Homeschooling vs. Public Schooling

[Lord Vader]

I wish I could home school my kids, but it’s just not possible at this time in my life. I also don’t think I’m intelligent enough to teach them much.

Growing up in school teaches you to not trust yourself, so you don't trust your children to learn - a nice circle. The fear is real, I know, myself. Even after I was sure of my beliefs that fear remained, that voice that said, "come on, dude, you're fooling yourself. If you don't send your kids to school they'll become teenagers that can't talk or read or clean themselves..." and it was quite awhile before how I felt followed suit with what I knew to be right.

Having said all that, I'm not going to say, "no, no, go ahead and homeschool, you can do it". Instead I'm going to just ask you to do something that is easy; read about other homeschooling parents. The best place to start is the Home Education Magazine. My own public library carries it and back issues; so if your does, too, then that makes things easy. The magazine is also available online. Then there are books... I would start with author Grace Llewelyn. Hope that helps.

 

[Lord Vader]

MS,

My opinion is that Jefferson's University is feasible.

The concept that motivation needs to be instilled into kids so that they become "self learners" is a line sold in teachers colleges, and it is a profound, ludicrous untruth. I don't have to argue with you about this; it is now acedemic. There are more homeschoolers every year, a good percentage of them unschoolers. There are a dozen or so Sudbury type schools in America alone - and the notion that they wouldn't be possible without mass compulsory schooling (or the internet) is just madness on the face of it. But all that aside, these schools don't use coercion and they work - you hilariously side stepped that to try to make some weak point. You must have some emotional stake in the validity of "schools" as we have them that runs so deep you can't hear yourself when you're ridiculous.

 

[Mustard Seed]

MS,

My opinion is that Jefferson's University is feasible.

The concept that motivation needs to be instilled into kids so that they become "self learners" is a line sold in teachers colleges, and it is a profound, ludicrous untruth.

If it is a "profound, ludicrous untruth" then demonstrate how and why. I have several teachers and a couple parents who, without their insistance on teaching me certain things or pushing me to focus on certain areas I would not have the love of learning to the large degree that I have such today. To think that just leaving a child with a parent or two is always going to be enough to instill the highest level of desire to learn as possible is absured and demonstrably so to anyone that is or has been a parent and will honestly address the issue of child motivation. I conceed that many childeren will learn a great many things that they find to be interesting on their own. But I cannot, in light of all my life experience, believe that coercion, either from parents or other teachers is something that can be withheld from any child that would be well rounded and eventualy wise.

I don't have to argue with you about this; it is now acedemic.

If it's so obvious then demonstrating it in an irrefutable manner will not be all that difficult.

There are more homeschoolers every year, a good percentage of them unschoolers. There are a dozen or so Sudbury type schools in America alone - and the notion that they wouldn't be possible without mass compulsory schooling (or the internet) is just madness on the face of it.

You make several statements and a presentation of a fact or two and seem to hold that as a sufficient proof for the whole of your view? Demonstrate to me something on the scale and with the proficiency of one of these schools that is run without any reliance on the internet or added financial resources or some preasure from parents to, to some degree or another, coerce their children into some aspect of learning.

But all that aside, these schools don't use coercion and they work - you hilariously side stepped that to try to make some weak point.

Show me a case in which a child has begun and continued on in such without any coercion what soever from even a parent.

You must have some emotional stake in the validity of "schools" as we have them that runs so deep you can't hear yourself when you're ridiculous.

I have an emotional tie to defending the truth as I perceive it. Don't you? I kinda was under the impresion that most on this forum did.

 

[Lord Vader]

"Demonstrate to me something on the scale and with the proficiency of one of these schools that is run without any reliance on the internet or added financial resources or some preasure from parents to, to some degree or another, coerce their children into some aspect of learning."

Coherent much?

 

[Mustard Seed]

"Demonstrate to me something on the scale and with the proficiency of one of these schools that is run without any reliance on the internet or added financial resources or some preasure from parents to, to some degree or another, coerce their children into some aspect of learning."

Coherent much?

With two extra commas your cognative skills may now have the capacity to discern what is being said.

"Demonstrate to me something on the scale, and with the proficiency of, one of these schools that is run without any reliance on the internet or added financial resources or some preasure from parents to, to some degree or another, coerce their children into some aspect of learning."

Cognition sufficient?

 

[Lord Vader]

Are you meaning to imply that there is now nothing wrong with that sentence?

If someone wanted you to put your sentence into other words, could you, and what would that look like?

Did you ever see the movie, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest"?

Cognition sufficient?

 

[Mustard Seed]

Are you meaning to imply that there is now nothing wrong with that sentence?

