Home Schoolers Threaten Our Cultural Comfort

[picchick]

[font="Tahoma"][url="http://www.djournal.com/pages/archive.asp?ID=274594"][font="Tahoma"][/font][/url]DISCLAIMER: This is an opinion article by a man named Sonny Scott [url="http://www.djournal.com/pages/archive.asp?ID=274594"]Article Link [/url]
[font="Tahoma"][/font]

[quote][font="Tahoma"]You see them at the grocery, or in a discount store.

It's a big family by today’s standards - "just like stair steps," as the old folks say. Freshly scrubbed boys with neatly trimmed hair and girls with braids, in clean but unfashionable clothes follow mom through the store as she fills her no-frills shopping list.

There's no begging for gimcracks, no fretting, and no threats from mom. The older watch the younger, freeing mom to go peacefully about her task.

You are looking at some of the estimated 2 million children being home schooled in the U.S., and the number is growing. Their reputation for academic achievement has caused colleges to begin aggressively recruiting them. Savings to the taxpayers in instructional costs are conservatively estimated at $4 billion, and some place the figure as high as $9 billion. When you consider that these families pay taxes to support public schools, but demand nothing from them, it seems quite a deal for the public.

Home schooling parents are usually better educated than the norm, and are more likely to attend worship services. Their motives are many and varied. Some fear contagion from the anti-clericalism, coarse speech, suggestive behavior and hedonistic values that characterize secular schools. Others are concerned for their children’s safety. Some want their children to be challenged beyond the minimal competencies of the public schools. Concern for a theistic world view largely permeates the movement.

Indications are that home schooling is working well for the kids, and the parents are pleased with their choice, but the practice is coming under increasing suspicion, and even official attack, as in California.

Why do we hate (or at least distrust) these people so much?

Methinks American middle-class people are uncomfortable around the home schooled for the same reason the alcoholic is uneasy around the teetotaler.

Their very existence represents a rejection of our values, and an indictment of our lifestyles. Those families are willing to render unto Caesar the things that Caesar’s be, but they draw the line at their children. Those of us who have put our trust in the secular state (and effectively surrendered our children to it) recognize this act of defiance as a rejection of our values, and we reject them in return.

Just as the jealous Chaldeans schemed to bring the wrath of the king upon the Hebrew eunuchs, we are happy to sic the state’s bureaucrats on these “trouble makers.” Their implicit rejection of America’s most venerated idol, Materialism, (a.k.a. “Individualism”) spurs us to heat the furnace and feed the lions.

Young families must make the decision: Will junior go to day care and day school, or will mom stay home and raise him? The rationalizations begin. "A family just can't make it on one income." (Our parents did.) "It just costs so much to raise a child nowadays." (Yeah, if you buy brand-name clothing, pre-prepared food, join every club and activity, and spend half the cost of a house on the daughter’s wedding, it does.) And so, the decision is made. We give up the bulk of our waking hours with our children, as well as the formation of their minds, philosophies, and attitudes, to strangers. We compensate by getting a boat to take them to the river, a van to carry them to Little League, a 2,800-square-foot house, an ATV, a zero-turn Cub Cadet, and a fund to finance a brand-name college education. And most significantly, we claim “our right” to pursue a career for our own
"self-fulfillment."

Deep down, however, we know that our generation has eaten its seed corn. We lack the discipline and the vision to deny ourselves in the hope of something enduring and worthy for our posterity. We are tired from working extra jobs, and the looming depression threatens our 401k’s. Credit cards are nearly maxed, and it costs a $100 to fuel the Suburban. Now the kid is raising hell again, demanding the latest Play Station as his price for doing his school work … and there goes that modest young woman in the home-made dress with her four bright-eyed, well-behaved home-schooled children in tow. Wouldn’t you just love to wipe that serene look right off her smug face?

Is it any wonder we hate her so?[/font][/quote][/font]

I think that this is a pretty good article except for a few things...I do not like the absolutes and generalization that this guy puts forth. Maybe I am being oversenistive however, with the heat that many homeschoolers are getting sometimes labels and the visuals he gives are not exactly the best.
My mom never had a home made anything that she wore every day...and I have seen homeschool families misbehave, not in the grocery store but in Church (and they were old enough to know the difference). Plus, my little brothers are not always on their best behavior. Also, I know families who do not homeschool and the mom stays at home and does not pursue a career. However, other than that I kinda liked the article.

[CatherineM]

I stayed home with mine because my career was over. I'd like to think I would have made that choice anyway, but I just truly don't know. I pulled the oldest out in 4th grade because I found out they weren't going to teach him multiplication tables because they were too busy getting them ready for the state testing. I also don't like the idea of cookie cuttering all homeschoolers. I've met some that very much reminded me of the little league parents paying private batting and pitching coaches to work with their 10 year olds, or stage parents, except instead of pushing them in baseball or modeling, they were pushing them in education. I've also met homeschoolers that had no business trying to teach their kids, and pulled them out of school out of convience. Most though are just trying to do the best they can for their kids, like most parents do, and don't need people stereotyping them.

[goldenchild17]

nice article overall. The intent of it was right on, but the over-generalizations is a little too much.

[Didacus]

The image it paints may not be the everyday reality, but the point comes across nonetheless.

[homeschoolmom]

Yeah, our family is not at all like that stereotype... However, I agree with the point that when one family makes a choice that is "countercoulter," other families do tend to seem a little defensive... when our choice really had nothing to do with other families.

[missionarybelle]

[quote name='homeschoolmom' post='1596855' date='Jul 10 2008, 09:41 AM']Yeah, our family is not at all like that stereotype... However, I agree with the point that when one family makes a choice that is "countercoulter," other families do tend to seem a little defensive... when our choice really had nothing to do with other families.[/quote]

same with us.

nice article on the whole.

[Apotheoun]

I teach at a small private high school, and the kids that were homeschooled up to 9th grade invariably are the top students in my classes.

[littlesister]

Good News for Once:

Latest news from California, where there has been a movement to outlaw homeschooling altogether on the grounds that the parents do not have teaching credentials:
From today's L>A> Times :
[i] " A controversial legal reuling that outlawed most forms of home schooling in California will face greater scrutiny because [u]the underlying family court case was dismissed earlier this week....[/u] "Home school advocates said Thursday's decision makes the appelate discussions moot.
"'It should make the whole thing go away', said Michael Farris, chairman of the Home School Legal Defense Association....'I don't see how in the world this case could be upheld...'" [/i]

[Autumn Dusk]

I think citing religious reasons isn't as valid a reason as it was when HS began to be popular. My friend in college best friend was an athest who's whole athiest family homeschooled. She was from a bigger sized city and she said they had athiest support groups just as they had Christian support groups.

Plus articles that generalize can be easily torn down (similiar to what Catherine said) becuase there are people who shouldn't homeschool, but do and do it for years and years. It wasn't the point of this article to mention that but it was so sweeping that it seems to make assumptions about homeschooling as a whole when its really not.

[Autumn Dusk]

[quote name='littlesister' post='1598918' date='Jul 12 2008, 10:01 PM']Good News for Once:

Latest news from California, where there has been a movement to outlaw homeschooling altogether on the grounds that the parents do not have teaching credentials:
From today's L>A> Times :
[i] " A controversial legal reuling that outlawed most forms of home schooling in California will face greater scrutiny because [u]the underlying family court case was dismissed earlier this week....[/u] "Home school advocates said Thursday's decision makes the appelate discussions moot.
"'It should make the whole thing go away', said Michael Farris, chairman of the Home School Legal Defense Association....'I don't see how in the world this case could be upheld...'" [/i][/quote]

The whole California case was around parents who had been proved abusive (and documented) who still faught for their right to home school even after (what seems validly and beyond a doubt) loosing custody of their children. They were returned months later after. It turned into a much bigger drama becuase the state had no other way to stop these parents and saw it as an inroad to stopping all others. Parents proven abusive fall into the category of "people who should not be allowed to home school" I understand many HS parents are falsely acused but then they are cleared...and thats not the same. However, in this case I don't blame the state for over-reacting to one family's poor decisions.

[picchick]

[quote name='Autumn Dusk' post='1599104' date='Jul 13 2008, 09:41 AM']The whole California case was around parents who had been proved abusive (and documented) who still faught for their right to home school even after (what seems validly and beyond a doubt) loosing custody of their children. They were returned months later after. It turned into a much bigger drama becuase the state had no other way to stop these parents and saw it as an inroad to stopping all others. Parents proven abusive fall into the category of "people who should not be allowed to home school" I understand many HS parents are falsely acused but then they are cleared...and thats not the same. However, in this case I don't blame the state for over-reacting to one family's poor decisions.[/quote]

I do bame the state. This would go under over-generalizations. Seeing the croutons that many states give homeschoolers, I feel that the state finally had something to say, "Alright, we got them!" It kinda of gave them the excuse to fight homeschooling families. It is very sad that homeschool families hide abuse by homeschooling but this is the exception rather than the norm. They need to exhaust all other means before doing something so drastic as to outlaw it all together.

I just want to make it clear that I agree with all of you that the article did use labels, sterotypes and generalizations. However, I always wondered why people fought against homeschooling. This article provided some insight (even though it was an opinion article) into that wonderment. I still am not getting the homemade dress...not even the families I know who wear exclusively dresses (well except the men) make their own.

Meg

[dominicansoul]

good article over all...it beats what a co-worker told me this week....she said "homeschoolers are the loons that are so repressed they grow up to kill their parents."

