Monday, February 25, 2008

Homeschooling News

Homeschool thoughts…
I don’t usually go too far into the homeschool topic as my goal was to get my little one back into the school system as my oldest currently is. I have toyed with the idea of homeschooling my oldest as the education in Arizona is not ...



Home-schooling has been illegal in Germany since it was outlawed in 1938. Hitler wanted the Nazi state to have complete control of young minds. […] Klaus Landahl, 41, who moved in January from the Black Forest in Germany to the Isle of ...


Families are fleeing to the UK from Germany to escape a law introduced by Hitler that could lead to their children being taken into care if educated at home.


Nazi-era law mandating state control of children alive and well in Germany.


Home School Day activities include workshops, presentations, guided tours, hands-on aerospace demonstration stations and scavenger hunts. In addition, prices for IMAX Theatre and the Morphis MovieRide simulator are discounted. ...


Natalie and Chris Conrad’s family is part of the 6000-student home-school network across Nebraska. And the family is a small part of a debate in the Nebraska Legislature pitting personal choices and religious freedoms against state ...



15 years ago when I was single God planted a seed in my heart to Home School. Five years after he planted that seed I meet and married my husband. My husband had a son (Reece) from his first marriage who can to live with us right when ...


Klaus Landahl, 41, who moved in January from the Black Forest in Germany to the Isle of Wight with his wife, Kathrin, 39, said they had no option but to leave their home, friends and belongings in order to educate their five children, ...


He replied, "Dee, it was my pleasure and privilege to get behind this effort on behalf of home school students in Arkansas, and I sincerely appreciated the backing of the Home School Legal Defense Association and the Arkansas Christian ...


Mike Huckabee has been endorsed by the Home School Legal Defense Association for his strong pro-family stance and his record and views on homeschooling. At the heart of his beliefs is figuring out what is best for “the least of these,” ...



Her bill would require home-school students to take state-mandated tests or have their schoolwork assessed by an outside evaluator. If students' progress falls short academically, they would be sent to public or private schools. ...


This new edition of a best-seller completely updates its discussion of the skills, techniques, and attitudes early childhood teachers need to work more closely with families. Many practical strategies and problem-solving techniques are ...


I have often mentioned that my homeschooled kids attend a homeschool "school" type program. With a new location opening up in Texas, I thought I would take the time to tell you more about it. Masters Academy of Fine Arts is a program ...


Cabin fevers are running high and it takes a resourceful homeschool parent to keep the troops happy and contented. And as you probably heard, the official Pennsylvania groundhog, Punxsutawney Phil, saw his shadow on February 2nd, ...


She kept him home from school at times, afraid that he might try to hurt someone. For the first time, he had to be hospitalized, living away from his family until he calmed down. She said she would prefer that her son attend a school ...



But I'm hoping that our further involvement in this league will introduce us to more homeschoolers in our area, outside of my local Catholic homeschool group. I am definitely looking forward to meeting new homeschool moms and kids, ...


We propose to design the program to meet the needs of families who prefer home-schooling with ongoing, consistent support from teachers and some classroom learning. We would propose two days per week of classroom time for each student ...


The Buena Park Library District is hosting a special Open House event for home educators and their students in the Buena Park and surrounding communities on March 10th, 2008 from 6:30 to 7:45 pm at 7150 La Palma Ave., between Knott and ...


Thou Shall Not Send Your Child To A Public School - Why Not Homeschooling Our Children Is A Sin. &: Excellent God Centred Biblical Homeschool Curriculum. Accelerated Christian Education (US)-Teach-The European Academy For Christian ...



They are part of the Hallstrom Home School Workshops program, which is largely made up of Rockford families. They beat a field of 18 teams, which included students from Boylan, East, Guilford and Jefferson high schools and two other ...


Smith Faculty Opinion: Dr. Peter Morici, Professor of International Business.


My son Gabriel has returned home to homeschool high school - and I am also teaching several local Waldorf high schoolers as well. So I will be chronicling our adventures together in a new blog. I think that this new blog will be of use ...


