Topic : 11/24 Great School Debate

I'd actually dare say a home schooled child passing the

tests show much higher intelligence.  Schools make

sure they spend at least a week preparing the students

for what they KNOW is on them tests to pass them so

the school can get required and more funds for thier school.

Politics is the factor not the children?

After the testing it goes back to the usual school days and

YES many children get left behind because of inability to adapt

in school for many reasons and a unhealthy home life?

I am sure home schooled has a few too but a parent willing

to give the home schooling shows more interest than most parents?

I have to say that I am very much like Dr. Phil in that I hated school as a child. I did not like the structure or the strict requirements that were placed upon me in my catholic school experience. However, I have come to realize as both an adult and an adult learner, who is currently in school, that it was that structure that was pivotal in the development of my childhood.

I recently wrote a paper comparing home schooling to traditional education for a "human development" course. I learned a great deal about home schooling that I was never aware of. I respect a parents’ right to chose for their child and appreciate the enhanced resources that home schooling parents have now available to them which may ensure a strong education for their children. There are certainly benefits to both traditional schooling and to home schooling. What is critical to realize is that it will be the bridge between the two types of educational formats that will truly afford parents, teachers and children the most benefit. It does not need to be an "us" versus "them" philosophy. At the end of the day, sharing resources between both types of educational forums will only help enhance the learning of our children.

As for the “un-schooling” that was talked about today, to me, it sounded like the most preposterous approach I have ever heard to teaching. Again, as Dr. Phil stated, preparing a child for the real world certainly requires a great deal of structure and becoming familiar with how life will be in the real world when they are asked to perform. By parents allowing children to do as they please, when they want, on their own accord, they are doing a disservice to them because this clearly does not mirror the real world. Instead, it harms them and only sets them up for failure in adapting to that new reality.   

Deep down I do still have my own reservations about the strength of a home schooling parent as compared to an educated, certified teacher. Having the rich training, ability and education behind a teacher does seem to me to provide the best opportunity for a child to really learn and grasp a topic. I often wonder how uneducated parents can truly provide the depth of education that is required for children to succeed. While they can certainly provide the unconditional daily love, support and resources, they must admit that they are restricted as to what educational depth they can really provide that would challenge a child. In a way, I feel it would compromise or hold back a child from reaching what could be their true potential.

Michelle Dickinson

New Jersey

I so agree, the basic life of who a child would be begins at birth

and continues with the parents and every person and event

they encounter.  I also think there is many

troubled children who found a savior in a teacher at some

point in their life.             Neither is all bad.

What happens at home can affect a child profoundly and no

manner of schooling can cure a unhealthy home life.

  What we seen on the show today does not define what

most who home school do!   This Mother does not have

a well balanced life going on for those children.  Obviously

a child receiveing a tooth roting, deforming bottle at 5 proves that.

With all these highly educated morons running around trying to overthrow America from within, they MUST agree with Nikita Khrushchev's (1964 UN) statement of we will LOWER THE MORALS, DIVIDE THE FAMILY and RE-EDUCATE THE CHILDREN. VIA Public/Government Schools.

As a person born in 1942, I have had the opportunity to watch how our country as it has gone down the tube with the introduction of MTV, violent games, guns and drugs in the kids hands. As an results in part by the organization known as the American Communist Liberation Union or is it the American Communist Lawyers Union, oh I’m sorry it’s the American Civil Liberties Union as they prefer to be known as.

I truly believe that the world would be a better place to live in if organizations like the A.C.L.U., N.O.W. and Coalition of Concerned Patriots, etc and many of the people of Hollywood could take their beliefs to Iran, Syrian, and North Korea, Germany, France, Russia, and other countries that would just welcome their efforts.

If they are truly anti-war organizations and overseers of the people’s rights, then go end wars somewhere else; the only war here in America is the war on anti-America activities.

When God was removed from the lives of our children, thanks in part to the aclu that is when guns, drugs, MTV, sex was introduced into their lives. And remember, our children spend more time with Government educators awake than awake hours with their parents/single parent. Again lower the morals, divide the family and re-educate the children.

There are countries on this planet that need their help a hell of a lot more then America, so please go there and help them re-educate their children, if you dare

I was watching your show on Home schooling v Government schooling/Public schooling and for reason expressed above I say take back the children and start renew the morals in the education system.

I am a teacher and wanted to comment of several things that you said.  First: FYI: teachers do a lot of research and incorporate learning styles into the classroom.  Your statement sounds like a false assumption.

The bottom line in parenting and growing up is that it takes a village.  Parents, no matter how well educated or well-intentioned, do not possess the ability to provide all of children's' needs.  Children need to have their own experiences with no parent there to fix the wrongs or take them out at an sign of adversity.  Children need to learn to try things that don't initially interest them and to finish things even if they don't want to. 

By having children raised so closely to parents, I believe these children to be stifled and crippled.  It may not seem evident now, but wait until college...the social gaps will be regrettably obvious then.  Most home school children either maintain some level of distance from the greater group or overindulge due to lack of exposure to issues like sex and alcohol.

Talk to you kids all you want.  Enroll them in a weekly soccer practice if it backs up your argument better.  If you really want to feel convincing, bring Science into the kitchen....no ones really buying it but it may make you feel better.   You can not recreate the atmosphere of school, the expertise of teachers or the rich experience for children.  Parents who enroll their kids in home schooling usually fit into one of the following categories:

Motivations

1) They themselves experienced social rejection

2)They themselves experienced academic failure

3)An irrational fear of "the world we live in today"

4) A selfish desire to experience everything that your child experiences so much to that you are willing to deny you child most if not all experiences that don't include you

5) An obsession with control

As I read through the pro homeschooling letters, I just enjoy attaching the motivation to their argument.  Notice...what is best for children didn't make the top five.