Irish Translation Forum

breandan_ui_ciarraide wrote:This is why so many of us homeschool. It's odd, but the supposed "backwards" mentality of living on a farm and educating your children in the home actually is being proven to turn out upstanding, hyper-educated, hardworking honourable folks. Guess it goes to show that 8,000 years of known human history held onto that for a reason

I agree. My daughter would have been homeschooled long since, but she really resisted the idea (she's wanted to go to school with other kids since she was a tiny toddler and first realized that such a place existed). We've eaten up our savings sending her to private school these past four years (five, really, as we've paid for next year in advance). After that, the money for schooling is gone, and if she doesn't win the lottery for the charter school, it's going to be homeschooling for her. I think she's actually kind of warmed to the idea, now that she realizes it DOESN'T mean that she won't be around other kids...there are lots of homeschooling groups here, and the museums and libraries actually support homeschoolers with special materials and activities.

Redwolf

Ailill wrote:Homeschooling? In the UK it's illegal not to sned your kids to school. I don't think homeschooling is allowed.

Here it's legal in all 50 states, but each state has its own criteria for allowing it, and you are required to prove that your children are being educated to at leat the minimum standard the state requires (usually through regular testing). Some states require you to use a prepared curriculum, others require you to work through the local school district (our area is like that...they offer "counseling," which I intend to ignore, and regular testing, which is required), others are less regulated. It hasn't always been so...in some states, parents have had to fight tooth and nail for the right to homeschool their children. Opponents raise all kinds of arguments, but Breandan's right...homeschooled kids consistently get high test scores, and, when they're ready to go to college or get a job, prove to be every bit as social and well-socialized as traditionally schooled kids.

The U.S. does require that all children receive schooling between the ages of 7 and 16 (and provides free public education for children between the ages of 4 or 5 through high school graduation), but you can provide that at home, so long as you can prove that your child is getting AT LEAST what he or she would be getting in public school.

Redwolf

Here's another thing that will probably shock you, Ailill...U.S. high schools regularly graduate students who are illiterate, or barely literate...who couldn't tell you when the U.S. Declaration of Independence was signed or what the Magna Carta was, who have no idea how to do the simplest algebraic equation. We have nothing equivalent to Ireland's Leaving Certificate or England's A levels. There have been pushes for years to require graduation testing, and some states have tried to implement it, but they face A LOT of resistance. California passed a minimum-standards test for graduation a couple of years ago, but parents and students are actually fighting it...senior scheduled to graduate this year are complaining "but we haven't had time to prepare!" (Hello? Haven't they been in high school for FOUR YEARS????). It's also not unusual for children to be passed up through the grades even if they haven't met the minimum standard for their previous grade (because "holding them back might damage their self-esteem").

A couple of years ago, we hosted an exchange student from Germany. She was only 16, but was enrolled in senior-level classes in our local high school. Even then, she was shocked at how little she learned. After speaking to her friends back home, she became terrified that she would fall so far behind her class in math that she wouldn't be able to advance to the next grade (and she was taking senior-level algebra!). She took an American History class, and didn't learn a single thing about American History that she didn't already know! She came home every day complaining about students sleeping or talking on cell phones in class, and teachers who wouldn't do a thing about it (the schools here are paid by the student per day, and so teachers are very reluctant to send malingering students home or to detention). It's scary!

You know, the more I think about it, the better emmigration sounds....

Redwolf