The situation I am referring to is when our choice to homeschool becomes someone else's problem. I am not referring to those in our lives that are totally anti-homeschooling, lecturing us on our disorganization and lack, ...



“This week’s free download, from Homeschoolestore, is an excerpt from The Fairy-Land of Science by Arabella Buckley and describes the life cycle of the primrose with great accuracy and poetic insight. The book was one Charlotte Mason ...


I really need to bring a copy of their schedules home with me until I learn it. (I've only been at this school a few months). Anyway, we have a sub for the whole day and since we have to pay her, she needs to work. ...


961_logo_3 Plant senior James Harrell III, a standout on both sides of the ball, has signed with Arkansas-Pine Bluff. The 5-foot-11, 195-pound Harrell played cornerback and wide receiver for the Panthers. ...


We have a little Cardinal family who must be nesting very near to the house. They are so darling! I haven’t seen Mrs. Cardinal in a few days, but Mr. Cardinal is a frequent visitor to the window here by the computer. ...



The St. Michael's School boys basketball team took first place in its division. read more.


I could walk ev-er-so-slow-ly home for a cool down. I could not stand straight because my back muscles were so tired. And in the days after I can feel muscles building and organizing and having committee meetings in my thighs. ...


Angela explains how our choice to homeschool can sometimes make our friends feel bad when they don't put their own kids first in her post Mother Crone's Homeschool: Musing: When Our Choice Becomes Their Problem.


We'll do school. That's about it. I'm am exhausted from working all weekend. I need to get everyone's lists printed out and make sure that we do get school done. We've been slacking a lot lately. I may also work on my Cafepress store a ...



Tuesday, February 26, the Nebraska legislature’s education committee will be considering four bills, among them LB 1141, the anti-homeschool legislation we are working against. Senator Schimek has already begun talking about compromise, ...


A Tennessee woman whose Social Security Number was attached to a deceased woman is still fighting to government to prove she’s alive eight years later. They won’t accept her tax returns, so no refunds or rebates. ...


The culture of learning in England is making us consider home schooling our daughter, writes Adharanand Finn.


Schmap.com, a site that mashes Yahoo Maps and Flickr images, recently added one of our daughter’s photos to its collection of images of Town Square Municipal Park in downtown Anchorage. The photo is scanned from a B&W print she ...



Sometimes I get so discouraged when I read an encouraging book about homeschooling. The ideas for this or that unit study or discipline technique and the other creative blending of subjects and age level all sound so easy on paper...


I’ve acquired a copy of Elizabeth Hainstocks’s Teaching Montessori in the Home: Preschool (I’ve also got the School Years book coming too!) and have been working through it getting some things ready for April. Following (roughly! ...


I have found it hard to get into a consistent daily rhythm down here. Things take so much longer to get done. Going to the grocery store can be an all morning event and doing laundry takes 2 days from start to finish. ...


REGISTRATION is being accepted for enrollment for Our Lady of Lourdes School, 44 Cleveland Ave., for the 2008-2009 school year for new pupils in pre-K through grade 8.


A new carnival is coming to town.. SisterLisa is hosting the Share Your Faith Carnival : Homeschool Edition at The HomeSpun Life. Please go by and join the fun as we testify why and how the Lord led us to homeschool our children. ...



Because I've been increasingly disgusted with what passes for free and appropriate education at the middle school level in our town, this vacation I began to look into the only two other options I know of: home schooling and private ...


Our awesome 4H leader set-up a non-4H, homeschool vaulting class at Blue Star Farm in Suffolk, VA. Nicole d'Auriol and her daughter, Sarah are both wonderful instructors who emphasize safety when working on horseback and in the gym. ...


A Comprehensive Review of Filling Medical School Applications… A medical school is an institution that teaches medicine and trains its students into becoming successful medical practitioners….


When I asked myself the question, How do you feel about home schooling? I first thought "Why would anyone do that" So I researched exactly that, What are the reasons that people give of why they choose to homeschool and how valid are ...



Forum: Christian Education Posted By: dgszweda Post Time: February 25th, 2008 at 01:19 PM.


This area is in the country and the best part is that the home school services all the kids special education needs. They will all be going to the same school! I called the County's Transportation to find out what school it would be and ...


The Homeschool Lounge is a FREE online community for Homeschool Moms, the very first of its kind! The vision of The Homeschool Lounge is to connect Homeschool Moms from all corners of the web! Get advice, give advice, share, ...


"One of the most important things and the hardest for me to accomplish in order to have an organized day is lesson planning. I finally took a day one weekend and sat down with my children’s curriculum, and filled a calendar with ...



I just heard for our host hotel the Clarion and the have about 22 rooms left in various room types. If you would like to stay there call Marla or Jeff at 1-405-942-8511. We reserve the maximum rooms that they allow 90% if we don’t take ...


God began using His very own word and preaching from our Pastor to lead our hearts to bring our children home. Now, my pastor doesn't exactly preach 'homeschool'. Our church has a Christian School and that's where my children always ...


With schools great and small across the country going green through the Go Green Initiative, it’s impressive to see that the folks taking home the hardware with this week’s top honors are actually a part of the Woodman Home School. ...


Over the past year, I have developed many many wonderful friendships with homeschoolers around the country. A good share of the them have given names to their homeschools. After a few months of unsuccessfully coming up with a name for ...



What lineup of economic authors and titles would you include in a homeschool curriculum. From my opinion, both Robinson and A2 seem deficient in that regard, Robinson being slightly better. I know Rothbard is on the Robinson list, ...


A Different Kind Of Home Schooling Los Angeles Times, CA, February 25, 2008 Every year thousands of kindergarten- age children of immigrants like Ocario Gonzalez arrive at schools across Southern California unprepared. ...


I am home schooling a 10th grader, who is 'challenged' in math and a kindergardener who loves math. Over the years we have tried a lot of different approaches: workbooks; manipulatives; Saxon; Making Math Meaningful (both of them); ...


H: Mommy can we take a teko back home and get my fire truck? Me: Honey we can’t go home. We have to take an airplane to get home. H:No we don’t Mommy, our house is right over there, we can all fit in a teko. Please! ...


“There are so many, many decisions ... to be made for a new school district,” the retired ROWVA teacher and principal said. The group has compared the two districts’ course offerings, attempting to determine the similarities and ...



Anyway, we decided that the best course of action right now is to homeschool our boys. It’s been going really well and we are enjoying it. I do miss having the day to myself to complete errands, housework, and write but the additional ...


Resolving the core of differences between negotiators is especially important on the cross-cultural stage.


Andrea for Atypical Homeschool.net, 2008. | Permalink | No comment. Add to del.icio.us. Search blogs linking this post with Technorati. Want more on these topics ? Browse the archive of posts filed under General. ...


A little context first. I told the kids they could have a scoop of ice-cream in the afternoon after Hudson woke up from his nap. Chloe: “Mom can I wake Hudson up?” Mom: Thoughtfully thinking because there are times I ask her to do this ...



WALLET MAY BE ABLE TO FIT IN A BACK POCKET GREAT FOR WHEN OUT IN THE COMMUNITY GREAT FOR ESL GREAT FOR SITUATIONS WHERE YOU CAN NOT EXCHANGE PECS 30 PECS ESL EMOTIONS HOMESCHOOL AUTISM THERAPY WALLET BROWN VINYL WALLET WITH 2 BRASS ...


Tina at JETIHOJA Academy posted this neat quiz….I liked it so much….I needed to do it, too. Of course, the results are too funny, so I am posting them, too. What type of Mother Hen Are You? by Montessorimom.com: Educational Resource ...


I slept on a couch in one foster home because there was NO FOSTER MOTHER… just a dad and his six foster sons… Yeah. Lovely right? I’d either be home alone after school or stuck at school doing something because no foster parents would ...


Dahlia front I loved knitting this. The puffed sleeves - adorable. The top-down construction - my favourite. The lavender colour - elegant. The beaded bind-off - sweet. The nearly daily falling asleep at the same time as the kids and ...


As promised... here are the pictures on the Homeschool Fair... there were more than 100 pictures... I just chose a few "interesting" ones... :) The fair was a rather successful one... have received several very good feedback that the ...



Click 'Get Widget'; Click 'Embed Code'; Copy the HTML code; Paste into your sidebar; Enjoy! I would love to hear where all the Homeschool Hack widget lives. Be sure to let me know here or on the Homeschool Hackers social site. ...


This year we will continue our tradition of having a flag presentation at the Showcase (formerly called the Opening Ceremony). However, this year it will be different in a number of ways, the most important being that for your program ...


This is probably a legacy of the Amsterdam school, the Socialist-Expressionist architects who remodelled the city in the 1910s and 20s, and buildings designed in what were no doubt second-rate imitations of their style are all over the ...


He will see his best friend from school often enough, I am sure, and staying at home will allow him to get better acquainted with the kids that live on our street who stay home for the majority of the day. Doc and I also explained that ...



The qualified candidate must possess a minimum of a Master’s Degree in Social Work, be PA licensed or license eligible, have at least 3 years of relevant clinical experience, and have prior experience.


I'll be working all day today, but I thought I would pop in and blog. I finally got to the library yesterday to get the next book in the series I'm reading and I'll read that while my work is transmitting and downloading, ...


HELENA — Foothills Community Christian School will have teams in both the boys' and girls' division when the Montana Christian Athletic Association basketball tournaments begin today at Carroll College.


“Most of these guys wouldn’t even make the team, and the ones that didn’t play when I was in high school would start on most of these teams today. I do feel that the top players or athletes today are better than when I was there, ...


MOMOF3INNC posted a photo:. Just another homeschool day...



Currently the following teams have been seeded at the bottom of their division because we have no seeding information from them. If you play on one of these teams please conatct your coach and ask him to send fill at the seeding ...


My walk as a Christian amounts to an extension of my first walk home from school—when I became hopelessly lost. In September of 1969, in the Baltimore suburb of Timonium, I was the youngest first grader in my class. ...


RALEIGH - February 23, 2007 - With their all time high of 34 victories in a season, Christ School, led by Mason Plumlee’s 15 points, captured their second straight NCISAA 3-A basketball championship on Saturday. ...


I just finished writing my notice of intent to withdraw my son, Mad Scientist, from Charlottesville High School and teach him at home. Public high school has been a disaster for him. In general, I like CHS, and Mad Scientist has an ...



If you home-school, vote republican, helped purchase the pews in your church, and have a library of 200 theological works your faith is a sham! If you have had the deepest revelation revealed and dream dreams and have visions, ...


23, 2008, at the age of 103, at her home in Sullivan. Marjorie Spock was born Sept. 8, 1904, in New Haven, Conn., the second child, and first daughter, of six children. The Spock family was prominent in New Haven, as her father was a ...


The enormous popularity of Facebook has been built upon its networking structure, a structure centered around high school or university affiliation. With no homeschool option provided, however, many homeschooled students under 18 have ...


Do you keep your child home from school for blood sugar related reasons? At what point do you do this? I am wondering because yesterday Deacon seemed a bit out of it but once he got to school he was fine. He had a breakfast spike that ...


In fact, the needs of home school families for a "co-operative" are more than satisfied in this arrangement. In addition to a common house and workshop, there may also be erected a private oratory, in the hopes that it may one day be ...



Now, we're looking at new curricula for the new school year. Thinking about what we could or should do, and it's quite difficult, almost as hard as choosing the homeschool in the first place. I think we're in agreement that ...


We talk "mommy-speak" and we talk about family issues, school issues, home work issues, compare notes, milestones in our children's lives. Even though I work, I don't miss the "Big Events" - and by big events I mean the plays, ...


