Homeschooling: A Growing Trend

2157 Words5 Pages

Introduction

Today, many parents are homeschooling their children. A U.S. Department of Education’s report shows that approximately 1.5 million children were being homeschooled in 2007 (Lips & Feinberg, 2008). This is almost 3 percent of all school age children (Lips & Feinberg, 2008). A private researcher, the National Home Education Research Institute, estimates 2.5 million children were being homeschooled in the 2007 – 2008 academic years (Lips & Feinberg, 2008). By either count, homeschooling is growing exponentially.

Parents have been teaching their children at home for centuries. During the 1970s, the interest in homeschooling increased. Legal advocates had lots of opposition when pressing for the legal right to educate their child at home and change compulsory school attendance. The National Education Association fought to place restrictions on home schooling. However, most of the efforts have failed. As a result, homeschooling is legal in every state.

Reasons for Homeschooling Growth

There are numerous reasons why parents turn to homeschooling. Changes in the families and public schools drive the increase. Public schools grew larger, more bureaucratic, and more impersonal. Parents felt more alienated as the school was less responsive and less adaptive to cultural needs. This was combined with the loss of the Christian culture and curriculum the parents found offensive or against their social values (Gaither, 2008).

The major reasons for homeschooling cited by two-thirds of the parents interviewed are concern about the school environment, dissatisfaction with the academic programs, and the desire for religious or moral instruction (National Center for Education Statistics [NCES], 2004). Parents feel ...

... middle of paper ...

...ated, this was not true of the homeschoolers. The homeschoolers also tended to vote more often. They were also involved in more community service than the general population. The homeschoolers were not isolated, but politically and socially active (Ray, 2004).

Conclusion

There are a growing number of homeschooled students and it appears homeschooling is successful. Most parents homeschool because of the environment, both academic and moral. The states need to insure all children are being educated. However, the requirements vary by state. Michigan is the most liberal, not even requiring homeschoolers to report to the state. The internet has expanded the types of homeschooling. Combined with the availability of the public school system for specialized programs, homeschooling is now a more popular option. Homeschooling will continue to be a growing area.

Show More
Related

  • An Inside Look at Homeschooling

    916 Words  | 2 Pages

    Homeschooling is becoming more popular in today’s society then before. Homeschooling is teaching school subjects to one’s children at home (Merriam-Webster Dictionary). But is homeschooling the best way to educate children? Homeschooling can bring more positive outcomes versus public or private schooling. This is because homeschooling can bring many benefits such as family orientation, no worries about bullies, less exposure to bad influences like drugs. Also it has a good success rate, adaptable cost, and flexibility. Homeschooling will keep increasing year by year. According to Dr. Brian D. Ray about 2% to 8% per annum was the growth over the past few years. For these and many more reasons is why parents choose to home school their children.

    Read More

  • Homeschooling: Navigating Socialization and Morality

    710 Words  | 2 Pages

    Homeschooling is becoming a huge trend across America. It does have its downsides to it, just like any other education. Many parents have to worry about the right way of letting their child have socialization. Without proper socialization, a child can lack proper social skills. Many parents fear the temptations public school can provide, so they homeschool their children to bring them up with holy and moral attitudes. No parent wants their child to hang around other children who abuse drugs, alcohol, or can misguide their children down a wrong path. With homeschooling, parents can monitor whom their children socialize with and for how long. Fearing to not have any socialization at all is where parents can go wrong.

    Read More

  • Homeschooling: A More Beneficial Approach to Education

    1640 Words  | 4 Pages

    First, homeschooled children work more efficiently than public schooled children. Because homeschooled children receive more one on one attention than children do in public school, they receive the assistance they need to understand a lot faster than they would in a classroom with twenty other students. This allows them to get extra attention for things they

    Read More

  • Reasons Being Homeschooled

    3014 Words  | 7 Pages

    In order to determine whether Homeschooling is indeed promising, one must first understand the reasons why people choose to Homeschool. According to Reich, Homeschooling is appealing to many families because of the capability to almost entirely customize education for their children. Many families want to homeschool because they do not feel that their children’s spiritual and moral needs are met in public schools.

    Read More

  • Argumentative Essay About Homeschooling

    832 Words  | 2 Pages

    Homeschooling is often portrayed as an overprotective mom - unwilling to let her kids leave her for a day at school, and a large number of children, all unable to hold a conversation, let alone function normally in society. As someone who was homeschooled from kindergarten through eighth grade, I can attest that my homeschool experience was the exact opposite of this confining stereotype.

    Read More

  • Homeschooling

    1043 Words  | 3 Pages

    Some people argue that homeschooling is the way to go, because parents have more choices. Some families who homeschool believe that homeschooling is better than school, because regular school is government mandated, so the government determines what is necessary for children to be learning. These families get to choose what they think is critical for their child to learn and they think that all families have the right to define what their child is learning and that they should have complete control. A few families choose to homeschool because they want to decide what kind of education their child is getting and base it around their religious beliefs, because they think that schools have become too separated from religion. In Virgi...

