Topic : 11/24 Great School Debate

I'm self-employed, by choice and hard work, so that I can have the flexibility to meet not only my own needs but those of my family.

My kids were done with the candy after 2 days...my husband had to take the rest into work and leave it in the lunch room to get rid of it. :)

Well said.  I too have one child in public school.  He's a sixth grader at Bellmont Middle School and is on the Honor Roll.  I also homeschool my two youngest boys ages 7 and 5.   My 7 year old has ADD and I was tired of the constant nagging to put my son on medication.  He doesn't need to be medicated.  To make a real long story short, we pulled him out of school,  purchased curriculum and he is excelling.     I just hope Fridays show doesn't put a negative light on all homeschooling. 

Oh...so this was just because of a couple of jerky teachers? That's much different then how it was first described.

Your childhood is also to train you to be an adult.

 

And my kids learn how to make responsible choices by being allowed to make their own choices while they're young, and they get to experience the consequences of those choices when the stakes are much lower.

 

Does this mean I don't provide any guidance to my kids?  No.  I give them the information they need to make their own choice.

 

Silly example:  My son recently wanted a red hot chili pepper from the grocery store, saying he wanted to eat it.  His dad loves hot chilis, makes his own hot salsa, so it's not unreasonable to expect my son to have similar taste buds (he already has a much more discerning palate than I do and it wouldn't surprise me some day if he ended up becoming a chef).  Anyway, I tried to steer him to the  red bell pepper which I knew he'd like, but he declined, stating he wanted the hot one.  I told him (jokingly, not in a condesending tone), 'you're gonna burn your lips off!' and he laughed.

 

Got home, washed the pepper, and he took a huge bite (after I told him he might want to take a tiny bite first).  Nope.  Bit a huge chunk.  A minute goes by, and he says, Mom, you were wrong, it's sweet, and goes to take another huge bite.  I told him he should wait a minute before doing that.  No sooner did he take another bite than the pepper bite took effect.  We were both laughing as I poured the milk and handed him some bread to help take the sting out.

 

I could have not bought the pepper (it was 8 cents).  I could have just said no.  I could have told him it was too hot and not let him take a huge bite.  I'm a grown up, right?  I know these things.  Why wouldn't I want to stop him?  He's 8.  He's not stupid.  And worst case scenario?  He has hot lips for a few minutes. 

 

And he also knows his mom tells him the truth, doesn't ridicule him when she's proven right, and helps out with the consequences (milk, bread, and a hug).

 

No, we're not talking about that.

 

We were talking about respecting the RIGHTS of others to make choices, lest we find our own RIGHTS taken away.

 

And since this is a homeschooling board, the religious homeschoolers were the pioneers to guarantee that we all have the right to homeschool.  And now there are groups who would seek to regulate homeschooling further, taking away homeschoolers freedom of choice.

 

And if you are considering homeschooling your own children someday, as you claim you are, then this is a real issue.  You don't have to agree with the religious right and their views.  But you should respect their RIGHT to homeschool in the manner they choose.

 

That was my point earlier.

I have a husband who plays Devil's Advocate with me constantly,  for fun, so I'm used to it. :D

I agree that there needs to be a line.  But the line we have now is being tip-toed over.  It is no secret the NEA and Teacher's Unions (not necessarily teachers themselves, who generally have no choice but to join the union) want to get rid of homeschools, private and charter schools - and they openly support candidates on state and national levels to further that agenda - to keep pushing the line, bit by bit.

You see foster parents on the news, why?  Because children in their care were allegedly abused.  Yet nobody airs on the news the daily influx of children who are abused by their biological parents - where is that outrage?  The public school system fails/graduates students who can't read or function all of the time, churns them out like candy - yet which failures will you hear about, sensationalized on the news?  The homeschoolers.  The so-called fringe groups who are doing something the mainstream society as a general rule could not fathom doing - be it caring for abused children or homeschooling their own.  A myriad other examples also apply...

What if your kids don't have the luxury of a self employment?

What I am trying to get at here is that, and I am SURE you do, cause you seem like a very caring mother (father? sorry I didn't catch your sex yet) make sure they understand that in the adult world people cannot solve their problems, depressions and heartbreaks by zoning out of life for a week.

I dismissed that comment because you couldn't possibly be serious.

 

The actions you proposed were infringing on the rights of your children and putting them in harms way.  In our area parents who let their kids play with the hot stove unsupervised so that they get injured get charged with neglect and the kids taken by DCF.

 

Your rights end where another's rights begin.  You don't have the right to harm a child, nor purposely allow your children to be harmed.  We're not talking about harming our kids here.

No, just one particular elementary school.  The principal had to do some serious backpedaling...