She's an agnostic who believes her way of raising children is the best. She teaches her girls that they have to figure out how to live their own lives, and decide whether or not there is a God. She tries not to influence them in any way, shape or form. (Great parenting skills!)

[Autumn Dusk]

[quote name='dominicansoul' post='1599175' date='Jul 13 2008, 02:29 PM']good article over all...it beats what a co-worker told me this week....she said "homeschoolers are the loons that are so repressed they grow up to kill their parents."

She's an agnostic who believes her way of raising children is the best. She teaches her girls that they have to figure out how to live their own lives, and decide whether or not there is a God. She tries not to influence them in any way, shape or form. (Great parenting skills!)[/quote]

Don't nark that mindset. I know of HS'ers (through my friend) that have that same sort of attitude. As long as its a "be what you want" and not a "be anything you want but Catholic" its a choice that parents do make based on how they were raised and pressures they felt. I had three close college friends...one was raised "Christian, anything but Catholic." And the other was raised athiest/agnostic with the choice of any religion (or lack of) she pleased. The second friend was FAR more open to the church, more respectful of the Eucharist and Catholic Sacred traditions. To her credit she also believed that life begins at conception for medical reasons and sounded much more intelligent than my other friend. Catholicism holds some pretty hard truths to fight when you research, and I think people who are raised to get to the truth (as opposed to those "bible-belt" types) have a much better chance of comming to Catholicsm.

Just becuase a parent picks that route doesn't make them a bad parent, and while I don't plan on raising my kids agnostic, the remark is hurtful to me as I think there is some good in letting children make choices in their spiritual lives and not influencing them too much. In good terms this could mean letting a child follow a certain devotion rather than forcing them to, say, pray the rosary. I'm of the mindset that kids, especially after communion age, need to be building their faith themselves so a crisis doesn't occur when they are teens...and that a parent is responsible for the minimal...attendance and understanding of Mass so that a child can grow in their own way without being stifled.

[CatherineM]

I did like the way Florida handled us when we homeschooled. I didn't have to have a teaching certificate, but I did have to have the boys tested once a year. I could have it done by a certified person of my choice, or I could just bring them to the nearest school for the week they had their standardized testing. I chose the second because that option was free. I did have to pay for testing when it was time to put them back in public school so that they could figure out what grade to put them in.

We had a really good support group that met once a week at a community center for a language class for the kids. That's something that goes across age groups so an 8 year old and 12 year old can easily take the class together. Right after mine went back to public school, the group got large enough to start fielding sports teams to compete against the public school kids.

I did meet some kids once being homeschooled that I was sure were being abused, and I was in the process of reporting it when I found out someone had beaten me to it.

[picchick]

[quote name='Autumn Dusk' post='1599252' date='Jul 13 2008, 03:49 PM']Don't nark that mindset. I know of HS'ers (through my friend) that have that same sort of attitude. As long as its a "be what you want" and not a "be anything you want but Catholic" its a choice that parents do make based on how they were raised and pressures they felt. I had three close college friends...one was raised "Christian, anything but Catholic." And the other was raised athiest/agnostic with the choice of any religion (or lack of) she pleased. The second friend was FAR more open to the church, more respectful of the Eucharist and Catholic Sacred traditions. To her credit she also believed that life begins at conception for medical reasons and sounded much more intelligent than my other friend. Catholicism holds some pretty hard truths to fight when you research, and I think people who are raised to get to the truth (as opposed to those "bible-belt" types) have a much better chance of comming to Catholicsm.

Just becuase a parent picks that route doesn't make them a bad parent, and while I don't plan on raising my kids agnostic, the remark is hurtful to me as I think there is some good in letting children make choices in their spiritual lives and not influencing them too much. In good terms this could mean letting a child follow a certain devotion rather than forcing them to, say, pray the rosary. I'm of the mindset that kids, especially after communion age, need to be building their faith themselves so a crisis doesn't occur when they are teens...and that a parent is responsible for the minimal...attendance and understanding of Mass so that a child can grow in their own way without being stifled.[/quote]


I think the way tha DominicanSoul was saying was fending for yourself. Children need guidance. They need guidance as an infant, toddler, child, and teen.

I think that children need to be brought up in something so that they have something and nothing growing up. Sure there is the chance that they will fall away from the Church. That does not make the child bad nor does it make the parent bad. Sure, it makes thing rough but nothing about it is bad. After communion they still need to have that guidance in the faith. They need guidance outside of spirituality so why not in the spiritual life too? Of course the child can be more participitory in their faith at this point but it really isn't until they are confirmed that they become "adults" in the Catholic Church. Even at this point I believe there needs to be guidance.

Guidace is not beating it into them, force feeding etc. It is just what it is. Guidance. Teaching. Explaining. Telling the why of what we believe rather than the "This is what it is...too bad so sad."

Meg