SHE TAKES PRIDE IN HOME SCHOOLING ELIJAH BUT WHEN PETER IS PRESENT IN THE HOUSE, SHE BECOMES QUIET AND PASSIVE. WHEN IN THE HOUSE WITH PETER SHE IS MOSTLY IN THE SHADOWS. Director: Tom Pickard. Innocent This is a dark and gritty coming ...


I have been away for a month now and have settled well into life without all the worries of home. Since moving to Thimi I have done lots, but most have my time has either been at the school or hanging around home with neighbors. ...



It shares the name of this blog, Homeschool Image. While talking to some other homeschooling moms about my venture, one mentioned to me what she'd like to see on a t-shirt. "I want shirts for my whole family that say, 'Yes, ...


Here’s encouragement for homeschooled high school students and those of you sending your students off to college soon, courtesy of the University of Chicago’s student newspaper.


Also, the region is home to many families that home-school their children, a group prone to support Huckabee over McCain. Along with evangelicals, home-school families tend to favor the so-called "family values" that Huckabee espouses. ...


In 1963 “family home evenings” began. Before that we weren’t home much or together. When I was 16, I dated a young man who became a convert. He went to school, worked 2 jobs after school, and donated his time driving the deacons to pick ...


Until college, Alison’s schooling took place on a raft, on the crowded streets of Delhi, on Mt. Everest, on a camel safari across the Rajasthan desert, or wherever else her happened to be. It could be called ‘home schooling’ if you took ...



The snow days are adding up, raising concerns among some school officials that graduations could be delayed Larger schools such as Nashua North and South that hold their graduations at the Verizon Wireless Arena in Manchester had to ...


Laura and talked it over, prayed about it, and came to the conclusion that benefits of home schooling far outweighed any potential drawbacks. We began the home schooling adventure with an intentional awareness of the socialization issue ...


I am reposting this recipe to enter it into the carnival of recipes. I have had so many hits on my blog for people searching for this recipe. It is so good and tastes just like Olive Garden's! Minestrone Soup 3 tablespoons olive oil ...


Apparently they’d been quite good friends, since when the man my father met got the rather pompous application letter from Harvard Law School and told Vonnegut he wasn’t going to go since they were such assholes, Vonnegut immediately ...



June 20 and 21st Friday Used Curriculum Sale and speakers, 10am-8pm Saturday Vendor Hall and speakers 9am-5pm UNLV’s Student Union, 4505 S. Maryland Parkway, LV NV 89154 http://www.nevadahomeschoolnetwork.com Pre-registration or tickets ...


I don't think anyone has ever called me "groovy"...Groovy!! What type of Mother Hen Are You? by Montessorimom.com: Educational Resource.


We saw: a group of little 9 year old girls coming home from school on foot and crossing the road right when the light for the car lane turned green! A gum-chewing kleenex vendor weaving his way through the motor bikes to get his latest ...

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Investigators on Monday hoped to interview a 14-year-old who was the lone survivor of an apparent murder-suicide in which five other members of his family were killed.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:43:34 GMT


Students of Chavara Vidya Bhavan Matriculation Higher Secondary School participating in a function held in the school in Coimbatore.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:43:01 GMT


Happy lots: Students of Suburban Higher Secondary School who won a prize in the competitions organised as part of the 'Anu Week' celebrations by the Department of Atomic Energy and PSG College of Technology in ...
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:42:53 GMT


Law enforcement officers took the "BAT mobile" to New High School on Monday to show students what can happen if they get caught drinking and driving.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:42:28 GMT



Submitted by jstrait on February 25, 2008 - 4:37pm. My child didn't hear about anything like that, no note home and no lockdown at school.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:42:27 GMT


Tennessee is the top-ranked team in men's basketball for the first time in the program's history, earning the distinction in the latest Associated Press poll.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:42:22 GMT


