Some time ago, Crimson Wife over at Bending the Twigs wrote a post entitled
In this post, she revealed some test scores showing that homeschoolers in charter schools fared worse academically each year they homeschooled. In the end, she works it, out pointing out that many homeschoolers move on to community college and higher education options, so these scores showed the lowest of the barrel.
I noticed another disturbing factor... something veteran homeschoolers have been warning us about for years. These test scores were from charter schools. Charter schools that have been used for years to lure insecure homeschools back under the umbrella of the public education system. That means these kids also among those whose parents are not actively involved in homeschooling their kids but simply have them at home doing public school work.
Do you know what these stats really tell me?... THAT PUBLIC SCHOOL CURRICULUM DOES NOT WORK in and of itself.
Now I am not going to tell homeschoolers to not use public school at home resources. I have met some "homeschoolers" who would not be able to function about it. But all homeschooling families must understand that true homeschooling where the parent gets down and dirty into the nitty-gritty of the curriculum and actively helps, assists, and researches is the only kind of homeschooling that will be ultimately successful in the end.
Ask any parent of a highly successful public school student how involved they were... you better believe that their journey would mirror that of a homeschooler, even with their kids in school... Why would any homeschooling parent expect to do less?
Curriculum is meant to be used as a tool... not a substitution for one-on-one tutoring. No one who understands this fact will have a child whose stats are as low as the ones in Crimson Wife's post:
Trust me... the doubters are wrong.
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4 comments:
The doubters are VERY WRONG.
My eldest started college at 16. He is currently working on his Masters in Computer Science.
My youngest is in his second year of college.
They were BOTH homeschooled for highschool by me.
Hopefully you find this sufficiently relevant:
http://betrayed-whyeducationisfailing.blogspot.com/2010/06/remedial-rates-spokanes-big-dirty.html
Ohh, and if you go to the home page and look around you will see some real doozie politicking for *math curriculum.* I had no idea that even teaching mathematics was so POLITICAL.
I am not sure if my husband will stand for homeschooling through high school for various reasons. But every year I can teach my middle kids is another year I'm able to shape their days. (Ok... that's humbling.)
Hi Andrea-
The virtual charters in my area do not require students enrolled to use public school textbooks. Parents are free to use whichever curriculum they wish- even religious ones (the school just won't purchase those for them). Most of the families I know who have children in the virtual charters use homeschool math programs like Saxon, Singapore, Math-U-See, Right Start, Teaching Textbooks, Chalk Dust, etc.
Certainly I have plenty of concerns stemming from the popularity of charters but the curriculum isn't one of them.
ohhhhhh...
oh!
That's curious. So they are only charter schools in name? and there for testing oversight.
That explains a bit, I sure would like to learn more about that!
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