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My personal musings about anything that gets on my radar screen--heavily dominated by politics.

2006-11-27

It Doesn't Take Much To Paint the Whole Movement

I know a lot of people who home-school their children. In almost every case, the reason they do so is to get their children away from the PC indoctrination that seems to come along with public school attendance these days.

But, apparently, not in every case . . . .

On weekdays, during what are normal school hours for most students, the Billings children do what they want. One recent afternoon, time passed loudly, and without order or lessons, in their home in a North Side neighborhood here.

Hayden Billings, 4, put a box over his head and had fun marching into things. His sister Gaby, 9, told stories about medieval warrior women, while Sydney, 6, drank hot chocolate and played with Dylan, the baby of the family.

In a traditional school setting, such free time would probably be called recess. But for Juli Walter, the children’s mother, it is “child-led learning,” something she considers the best in home schooling. . . .

As the number of children who are home-schooled grows — an estimated 1.1 million nationwide — some parents like Ms. Walter are opting for what is perhaps the most extreme application of the movement’s ideas. They are “unschooling” their children, a philosophy that is broadly defined by its rejection of the basic foundations of conventional education, including not only the schoolhouse but also classes, curriculums and textbooks.

Also revealed in this article is the little tidbit that only 25 states even have testing requirements for home schoolers.

Now, two things emerge from this article for me:

:one: isn't this sort of what the establishment thinks all home schoolers do, anyway? As such, wouldn't it be useful for this movement to come up with some metrics to establish the viability of this program? Otherwise, it sure does make the whole idea look goofy; which, in turn, casts a bit of a shadow on all home schoolers.

:two: kinda makes you wonder what the NYTimes' motivation is in running this article. Oh, never mind . . .
Posted by: Michael / 11/27/2006 11:55:00 PM

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