←back to thread

Homeschooling hits record numbers

(reason.com)
193 points bilsbie | 5 comments | 21 Nov 25 00:31 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
Show context
kylehotchkiss ◴[21 Nov 25 19:26 UTC] No.46007963[source]▶
I can't say my public school experience was great, I was bullied and didn't really click with the popular kids, but being around a cross section of actual American kids in my age group (my school district mixed middle class with lower class neighborhoods) helped me shape my worldview and learn to deal with people who didn't look or talk like me. I frequently saw fights, so I learned that you just stay away and watch your mouth around specific people. I learned that the BS American value of "popularity" doesn't translate into successful futures.

I worry this move to homeschooling and micromanaging children's social lives just creates bubbles and makes children incapable of interacting with those outside of them.

replies(26): >>46008144 #>>46008201 #>>46008204 #>>46008219 #>>46008249 #>>46008284 #>>46008461 #>>46008724 #>>46008770 #>>46009026 #>>46009153 #>>46009306 #>>46009372 #>>46009898 #>>46009969 #>>46010107 #>>46010193 #>>46010400 #>>46010464 #>>46010990 #>>46011059 #>>46011090 #>>46011389 #>>46011422 #>>46011455 #>>46011460 #
swannodette ◴[21 Nov 25 19:51 UTC] No.46008204[source]▶
If you can afford it! "Grass-roots segregation hits records numbers" would be an equally fitting title.
replies(1): >>46008324 #
nlavezzo ◴[21 Nov 25 20:01 UTC] No.46008324[source]▶
What leads you to believe the reason parents are willing to dedicate huge amounts of their time and money to homeschool their children is racism?

Maybe it's:

  - the terrible educational state of the school system?

  - the fact that device and social media addiction is a prevalent and growing problem that they don't want their kids brains rotted by?

  - they want to provide their kids an education based on experiential and project based learning rather than filling out worksheets? 

  - they don't want their kids to be forced to wait for the slowest / least interested kids in class to catch up before moving on to more challenging material?
replies(6): >>46008353 #>>46008448 #>>46008544 #>>46008601 #>>46009046 #>>46009294 #
sevensor ◴[21 Nov 25 20:22 UTC] No.46008544[source]▶
I’m sure these motivations do play out in some circles. However, every single homeschooler I know personally, and I know quite a few, does so because they want their children to have a very specific kind of religious education. Often the way this plays out is that they homeschool for a while, transition to a denominational school, and then depending on the family they may stay there or make a second transition to public school around 9th grade.

I think this tendency is heavily dependent on where you live. We have great public schools that will track advanced children aggressively if the parents push for it, so the motivations you list are unusual in my area.

replies(2): >>46008964 #>>46009547 #
1. BrenBarn ◴[21 Nov 25 21:02 UTC] No.46008964[source]▶
Religion is definitely a big motivator. My perception though is other motivations have been on the increase, especially since the pandemic. One other group attracted to homeschooling is the hippie-type who thinks school is some kind of diabolical machine designed to crush kids' souls. Since the pandemic there's also been a big surge in the "I don't trust vaccines" group (which already had a good deal of overlap with the hippie group).
replies(1): >>46009136 #
2. ryandrake ◴[21 Nov 25 21:22 UTC] No.46009136[source]▶
I have a feeling a really large percentage of homeschooling is about religious separatism and political separatism, and not about academic performance. Yes, you'll hear HN commenters sing the praises of homeschooling because this site is going to be disproportionately represented by the group doing it for actual educational reasons.

Also, we HN commenters typically see the success stories around us at work, not the failure stories. We all know that guy on the QA team who's a genius and credits his success to homeschooling, but we don't know the countless numbers of grown adults who are trapped as housewives who can't get a job because they never learned 5th grade multiplication.

replies(2): >>46009173 #>>46009946 #
3. BrenBarn ◴[21 Nov 25 21:26 UTC] No.46009173[source]▶
That may be so, especially if you add a sort of "cultural separatism" (a la the hippies I mentioned). An odd thing I see recently too is people who seem to believe they're making various choices for educational reasons, but it's not clear if the education they're moving to is any better. They just do it because they perceive their child as being unhappy or stifled somehow. There seem to be, for instance, more and more parents who believe their kid is unusually smart and should be on some kind of fast track or not have to do certain things, even when there's little objective evidence of the kid's abilities.
replies(1): >>46009282 #
4. ryandrake ◴[21 Nov 25 21:38 UTC] No.46009282{3}[source]▶
Vague "educational reasons" is always the noble-sounding excuse they use, but often if you dig deeper they'll admit it's more about the various forms of separatism.

Sometimes you don't have to dig. A ton of moms in my wife's church group permanently pulled their kids out of public school in recent years, and they will openly admit that it's about keeping their kids away from "those" people, where the definition of "those" runs the gamut.

5. cosmic_cheese ◴[21 Nov 25 22:47 UTC] No.46009946[source]▶
Both were certainly major motivating factors for my parents’ choice to homeschool me in the 90s. Quality of education was a concern too, but it very much took a back seat to the other two.

The overwhelming majority of other homeschooling parents they had contact with also held separatist motivations.