You know you're in a different kind of college when a teaching assistant sets five marijuana plants down in the middle of a lab and no one blinks a bloodshot eye.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:41:41 GMT



Their aim had been to save the world. But now, huddled around a kitchen table in Sandy Springs, teenagers Julian Gindi, Jonathan Gaynes and Adam Augenstein explain that they've scaled things back a little.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:41:38 GMT


Feb. 23, 2008 Raymond Ferrell Boston, 85, of Keokuk died early Saturday, Feb. 23, 2008, at his home.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:41:01 GMT


By MITCH ALBOM * FREE PRESS SPORTS COLUMNIST * February 12, 2008 Editor's note: Story originally published on Oct.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:40:54 GMT


Turkey says it is not targeting civilians as it chases after separatist rebels in northern Iraq, but people in Iraq's semiautonomous Kurdish region say they have lived in fear since the incursion began.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:40:54 GMT



Age 89, of Owosso, passed away Saturday, Feb. 23, 2008, at his home. Mr. Roth owned and operated the Inspiration House Christian Bookstore in Owosso.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:40:41 GMT


Like most married women, Redondo Beach resident Deanna Lapen remembers the exact spot where her husband proposed.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:40:36 GMT


The bus rolls off the avenue and into the crowded parking lot. The passengers peer out the window.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:40:36 GMT



American Airlines on Monday insisted it tried to help a passenger who died after complaining she couldn't breathe, and disputed the account of a relative who said that she was denied oxygen and that medical ...
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:29:45 GMT


A local teacher agreed to get the procedure and we show it on-air and online In as little as fifteen minutes, you could spare yourself from one of the nation's leading cancer killers.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:01:53 GMT


Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wants federal help with equipment shortages affecting the California National Guard because of deployments to Iraq.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 19:56:02 GMT


Princeton-based Battelle Ventures, LP today said it has led a $9 million Series B investment in Nistica, Inc., a maker of high bandwidth networking equipment.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 08:00:00 GMT



Turkey says it is not targeting civilians as it chases after separatist rebels in northern Iraq, but people in Iraq's semiautonomous Kurdish region say they have lived in fear since the incursion began.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 18:56:16 GMT


The age-related memory condition known as mild cognitive impairment is more disruptive of day-to-day life and relationships than once believed, gerontology researchers at Virginia Tech have discovered.
Mon, 25 Feb 2008 21:35:20 GMT

Monday, September 03, 2007

Home Schooling - The Details

For an increasing number of American students, their homes are also their schools. Although estimates vary, perhaps more than one million students are now educated at home by their parents, rather than at public or private schools or by hired educators such as tutors. That number has grown from just over 10,000 or so in the 1970s when the modern "home schooling" movement was born.

Home schooling is now legal in every state and is gaining greater acceptance as a mainstream alternative to traditional schooling. In the past, home schoolers - parents who choose to each their children at home rather than send them to schools-were often regarded as a fringe group. In the public mind, they were commonly viewed as eccentrics or segregationists who did not want their children to mingle with people of other races or other religious faiths. Some home schoolers in the past were in fact forced into secrecy as a result of compulsory education laws in every state that require all children of a certain age (often from ages seven to 14) to attend public or private schools.

Yet dissatisfaction with public schools has made many parents more receptive in recent years to different education reforms, including home schooling. Consequently, public attitudes toward home schoolers have begun to change, laws have been amended to be more accommodating to home schoolers and the movement is attracting a greater diversity of parents.

Traditionally, religious concerns have been the key factor in parents' decisions to teach their children at home. Frequently, such parents object to the secular curriculum of public schools and what they view as the rejection of religious faith in the classroom. Too often, home schooling proponents say, the spiritual and moral values that parents teach at home are undermined by what is taught in the schools or by what their children experience in their dealings with other students.