I often wondered why legalistic works seemed so seemingly convoluted and wordy. The more I've gotten into discussing issues with people the more I see that often the only way to both clearly communicate what you want to say AND avoid either misunderstandings or people crawling rhetoricaly through holes in either your presentation or your logical constructs is to make them as exacting and comprehensive as possible. This reply is an example. I can think of easier ways to say it if I were talking to a sympathetic ear, and one familiar with my thoughts and views, but if I wanted to say the same thing to a critical and motivated opponent I don't see any way, at least not readily available (I don't have a decade in which to contemplate the simplist and most concise, yet accurate, response for each post), in which I can get as close to my answer being rhetoricaly and logicaly "bullet proof" as I want without using these words.

In other words, as disturbing as it may seem, I now more fully appreciate the exacting nature of legislations and litigeous and judicial papers.

If someone wanted you to put your sentence into other words, could you, and what would that look like?

Yes. Not much different in terms of complexity.

Did you ever see the movie, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest"?

Nope.

Cognition sufficient?

I hope.

 

[Lighthouse]

Lord Vader-
Mustard Stain does not know the meaning of coherence, or cognition.:nono:

 

[Lord Vader]

Uh huh, and you're comparing that sentence to the typical rigors of legalese? I can hear someone saying that you're just trying to get away from the discussion at hand, which you have done successfully.

You can re-word your sentence, you just don't feel like it right now?

Cognition and coherence are not the same thing.

 

[Mustard Seed]

Uh huh, and you're comparing that sentence to the typical rigors of legalese?

Not 'typical' legalese, per se. I'm not following Black's Law dictionary to a T.

I can hear someone saying that you're just trying to get away from the discussion at hand, which you have done successfully.

I'm not doing such. I can see that claim coming from someone too mentaly inept or lazy to try and grasp on to what was said.

You can re-word your sentence, you just don't feel like it right now?

I can hold your hand on a word by word picking apart of the sentence. Perhapse doing a gramatical diagrahm of the sentence will aid you in comprehension.

Cognition and coherence are not the same thing.

I never said or acted as though they meant the same thing. I was simply saying that your claim that the sentence lacks coherence is due to your lack of cognitive ability rather than any true incoherence born of faulty construction or improper word use. I think your inability to grasp that fact demonstrates a great deal of what I'm saying.

 

[Mustard Seed]

Lord Vader-
Mustard Stain does not know the meaning of coherence, or cognition.:nono:

Lighthouse is impotent in discerning other's capacities or degree of comprehension. He also rarely backs up his assertations with demonstrable proofs or demonstrations adequate to maintaining the logical and rational solvency of his statements.

 

[Huff]

Growing up in school teaches you to not trust yourself, so you don't trust your children to learn - a nice circle. The fear is real, I know, myself. Even after I was sure of my beliefs that fear remained, that voice that said, "come on, dude, you're fooling yourself. If you don't send your kids to school they'll become teenagers that can't talk or read or clean themselves..." and it was quite awhile before how I felt followed suit with what I knew to be right.

Having said all that, I'm not going to say, "no, no, go ahead and homeschool, you can do it". Instead I'm going to just ask you to do something that is easy; read about other homeschooling parents. The best place to start is the Home Education Magazine. My own public library carries it and back issues; so if your does, too, then that makes things easy. The magazine is also available online. Then there are books... I would start with author Grace Llewelyn. Hope that helps.

I've been read a lot of home schooling websites. I never knew it was that organized.

 

[Lord Vader]

I can hold your hand on a word by word picking apart of the sentence. Perhapse doing a gramatical diagrahm of the sentence will aid you in comprehension.

Have at!

 

[Lord Vader]

I've been read a lot of home schooling websites. I never knew it was that organized.

It's a word of mouth thing, which is as it should be in a free country. There are four kids I know right here at the University I'm at who were homeschooled. My wife just told me of a co-worker who was homeschooled. My neice in law has a friend who lives down the block who is homeschooled. I have to confess to being surprised when I finally read reports of how the numbers are increasing every year. The number that gets bandied about is 2 million, but that's the same number that was cited as an official figure in 2000! I have to believe there are more than that now.

 

[Huff]

It's a word of mouth thing, which is as it should be in a free country. There are four kids I know right here at the University I'm at who were homeschooled. My wife just told me of a co-worker who was homeschooled. My neice in law has a friend who lives down the block who is homeschooled. I have to confess to being surprised when I finally read reports of how the numbers are increasing every year. The number that gets bandied about is 2 million, but that's the same number that was cited as an official figure in 2000! I have to believe there are more than that now.

WOW

 

[Mustard Seed]

"Demonstrate to me something on the scale"

This means show me something that has the same degree, scope and influence as...


", and with the proficiency of,"

And something that also has the same effective nature to the same degree of efficacy as...

" one of these schools that is run"

...a school/homeschooling environment that is operated...

"without any reliance on the internet"

...without using the internet in it's administration, or in any of the means of educating and coordinating the items necesary to the education, or any aspect linked to the education (transport of learning materials either digitaly or via commercial or federal post)...

"or added financial resources"

...and also without using financial resources beyond and above those currently used by current homeschooling methoods used by the general populace of homeschooling participants...

" or some preasure from parents to, to some degree or another, coerce their children into some aspect of learning."

...or something that doesn't use coersion from parents to simply replace the force of either the government or some other commercial or buerocratic entity used by the current coercive education system.

 

[Lord Vader]

Show you something that has the same (I'll pick out one word) influence as one of these schools that is run without any reliance on the internet or video tapes or learning aides or materials or added (which I take to mean, govt. subsidy) financial assistance and without pressure from parents to use coercion or parents themselves using coercion?


Show you something that has the same degree of efficacy as a school that doesn't rely on the internet or other learning aids like a computer or added finances or without coercion?

A few problems. I wouldn't say Sudbury schools "rely" on learning aids. It would make more sense to say that when a kid wants to explore computers, a computer is employed (not "relied" on). I don't expect the govt. to fall over themselves to subsidize these schools, and the schools themselves might not want it for fear of strings being attached (homeschoolers themselves are leery of vouchers for the same reason). For this reason, Sudbury schools are expensive (as near as I can tell). But all of this is on their websites - they explain themselves in gory detail.

So you want me to show you an example of a school that is as good for children as a school that doesn't rely on learning aides like computers, doesn't get additional help financially, and doesn't use coercion... I would say that a school that can provide a kid with that which they are curious about, like a computer, is more helpful than a school that can't...

Does that help?

 

[Mustard Seed]

You asked for a demonstration of why coercive education, as has been in practice for roughly a century, could be proven to be effective. I demonstrated that the current system of homeschooling would not be possible if it were not for a vast array of things that were provided by a system that had coercive education at it's core. Things like computers and the internet would likely not have come into existance if it were not for the governemental education complex things like the internet would not have come into existance at such a date as it did (it was a computer network built up around research centers at governmentaly subsidized schools). So since I've demonstrated that the efficacy and availability of homeschooling would not be near what it presently is without the recent historic happenings that are connected to the existance of governmental education programs that coerced alot of people into education, you would not have homeschooling that would be as available or effective as what it currently can be.

 

[Lord Vader]

A pretentious writing style doesn't make you smarter, or sound smarter, or result in clear and precise communication.

Homeschooling is not a system. Homeschooling requires only supportive parents. The kind of world kids grew up in when they were peasants in Europe didn't have books, so they were illiterate. The kind of world the American farmer's kids grew up in had lending libraries, (after Ben Franklin invented them in 1731) which were popular in the colonies, so they grew up familiar with books and reading and writing (and used them to the extent that they were relevent to whatever kind of life they were living). Parents who unschool today have kids who are growing up in a world that has books and also cars and computers and grocery stores and banks... and so they grow up knowing about those things and they grow up knowing especially about whatever pursuit they happen to take up. See how that works? Care to name the logical fallacy of the argument that says we needed compulsory mass schooling so that the world would have stuff in it now that it didn't have a century ago so that once again compulsory schooling wouldn't be needed?

 

[Mustard Seed]

A pretentious writing style doesn't make you smarter, or sound smarter, or result in clear and precise communication.

Neither do your unsupported claims as to the uselessness of "mass coercive education" in our society result in clear and certain truths.

Homeschooling is not a system.

Then neither is terrorism.

Homeschooling requires only supportive parents.

Terrorism can require only a single person.

The kind of world kids grew up in when they were peasants in Europe didn't have books, so they were illiterate. The kind of world the American farmer's kids grew up in had lending libraries, (after Ben Franklin invented them in 1731) which were popular in the colonies, so they grew up familiar with books and reading and writing (and used them to the extent that they were relevent to whatever kind of life they were living).

Do you know how many kids in the history of America have had the kind of access to such librarys as you mention?

Parents who unschool today have kids who are growing up in a world that has books and also cars and computers and grocery stores and banks...

And you have some strange illusion that all that infrastructure was built around something utterly independent of the mass coercive education system that's dominated by that education system? You have a grand list of homeschoolers, I'm currious as to what the list of other schoolers would be, what innovations would they be responsible for?

and so they grow up knowing about those things and they grow up knowing especially about whatever pursuit they happen to take up. See how that works? Care to name the logical fallacy of the argument that says we needed compulsory mass schooling so that the world would have stuff in it now that it didn't have a century ago so that once again compulsory schooling wouldn't be needed?

Care to demonstrate the logical paradigm that allows you to claim that the pass century wouldn't be significantly different without the existence of the single largest overall governmental program in terms of it's average spending through the years?