I'm sorry that I'm too tired to perhaps argue my points with enough solid proof or many links and statistics. So excuse me.
I don't believe in the superiority of homeschooling compared to public schools.
Naturally it depends a lot on the country that is being observed. E.g. in my home country the public shcool system works very good and we have no need whatsoever for homeschooling, and I would be willing to compare the students from our public school system to the ones in your homeschools any time. We have only a few, small private schools and they are mostly run by religious people wanting to educate the children in a "healthy" environment. But enough of them, point is that because of the size of the US and the state of your public education system you may have a need for homeschooling. So while it may apply to your country it shouldn't be considered an universal truth. We have very equal learning possibilities in Finland no matter where you live and the teaching is good quality, while in the US (please correct me if I'm wrong) there are e.g. great differences between the quality (and safety) of schools in different areas. These kinds of things create the need for private schools and homeschooling.
Like it has been said in the earlier posts, the main responsibility for raising a child should be held by the parents, not the school. The school educates, while parents and friends make the child the adult he/she is going to become.
Some of what you talk about souds really strange to me, e.g.:
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Originally Posted by fatboy
Your children get to learn what you think is important, rather than what a vocal minority of parents believe they should learn.
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Do the parents in the US really have a say in what is thought in schools?
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Originally Posted by fatboy
1. Your children have the opportunity to learn far more than they ever will in public school.
2. You get to watch your children grow up, not only physically but mentally and emotionally as well.
10. You get to watch your children grasp new concepts and remember what it's like to learn something new.
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I think yankeefan made some good comments on these.
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Originally Posted by fatboy
Again, yes of course. My point is that public schooled children get bombarded by false information, even when the parent is fully involved.
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They don't where I went to school. But I would assume that in a country that flips its wig over one breast the sexual education would be telling about bees and honey... And if the parents and children talk about these issues with their right names and naturally, some false information from school wouldn't change the child's mind. Parents are a much stronger influence in a child's life than school.
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Originally Posted by fatboy
There have been far more highly educated people coming out of homeschooled environments than public school systems. Even if you exclude the time before there were public schools, I would bet that the ratio of "highly educated" coming out of homeschool environments would be higher than that of public schooled children. Homeschooled children also have a higher average score on national standardized tests than public schooled children.
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Again, this may apply to the US but not to other countries, at least not to my home country. And I would like to see the research you base this on.
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Originally Posted by fatboy
Yes, homeschooling is the ultimate in parent participation. However, even a parent that is participating fully in their public schooled child's growth doesn't get the opportunity to see the little daily things that effect that child.
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I'm not convinced that it is the healthiest thing for a child's growth process to spend every day all day with his parents. Children need to learn stuff they cannot learn by staying home with their parents. They need to be able to do the stupid things teens do and then learn from their mistakes. You can't raise your child in a bubble. I just don't believe anyone who claims that a child will learn and experience the same social aspects at home that he could learn in a public school. I agree with yankeefan here also.
Fatboy, you say public schools are cruel. For a very few they can be, but not in general. Although I'm of course speaking only about my own experience and Finland.
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Originally Posted by fatboy
Yes, it could happen. But the fact is we put our children in schools that look more like prisons than fun places to learn. They are taught a curriculum that is geared toward the lowest common denominator. They are placed into a social situation that breeds a disrespect of authority for the sake of simply being disprespectful. And this goes on for 35+ hours a week. Even a fully involved parent has a small sliver of that child's time in which to teach the fun side of learning. And before he/she does that, they have to surmount all of the negativity that the child gets throughout the week.
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I have a feeling that your experience of public schools differs quite dramatically from mine. Prison? A 5-day negativity trip? Sounds like a pretty strange concept to me.
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The point is, you create the dress code - not some failed bureaucrat or some gansta rappa.
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The point is, and I think this is what yankeefan was saying also, that they have to leave home sometime. And they can't be wearing pyjamas when they do. Even if you teach them that they don't have to follow the trends and they can just use overalls all the time, the rest of the society doesn't change. Their friends will be wearing the "trend" clothing and when your highly educated kids go to apply for a job in a big law firm or whatever, they will have to get in the suit just as everyone else.
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My point is that it's easier in a homeschool environment.
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I think vacation planning is not a good reason to change to homeschooling. The kids have a long summer vacation almost everywhere I think. Here the parents have a 4 week vacation in the summer, so the planning is not a problem to us.
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As I pointed out, homeschooled children are more active in their communities, politics, and have more stable and rewarding (according to them) personal relationships.
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You state this as an undisputed fact. Doesn't sound that reliable.
According to me I'm better looking than Brad Pitt and smarter than Stephen Hawking...
I can't help it, but when I think of a homeschooled, "highly educated" person living in a rewarding relationship and participating actively in his community, I see this elitist guy walking around in his tweed jacket surrounded by his upper class friends and laughing with a brit accent at the common people and their stupidity. "Hey chaps, anyone down for a game of tennis? Right ho!"
Only Jeeves is missing...
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Why can't they get it from home? My kids get a lot of interaction with other kids. They have friends in the neighborhood, they have friends at the various activities they do. There are groups of homeschooled children that they get together with at various events (going to the museum, the zoo, a ball game). Are you under the impression that homeschooled kids are locked in their houses all day?
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The kids going to public schools also socialize with their friends outside school. But the time they spend in school with their peers, the homeschool kids spend mostly with their parents.
It's hard for me to believe that a parent with no education for theaching any subject could know as much as, say 20 teachers, who have all studied to become qualified teachers of their subjects. You'd have to know of course all the basics like math, English, biology, geography, history etc. but also foreign languages (though this is not perhaps a problem for Americans since they don't need to learn other languages... ;) ), music, painting, physical exercises and so on. It would take a long time for someone to master all of these in such a manner that he would be able to teach them efficiently to someone.
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Originally Posted by yankeefan
Parents need to get back into participating in their kids lives. They need to take some of the responsibility for their education and growth. They need to be there for their kids.
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I totally agree also. It seems nowadays parents are all the time in such a rush to build their careers or attend to their hobbies or something else, that they don't have any time for their children. Then they buy their kids a Playstation and GTA for christmas, that should keep them happy....