    Read More

  • Homeschooling

    1856 Words  | 4 Pages

    Homeschooling has been around for a long period of time. People wanted their kids to be homeschooled for a number of reasons. They felt like their kids was just part of a system and that their kids was missing out on a real education. In the 1970s John Holt, “began arguing that formal schools’ focus on rote learning created an oppressive classroom environment designed to make children compliant employees (J. Gary Knowles, Stacey E. Marlow, & James A. Muchmore, 2015).” It’s ok to be a compliant employee but people want the best for the kids and the only way for that is for your kid to be the boss. With that statement John got a few people to buy in and follow his movement and started homeschooling their kids. With homeschooling as a parents you wear a lot of different hats, so with that said you have to have a lot of patients with your kids because they’re going to ask a lot of questions. People need to have some

    Read More

  • The Benefits of Homeschooling

    966 Words  | 2 Pages

    Parents decide to homeschool their children for multiple reasons. The most commonly given reason for homeschooling is religious and/or moral values. These reasons make up roughly seventy-five percent of parents. Some of these parents want more spiritual lessons taught that would not be provided in other schools. Others do not want their children to learn about evolution theories or sex education. The second most popular reason for hom...

    Read More

  • Negative Essay: Homeschool Or Public School?

    1552 Words  | 4 Pages

    While the majority choose to do so for academics, the reasoning goes beyond simply that. Homeschool families are often stereotyped as extremely religious and attempting to hide their children from the corruption and sin of the world. Families that do keep children out for these reasons are still prevalent within the homeschooling community; my mother contemplated homeschooling me and my brothers for this reason, and one of my best friends is homeschooled in a religious home. As homeschooling grows more mainstream, more families believe that public school squashes a child’s creativity and attempts to conform all children into the same person. Lynn Schnaiberg, a writer for Education Weekly, gives the reasons for four homeschooling families in her article “Staying Home from School.” In this article, the first family, the Scandora’s, believe “learning is not a product of teaching” and that their children should be free to learn at whatever pace they want. Another family featured in Schnaiberg’s article, the Collins family, is dissatisfied with the Baltimore city schools, which had some of the lowest test scores in the state. The Hoyt family has two children who are considered “gifted.” Because public schools do not give proper attention

    Read More

  • Homeschooling Thesis

    719 Words  | 2 Pages

    Studies have shown year after year that homeschooled students consistently perform just as well as (or in many cases better than) traditionally schooled students on standardized academic exams. But very rarely does anyone ask why this is, or what caused the student to do so well, because they are usually too concerned with questions about the student’s social life or if they would be able to handle the transition into college. Therefore, my thesis statement is: Homeschooled students often achieve higher academic success and are more active in their communities than traditionally schooled students, due to a personalized approach to learning that emphasizes individuality. My research paper will debunk some popular myths about homeschooling, and give the real reasons why homeschoolers are so successful.

    Read More

  • The Benefits of Home Schooling

    659 Words  | 2 Pages

    Education in some places maybe are poor, this reason has increased homeschool, since the education your childs is something that will help achieve many of their goals in life ( Sunday Times).

    Read More

  • The Benefits of Homeschooling

    1420 Words  | 3 Pages

    In today’s American society, quality education is important for one to succeed. Without proper education, a person will find it extremely difficult to apply for college, a job, or to pursue his or her dream. Typically when Americans think of education, public education is the first to come to mind. Public education has been around for centuries and is provided to most children throughout the United States. Due to this fact, public education has been the go to education source for years. Though, this trend is slowly changing with many parents deciding to home school their children instead. Many factors are the cause for this issue, but the common arguments arise from a certain few. For students, public school provides many opportunities ranging from social connections, school sports, and the exposure to teachers who are experts in their fields. But homeschooling is often superior because it offers additional time for students to participate in various extracurricular activities and community service, allows for more individual attention, personal character development, and it offers less exposure to discrimination that is received in the public school environment.

    Read More

  • The Negative Effects of Home Schooling on Students

    1834 Words  | 4 Pages

    There are many reasons for homeschooling a child. These reasons include, religious reasons, lack of a good public school district, and distrust of any school district for one’s child, to name a few. Many professionals are completely against the practice of home schooling, says Thomas Shannon, executive director of the National School Board Association. He says that home schooling is “a giant step backward into the 17th century. (Stencel, 1994)

    Read More

  • Reasons Why Parents are Choosing Homeschooling

    945 Words  | 2 Pages

    As the population in public schools increase, the problems in these schools are also on the rise. These changes are leasing to the way parents are schooling their children. Many parents are leaning towards homeschooling as a solution to this problem. This increase in homeschooling can be directly related to an increase in school violence, the offering of a lack luster curriculum, and lack of student teacher interaction.

    Read More

  • The Pros and Cons of Homeschooling

    2520 Words  | 6 Pages

    ...l that it is a decision that a parent needs to make, based on what they feel are important standards for learning. Home schooling provides a more relaxed environment, with a one on one learning environment and a flexible schedule. It also provides a pace that is best for the child, an environment on areas children want to focus on as well as confident student who doesn¦Ðt have to deal with the feelings of others. However, it decreases the socialization of the child, less exposure to different ethnicities and a limited view of the real world. The parents probably do not have the knowledge they need to teach, there are more distractions to deal with and parents may not know how to teach. These ideas are serious to think about and only add to the controversial idea of home schooling.

    Read More

More about Homeschooling: A Growing Trend

Open Document