why, it just struck me as funny.

I've seen conflicting reports on test scores, including one study that found no measurable difference between the scores of homeschooled students and public school students.

This graphic includes "online education" under methodologies. In our state, students who use online schools are not technically counted as "homeschoolers" if the online school is public. So the numbers would be even higher if those students were included. (No matter how "schoolish" an online curriculum may be, those students are still getting a very different educational experience from students at brick-and-mortar schools!)

I really like the graphic showing why parents choose to homeschool. It's a good representation of what a complex decision it can be, and what a diverse group homeschooling families are.

Looking at the comparison section, I had to laugh. Not all schools can provide more resources than homeschoolers: there are plenty of schools out there who don't even have enough textbooks for their kids!

I'm completely confident that my kids have more resources than their public-schooled friends. Everything we have is used by two kids instead of a whole class. Our local school might have a more expensive microscope than ours, but ours works fine and it's available all the time. The same goes for our chemistry set, our computer, our binoculars, our math manipulatives, our art supplies, our book collection, and even the teacher! :) Plus, we can go to the library whenever we want, not just the first Monday of the month.

I can't say if our curriculum is richer than a public school's curriculum, because I don't know what the school kids are doing these days. But I can tell you that when my kids were in public school, they often seemed to touch briefly on a multitude of topics instead of studying anything in depth. My kids were vaguely familiar with historical events and scientific concepts, without having a real understanding of any of them. To me, a rich curriculum is measured in depth, not breadth.

Anyway, if you haven't seen this before, it's definitely worth a look!

Hooray for Monday!

We started the morning with some handwriting practice. The kids HATE it, and I don't blame them, but they need it! They both developed really bad habits in early elementary, since handwriting was never officially taught in their school. Supersim's first grade teacher told me at the time, and I quote: "With all the curriculum we have to cover to get them ready for second grade, we just don't have time to practice handwriting." Um, maybe I'm way off base here, but isn't legible handwriting one of the things kids need in second grade? And in life?

Anyway, we use a variety of practice sheets for handwriting; our current favorites are the A-Z animal books from LightHome. I only make them spend 15 to 20 minutes on it, as long as they are doing their best effort. And we do handwriting no more than twice a week because I don't want them to get so burned out that they just zoom through it.

I wanted to show the kids how punctuation and the use of onomatopoeia can add interest and excitement to a story, so we read Jan Brett's Hedgie Blasts Off! I got the idea of using great children's literature to demonstrate great writing from Mastering the Mechanics by Linda Hoyt and Teresa Therriault. It's an excellent resource for teaching writing effectively. Supersim is learning how to use quotation marks and the correct places to use commas; Dude is learning about complete sentences and using exclamation marks for emphasis and excitement. (The Jan Brett book was his request.)

After a snack break, it was time for math. As much as possible, we're trying to avoid worksheet fatigue, so we use a variety of techniques for math. We use lots of math manipulatives, including Math-U-See, and we read math storybooks and play the games in Family Math. Today we read Life of Fred together and the kids worked out the problems on their individual dry-erase boards (more fun than paper.) Then we tried out multiplying two and three digits by one digit.

Later, we pulled out the microscope and looked at random stuff, which is always a good time. Sugar crystals are pretty; shavings from the pencil sharpener, not so much. We were all pretty icked out by the chicken we'd had for lunch. Then we sprinkled some dry yeast on a slide; the little pellets look a bit like Cheetos when they're magnified. We dropped in a teensy bit of warm water and watched the show!

Finally, we did a bit of fingerprint art, Ed Emberly-style. It was a great day of home education, in my opinion. We learned, we had fun, and we enjoyed our time together. What more could we ask?

More School?

Check out this link, if you haven't seen it already.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_more_school

I predict higher dropout rates. We don't need more school hours or days--we need more effective school hours and days. We need more teachers, so each class has a manageable number of students (no one can give 24 kids individualized attention, not even SuperTeacher!) We need lessons that reach kids with all learning styles. And we need to stop preparing kids to take tests and start preparing them to have full, rich lives and a lifelong love of learning.

Supersim and Dudeman ask us each morning, "So, what are we talking about today?" It makes me so happy to hear the excitement in their voices. They don't dread going to school anymore. (Well, OK, they don't exactly jump for joy when we work on mulitplication tables, but they do focus and get through them because they know the next hour will be really fun and interesting.)

I'm so blessed to be able to have this time with my kids. I understand that longer school days would benefit parents with long work days, who need a safe place for their kids in the afternoon. I can't fix society today (it's on my list for next week!) but I can do what I think is best for my family. If I had to send them to school for 8 hours a day, they would go crazy and so would I!

The Super Awesome School of Super Awesomeness...

...and Super Achievement is open again! Hooray! And we're doing things OUR way! We work at our own pace instead of waiting for others to catch up. We don't waste time standing in lines or gathering our stuff to head to the next classroom. We read real books instead of textbooks, and we study and discuss topics, instead of "receiving instruction." When we're interested in something, we work as long as we want and as late as we want--no bells! And nobody yells at us while we eat lunch. (Unless we happen to be a dog who got a bit too bold.)

I'm so happy to have my kids HOME HOME HOME!

Two Conversations with Supersim, plus a highly opinionated commentary

Yesterday:

Me: Sweetie, don't you have a spelling test tomorrow?

Super: (Heavy sigh.) Yes.

Me: Don't you need to study the words?

Super: No.

Me: Why not? Are you already prepared?

Super: I guess.

Me: You must have studied really well for the last one--you made an A on it.

Super: I didn't study for it. The words were just easy.

Me: Oh. Are they easy this week, too?

Super: I don't know.

Me: You don't know?