Certainly, conservative and evangelical Christians continue to be the most ardent advocates of home schooling and have probably done more than anyone else to publicize the issue. Yet a different type of home schoolers has been prominent in recent years. They include many parents who are driven to home schooling less by religious conviction and more out of frustration over the quality of public schools in general and the cost of private schools. They cite factors such as school violence, gangs, drugs, unhealthy peer pressure and an overemphasis on competition as reasons for keeping their children out of traditional schools. Whatever their motivations, however, home schoolers feel that they can provide a better quality education for their children by taking on the responsibility themselves.

Supporters of home schooling often frame the issue in terms of personal liberty and freedom. They contend at parents have a fundamental right to raise and educate their children, without the involvement of any form of government. They often characterize public schools as dreary, uninspiring institutions that dampen children's enthusiasm for learning and weaken students' individuality. They also argue that, compared with students in schools, children who are home schooled perform better academically, retain more of an independent spirit and have a greater eagerness to learn.

Critics of home schooling include many liberals and educators, as well as some education groups such as the National Education Association (NEA), a teachers' union. Opponents worry that a child who is educated only by his or her parents will lack the social skills that students learn by interacting with their peers at school. They defend traditional school as places where children of all races and classes learn to interact, cooperate and develop the interpersonal skills that are essential for achieving success and being comfortable in the world. Some are also concerned that not all parents who home school are qualified to teach the spectrum of subjects that children need to learn before they go to college or enter the workplace. Others argue that in order to gain a full education, students need to be exposed to a variety of viewpoints an educational ideas, not just those of their parents.

The issue of home schooling raise many questions, including how an whether to regulate it. Should a parent without a high school education be allowed to teach his or her children at home? Should home schoolers be required, like other educators, to get certified by local boards to teach? Who, if not the government through regulation, will guarantee that home schooled children Are actually getting the education they need? Should the government have any say in exactly what children need to learn anyway? Should the government have the power to decide which parents are qualified to teach their own children at home?

Update:

The Education Department estimates that, in 2003, more than one million children were home schooled in the U.S., up from 850,000 in 1999. Many home-schooling advocates, however, say that the actual number may be well over two million. Whatever the exact number, it is clear that more and more parents are, for a variety of reasons, choosing to eschew formal public or private schooling in favor of an at-home education for their children. The rise of the home-schooling movement, as its supporters call it, has been "one of the most significant social trends of the past half century," according to home-schooling expert Patricia Lines.

The successes of the home-schooling movement have been well-documented. According to one study, children who were home schooled achieved an average score of 1100 out of a possible 1600 on the SAT, a popular college-entrance exam, in 2000. By contrast, the national average that year was roughly 1019. Although some education experts have described the methodology of that and other such studies as faulty, advocates tout those statistics as proof that home schooling works.

Home schooling is now legal in all 50 states, with varying regulatory guidelines. But as more and more families to turn to home schooling as a viable alternative to traditional schools, opposition to it is also growing. Many critics say that by refusing to expose their children to a diverse public school environment, parents who home school their children could actually be stunting their children's social development.

Reasons Parents Choose to Home School Their Children

Is home schooling an effective way to educate children, giving them the freedom to pursue their interests in a familiar, comfortable setting? Or are home-schooled children missing out on the learning experiences that can be provided only by interacting with a diverse group of fellow students?

Advocates maintain that home schooling gives children the freedom to study what they are most interested in rather than following a rigid, pre-determined curriculum. Some parents also tout home schooling as a way to teach their children religious values, which they say are absent from the secular public school system. Supporters contend that home schooling allows them to play a greater role in the lives of their children, so that they can protect them from negative peer influences with regard to problems such as drugs and violence. Also, some backers say that the education provided by U.S. public schools is inadequate.

Critics of home schooling, however, argue that home schooling can have a negative effect on a child's development by sheltering him or her from the outside world. Unlike traditionally schooled children, home schoolers are not subject to diverse viewpoints, opponents maintain; their limited experiences could hinder them as they enter adulthood. Additionally, some critics say they worry that home schoolers receive subpar educations due to limited resources and too narrow curricula.

Retrieved September 3, 2007 from the public domain content of the United States Government @ gpoaccess.gov