Making the decision to home school is, on the face of it, not an easy one. There are many questions that need to be asked, and answered, before you can take this very significant step in your child’s education. What can influence the decision is an idea of some of the benefit of home schooling.

So here are some things to think of.

1. Your child will get one to one attention with you. The issues associated with large class sizes will be gone forever.

2. Noone knows your child better than you, so you can tailor the lessons to suit your child. That will be something that could never happen in a conventional class room.

3. If your child is someone who is particularly susceptible to peer pressure, then home schooling can alleviate the problem. With your child completely under your control, you not only dictate the curricular activities, but the friends and social elements of their day.

4. Family life can return to how it should be. No more strangers passing at the breakfast table.

5. Many children get wrongly labeled with ‘learning difficulties’ when all that they needed was a different approach. If your child falls into this category, you will be best placed to evaluate your child’s needs and requirements.

6. Scientific studies indicate that home schooled children can come out ahead in every measurement. Other factors may affect this of course, but the indications are that home schooled children achieve more academic success than their traditionally schooled counterparts.

7. Research also indicates that home schooled children actually have better social skills than traditionally schooled children. This rather flies in the face of most people’s beliefs.

8. Although not a statistic that should affect your decision making, every child taken out of the state controlled education system actually saves the tax payer around $9000 per pupil per year.

Whilst it is not a task to be undertaken lightly, there are compelling reasons for educating your child at home. It can be argued of course that the benefit of home schooling will not be so strong for all children, but equally, there are many who could benefit significantly from home tutoring.

The article was written by Charlie Cory, who is the owner of Teaching Your Kids. Teaching Your Kids provides advice about home schooling your children.

Visit his website about the benefit of home schooling now.

Bookmark to:

In this second article about Home Schooling we’re going to discuss exactly how home schooling works.

The most logical question about home schooling would have to be, “How can a student learn when there is not a trained professional teacher there to teach the student?” The truth is, most people are so convinced that the traditional method of teaching is the only way that works, that they can’t possibly imagine home schooling being successful.

In truth, home schooling is different for every family. Because there is no traditional classroom each family is free to educate it’s child the way they feel is best, within reason of course as you want to make sure the child is properly prepared to be able to go out in the world and handle whatever job or profession he or she is interested in pursuing.

One method that families use is where they take the child’s interest and curiosity in a subject and help the child explore the subject. The idea is that there are opportunities to explore many subjects like math, science, history, geography, English and many others. By encouraging a child’s normal curiosity eventually all the subjects that would be taught in a conventional classroom get covered.

Another method that families use is that they buy all the books and supplies that a school would buy and follow a normal school curriculum. The material is simply taught at home in a small setting instead of in a large classroom. The theory behind this is that the child is not distracted by his surroundings, feels more comfortable at home and therefore can concentrate better on his studies.

The question many people ask is, “Do children really learn anything in a home schooling setting?” Statistics show that, at least at the college level, students do very well. Obviously this depends on the student and the family. Some children work very well on their own and can actually accelerate beyond a normal work load. Others don’t have as easy a time and must take things at a slower pace. That’s one of the great advantages of home schooling as each child can go at his own pace.

The majority of critics feel that a home schooled child will be at a disadvantage when applying for college admission or a job because they don’t have an official diploma to fall back on. The actual truth is that most colleges and employers are willing to look past that if the child can demonstrate a skill in a more personalized way. Many colleges encourage applications from home schooled children because they feel the child will be more well rounded and therefore help to form a more dynamic and diverse student body.

When all is said and done it basically comes down to the student. One student who would be a straight A student in a traditional classroom could totally bomb out trying to learn at home because they don’t have the structure that they need. Another student who would be lost in a traditional classroom because he can’t keep up with the mandatory pace would be a great home schooled student because he would be able to take things at his own pace and might even, in the long run, become better educated than his traditionally schooled peers.

The debate will surely go on.

——————————————————-
Michael Russell
Your Independent guide to Home School
——————————————————-

Bookmark to:

Home Schooling. Let’s start off by saying that home schooling is not just for the rich and powerful. Anyone can be home schooled. How do we know that? Because today in the United States there are over 1.2 million students being home schooled. It is doubtful that all of them are very rich.

Yes, home schooling does cost money but a child can be home schooled for as little as $1000 a year. Unless a family is truly poor this is not a large sum considering that comes out to about $3 a day. We spend more than that on our lunches at work.

So what about home schooling as far as it’s benefits? Is it worth it? Do kids learn better? Are they smarter when they finish? Is there anything about home schooling that is bad?

Statistics show that students who are home schooled have better grades and actually learn more than students who go to public or private schools. Of course many people argue these statistics saying they are skewed and inaccurate and some say they are outright lies.

Why the battle?

Because the one truth that can’t be argued is that home schooling is eating into public and private schools’ pocket books. The growth rate for home schooling has been rising about 15 to 25% per year of late. This is about 20% of the students outside the government school system when you look at the raw numbers mentioned above. Another 250,000 children are expected to enter home schooling in the coming year.

The number of home schooling students do present a threat to government schooling, as they are finding that you don’t have to hire super qualified teachers to get a good education for your child. And the truth is, an average family only spends about 10% of the per pupil cost that public schools spend on each child, which refutes the theory that you need to spend a lot of money to educate a child.

This does pose a significant economic threat to public schools since their school budgets depend on attendance. It is estimated that over $7 billion has been lost to public schools because of the number of children who are being home schooled.

Home schooling families are also a very powerful force in government. When a bill was introduced that all home school instructors be certified the home school community made such a loud noise that the bill was defeated by a vote of 424-1 when it came up in the house.

In an attempt to battle back, defenders of the public school system are fighting with every legal resource at their disposal. One of their tactics is the undermining and co-opting of the home schooling movement by establishing government home schooling programs which try to lure families by offering them free resources. Yes, the battle goes on and it won’t be ending any time soon.

In the next article we’ll go over exactly how home schooling works and how students earn their diplomas.

——————————————————-
Michael Russell
Your Independent guide to Home School
——————————————————-

Bookmark to: