This article is from back before “the holidays,” so maybe you missed it like I did.
Pantagraph.com tells us in Home School: A Growing Trend that while homeschooling works well for many (get ready for it), “not everyone is an unabashed fan of home schooling.”
This is largely an article that emphasizes the role of evangelical Christians in homeschooling, and it also gives public educators the opportunity to mention the advantages of diversity in their schools.
One of the people interviewed said,
“They get a richer experience when around other kids, a setting you can’t duplicate in a home school.”
I’m always surprised by the assumption that homeschooling families aren’t able to provide rich, diverse experiences with a variety of cultures. This just hasn’t been an issue for our family, which has regularly had many experiences with people of different religions, ethnic backgrounds, races, and nationalities.
I also get a little miffed at this kind of thing:
“Barry Reilly, assistant superintendent of human resources for Bloomington’s District 87 whose three children go to public school, said the quality of home schooling ‘comes down to the quality of instruction and curriculum as well as the dedication of the kids.’”
Quality of instruction? Curriculum? Dedication of the kids? I’d have to say in the hundreds of homeschooling families I know, the “quality” of homeschooling comes down to the quality of the relationships. In a warm, trusting, loving environment where children’s individual traits are appreciated, lots of learning happens.
This is yet another reason why it is difficult to compare homeschooling and institutional education. Educational authorities most often do not even mention “relationships” — one of the biggest factors that homeschool parents recognize as integral to the education of their children, and surely one of the ingredients of homeschooling most difficult to imitate in many government schools.
by Jeanne Faulconer
HEM
Helen
Tracy
mark
marynix
ann-lahrson-fisher
valerie
sandi
david
My sense of the tone of that article was like yours. I didn’t like it and thought at the time that I wished that homeschooling articles would stop popping up. I’m kinda liking the rare article here and there about homeschoolers. It seems like the good information that they sometimes put out can be hijacked by the misinformation or bad information. And it seems like there’s always bad information or ignorant opinions from the ‘experts’. I’ve seen this in two different newspapers in two different areas of Illinois. It’s dead wrong information which the group (HSLDA) refuses to fix on their website:
“Attendance is generally 176 days a year but is not mandated for private of homeschools.”
If there is no attendance mandated, then why would a ‘homeschool’ group put that information on their site? Why?!
Thanks for posting your thoughts about that article, Jeanne. It’s great to see a different perspective about my stomping grounds here in central Illinois. There was a whole series of Pantagraph articles over a couple of days concerning homeschoolers.