Super: I never looked at them. They're probably easy.

Me: Well, what if they're not easy? Don't you want to look them over and see if you need to--

Super: No, it doesn't matter. I'll probably make an A or a B on it.

Me: So...if you don't make any effort, you're pretty sure you'll make at least a B.

Super: Yeah.

Me: But with a little effort, you could make an A?

Super: If I get a B, that's fine, Mom. I really don't care! It's just a stupid spelling test!


Today, on the way to a morning dentist appointment:

Me: What are you missing this morning, Sweetie?

Super: I don't know.

Me: Well, what do you normally do first thing in the morning?

Super: Just stupid stuff.

Me: Sweetie, can you give me a real answer, please? You must know what you normally do when you get to school.

Super: We watch the news.

Me: You do? You watch a news show? Which one?

Super: No, not real news, school news. Two kids come on TV and they tell us the weather for the day and the lunch choices. It's boring.

Me: Boring? It sounds kind of cool. I didn't know the kids made their own news show. Do the younger kids get to do it, or just the older ones?

Super: It's the same two kids.

Me: What do you mean?

Super: It's always Levi and some other kid I don't know.

Me: You don't take turns?

Super: No.

Me: Well, why do those two get to do it every day?

Super: I don't know. I don't really care, Mom. I don't want a turn--it's dumb. Mom, after this is over, do I have to go back to school?


And Now...A Highly Opinionated Commentary:

When Supersim was in Montessori preschool, her teacher told me she was a gifted child and one of the most enthusiastic learners she had ever taught. She called Supersim a "collector of knowledge." In first grade, Supersim's teacher called her a "delight" and she even said that it was a real treat to listen to Super read out loud because she read with such wonderful expression and enthusiasm. She loved reading, but math was her favorite subject. She would eagerly show me the math "trick" she had learned in class that day.

In second grade, Supersim's teacher stood at the white board and lectured for most of the day. There were very few hands-on activities because they were drilling for the standardized test. Supersim began to struggle in math, but when she asked questions, the teacher responded: "Weren't you listening?" By the end of the school year, the teacher was advising me to get Supersim some medication to help her concentrate because, "she just doesn't get it."

At the beginning of the third grade year, I talked with the teacher and told her my concerns about Super: that she had enjoyed school until the previous year, that until recently she had been such an enthusiastic learner, and that she was intimidated by math. We resolved to work together to boost her confidence and get Supersim excited about learning again. The work that came home was all marked "Great!" and "Nice work!" It was great work at first, but as the year passed, Supersim got sloppy and started putting forth the bare minimum effort. Still, her grades were good, and I just couldn't put my finger on what was bothering me...

Until now. I've been reading a fascinating book by Robert L. Fried called The Game of School. Here's some food for thought from this excellent book:

Let's consider a frightening possibility: far too much of the time our children spend in school is wasted. It's not that nothing happens there or that kids spend their time just fooling around or that teachers don't try their best to present lessons they think are in our children's best interests. It's just that unless our children--of all ages--are truly engaged in their learning, most of what they experience during school hours passes over them like the shadow of a cloud, or through them like an undigested seed. They may be present in the classroom, but they are not really there. Their pencils may be chugging away on the worksheets or the writing prompts or math problems laid out for them, but their intelligence is running on two cylinders at best. They pay some attention to what their teacher happens to be telling them, but their imagination has moved elsewhere.

Yes, I thought. What did you do in school today, kids? Nothing. I know they did something but whatever it was, it was obviously not interesting enough to talk about later. Every day I ask my kids what they did in school, and every day they tell me about something that happened in the cafeteria or on the playground. If I want to know what they learned, I have to play twenty questions, and eventually they get annoyed with me. Mom, we're done with today, and we don't want to think about it any more..

Then, I read this part:

Why shouldn't our kids be eager to head off to school each day, anticipating their next investigation, project, or performance? It can be agonizing for parents to see their imaginative, articulate, eagerly seeking young learner become, over the years, someone bored, passive, complaining, or compliant--focused on not making mistakes rather than taking on new challenges. Most kids in school listen and do what they're told, most of the time. They pick up stray facts and acquire some skills they wouldn't necessarily learn elsewhere. They learn about following rules in the lunchroom and about leaving one-inch margins on their papers. They even learn the Pythagorean theorem and how to write a five-paragraph essay with three supporting arguments and a conclusion.

But unless they view such activities as important, as having meaning to them or their lives right now, they aren't truly learning, in the sense of developing their minds and hearts as young people eager to embrace the world.

A light came on in my head and I thought, "THAT"S IT! That's exactly what I was feeling, but couldn't quite articulate. My gifted girl, my "Collector of Knowledge," has become bored, passive, complaining and compliant! She can't find meaning in the work she's doing in school. Why? For starters, she's not investigating anything. She's listening to a lecture, filling out a worksheet, answering the questions at the end of the chapter. She's just going through the motions because that's what is expected of her. Textbooks don't ask students to make discoveries--they ask students to regurgitate the facts that were just spoon-fed to them. As for taking on new challenges, could you get excited about a list of spelling words? When she says, "It's just a stupid spelling test, Mom," what she's really telling me is, "I don't see any point to this. I'll take 30 0r more of them this year, and they don't have any relevance in my life, so why not coast?"

I'm not suggesting that textbooks should be trashed or that kids shouldn't learn how to spell. Students need to learn to glean knowledge from many sources, and they also need all sorts of communication skills, including learning how to spell words correctly. But if my daughter can go from "gifted collector of knowledge" to "I don't really care, Mom," in four years, then something has gone terribly wrong. And if her teachers can't reignite that spark, and I feel that I can, isn't it my responsibility as a parent to take over her education?