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Homeschool Questions and Criticisms
- This topic has 23 replies, 12 voices, and was last updated 15 years, 7 months ago by
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I’ve started this topic in response to our recent discussion on answering tough questions about why we homeschool. The idea is to build a list of common questions and good answers we can all use as a reference.
Let’s start by listing the most common questions. We’ll leave the answers for a little later. After some time of collecting questions, I’ll organize them and start discussions to collect answers. If we have a good response we may move everything to its own special area.
So what questions and criticisms do you hear?
I’ll start by moving over the question mj posted in the previous discussion. It is, of course, the one we all hear. It is often known in homeschool circles as the big question or the “s” word: “socialization.” Here’s how mj put it:
A criticism that we face on a weekly basis is “Your kids need to be with other kids their age. Homeschool is fine, but when do they get to be away from you and with their peers? They need friends their own age.”
Don’t you plan on putting them into a middle school or high school? You’re not a teacher, so how can you do it? How do you do it with each of them and not go insane?
Why do you Homeschool when they will only learn(information) as much as you know, (like if you didnt take chemisty or geometry how will you be able to teach it to them?)
Why would you want your kids with you all day?
What about a “high school diploma”?
How will they ever get into a college?
Don’t you want them to be independent and Be ALL they can be, how can you do that with them in your house “sheltering them”?
This is my favorite one….Are you smart enough to homeschool? ( I am a nurse and enjoy answering that one)
Here is a comment that often I think needs an answer. I don’t think I have the patience to homeschool. (Again I have an answer for that one too, but it isn’t always the most diplomatic one)
I should hang my head in shame.
The latest question I got…
“If you are not going to send them to highschool, how are they going to be able to handle the social pressures of going to college?”
One we hear regularly…
“So did you do school this week?”
Because obviously the only way you are learning is if you are pulling out the textbooks every day.
Here’s one that blew me away: Isn’t homeschooling a very elitist decision? After all, taking a child out of an educational system which is in obvious disarray may be fine for that one student, but it does nothing to improve the situation for all of the other children who are left in school. Isn’t homeschooling then, an ungenerous act because those parents who choose it are shirking their duty to the other families who stay in the system, and if middle and upper class parents leave the school, this removes active and concerned parents who might otherwise fight for needed improvements? I really don’t like this question, it seems that no matter how graciously I try to answer I always end up looking like an insensitive jerk who is merely “circling the wagons” around my children and leaving others out in the cold.
Oh, and here is one that I’m certain is VERY close to the Shafer family’s heart: So, you have a child on the autism spectrum (or, simply special needs as it could apply to more folks)… shouldn’t she be in a school program with professionally trained experts in order to ensure that she will develop to her full potential? Isn’t that going to be way too hard on you and your other children to have to deal with the daily struggle of her special needs AND the educational needs of all the children?
A lot of public schoolers have told me that they choose to put their kids in school to be the “salt and light” to the other children and the teachers. My response is that even Jesus didn’t start His public ministry until He was an adult.
From non-homeschoolers – What about socialization? My response is to point out what socialization is – the passing on of values, morals, etc. and that I don’t want other children and adults doing that for my kids. If they are talking about socializing, well, I wasn’t supposed to do that in school anyway. 🙂
Thanks everyone for the great questions. Feel free to add more as you think of them.
We just made a new Homeschooling Questions and Answers section on the forum (down under the Mom’s Porch area). I moved this topic over there too.
Let’s do this: I’ll start a new topic for each question and everyone can jump in with answers and discussion. I think I’ll just post one question at a time so we don’t overwhelm the entire forum topic list all at once. Then I’ll post the next question after everyone has a chance to discuss the current one.
Sound good?
Doug, that sounds great! Good idea to focus on one question at a time, incase anyones like me and gets overwhelmed with too many Q’s at once. 😉
I get comments more than questions –
* I don’t have the patience to do that. You must be a saint.
* Mothers should have their own lives.
* The schools around here are great!
And, of course, the socialization question we all get time and time again.
Alright, I posted the first question: What about socialization?
You might want to think about answering in some different ways for different people. For example, you might answer Christians differently than a non-believer. Likewise, you might answer your parents differently than someone you meet in the grocery store. And one of my kids added that there may also be times for snappy one-liners. 🙂
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