From the LA Times as reported by the Pew Forum:
The Browning and Curto families, both of whom live in the South Bay, have embraced very different styles of education. But they now find themselves on the same side of a battle to continue teaching their children at home in the face of an appellate court ruling that home schooling in California must be conducted by credentialed instructors.
The February court decision is not being enforced pending appeals. The 2nd District Court of Appeal agreed last week to rehear the case in June, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger pledged to support new legislation allowing home schooling if the decision is not reversed. Meanwhile, the ruling has forged a rare alliance of religious and secular home schoolers.
I have a novel idea. Rather than fight the requirement to have credentials that basically license you to teach, why not just attain those credentials? It is a good thing to have training in pedagogy and learning. Why not attain the highest level of training you can to make yourself a better teacher for your children's sake? Why not become part of the community of teachers to learn from each other and have a deeper understanding of how to best help your children learn? Why not learn what the requirements are for accrediting agencies and have a better handle on what it is that colleges look for? The argument that a homeschooler should not need to have these credentials seems to reinforce mediocrity than to promote excellence in education.
The family's Christian faith was the primary reason they decided to home school.
"I felt it was something God called me to do for my children," Curto said.
She worries that in a public school, her children would be exposed to topics such as same-sex marriage or that holidays like Christmas would be marginalized…
But Curto insists that she has no interest in sheltering her children — she said she taught Caedyn about Darwinism alongside creationism.
Math comes next on the morning's agenda, with Chamberlain practicing subtraction while Caedyn does word problems.
Curto has designed most of the lessons, but the children are also in classes at Hope Chapel in Hermosa Beach: Chamberlain is taking knitting and volleyball; Caedyn is studying grammar and composition.
As they get older, the children will probably take academic classes such as high-level science through their church or a community college.
She is not sheltering her children…by sheltering them from the things to which they might be exposed in public school? This mitigates an important set of lessons that parents need to teach their children in addition to what they learn in schooling outside of the home – how to live a certain way in a world that is fundamentally different. My advice is to be excellent in your teaching. Fighting the requirement to get credentials is not practicing excellence at all but is establishing a pattern of mediocrity and selfishness with one's children.
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The usual arguments against accreditation are the following:
a) Accreditation means two years of inane classes at considerable expense.
b) There is no evidence that accreditation improves teaching.
I am not a home schooling advocate, but my own experience teaching the numerous kids at church is that the home schooled kids are more mature than their public schooled peers. Probably an anthropologist can give some reasons for this, but perhaps homeschooling emphasizes building relations and role models across generations, while public schooling encourages role models from peer relationships. The US, having determined that discipline is a violation of human rights, has some of the worst problems in the public schools associated with least common denominator moral leadership by peers.
The usual arguments against accreditation are the following:
a) Accreditation means two years of inane classes at considerable expense.
b) There is no evidence that accreditation improves teaching.
I am not a home schooling advocate, but my own experience teaching the numerous kids at church is that the home schooled kids are more mature than their public schooled peers. Probably an anthropologist can give some reasons for this, but perhaps homeschooling emphasizes building relations and role models across generations, while public schooling encourages role models from peer relationships. The US, having determined that discipline is a violation of human rights, has some of the worst problems in the public schools associated with least common denominator moral leadership by peers.
As a product of traditional academia — I know that most people from that side of things cringe at homeschooling. But I'm not familiar with any work that has shown that homeschooling is an inferior choice — From what I've seen of high schools these days, it would be hard to do worse.
As for credentials, what would you have to be credentialed to do? Elementary school? High school english, science, math? All of it? Seems kind of dumb to me. Our education problem in this country does not lie with homeschoolers, it lies with the lack of parental involvement. That is a difficult problem to fix.
As a product of traditional academia — I know that most people from that side of things cringe at homeschooling. But I'm not familiar with any work that has shown that homeschooling is an inferior choice — From what I've seen of high schools these days, it would be hard to do worse.
As for credentials, what would you have to be credentialed to do? Elementary school? High school english, science, math? All of it? Seems kind of dumb to me. Our education problem in this country does not lie with homeschoolers, it lies with the lack of parental involvement. That is a difficult problem to fix.
Good observations, Drew. The problem with some home schooling parents is they THINK they know rather a lot but in fact they don't know much at all.
Good observations, Drew. The problem with some home schooling parents is they THINK they know rather a lot but in fact they don't know much at all.
The problem is in quality teaching. Better school districts can afford higher price tags to lure better teachers. The parental involvement is, I think a correct observation as well subtracting the phenomenon of hyper-involved "helicopter parents".
Paul – "All of it?" Yes. If you are going to teach your kids all of the subjects and also design an effective curriculum that properly assesses learning outcomes, all of it. You cannot teach unless you have tools that allow to to understand what they are actually learning and how they are learning it. The Praxis test ensures that teachers in teacher education programs for el. ed. can do basic competencies that they can teach. And don't confuse that with No Child Left Behind. Different policy, different issue.
Looney – accreditation is not about improving pedagogy as it is about achieving a minimal set of standards for curriculum. Professional development is one of the areas generally targeted for teachers. Portfolios that are self-reflective tools that are shared are also part of the process. Teacher education and development is more than what the minimal standards are that need to be met to be accredited.
The issue is that the state has no means to determine if home-schooled students are actually meeting these stated goals without some tie in to the accrediting bodies of the state, one of those being certification compliance for teachers.
Jim – all I need to do is post on homeschooling or inerrancy and I can almost calculate a visit
The problem is in quality teaching. Better school districts can afford higher price tags to lure better teachers. The parental involvement is, I think a correct observation as well subtracting the phenomenon of hyper-involved "helicopter parents".
Paul – "All of it?" Yes. If you are going to teach your kids all of the subjects and also design an effective curriculum that properly assesses learning outcomes, all of it. You cannot teach unless you have tools that allow to to understand what they are actually learning and how they are learning it. The Praxis test ensures that teachers in teacher education programs for el. ed. can do basic competencies that they can teach. And don't confuse that with No Child Left Behind. Different policy, different issue.
Looney – accreditation is not about improving pedagogy as it is about achieving a minimal set of standards for curriculum. Professional development is one of the areas generally targeted for teachers. Portfolios that are self-reflective tools that are shared are also part of the process. Teacher education and development is more than what the minimal standards are that need to be met to be accredited.
The issue is that the state has no means to determine if home-schooled students are actually meeting these stated goals without some tie in to the accrediting bodies of the state, one of those being certification compliance for teachers.
Jim – all I need to do is post on homeschooling or inerrancy and I can almost calculate a visit
Drew, my local school district with Mission San Jose High School is ranked at the top of the public schools in Northern California. (There will typically be several kids who score a perfect on the SAT every year.) We are also starved for cash, thanks to anomalies related to property taxes which were allocated 30 years ago when this was a rural farming community. The local schools are in terrible condition – much worse than neighboring communities including inner city Oakland.
Actually, MSJHS could be cited as evidence of an inverse relationship between school funding and academic performance. Of course the real reason for the high performance is all of the pushy Asian parents.
Regardless, the California public school system can't handle an influx of 160,000 home schooled kids. If the parents of home schooled children started signing up for education classes in the community colleges, the situation would be catastrophic, because young people studying for a career as public school teachers would be competing for scare classroom space.
Drew, my local school district with Mission San Jose High School is ranked at the top of the public schools in Northern California. (There will typically be several kids who score a perfect on the SAT every year.) We are also starved for cash, thanks to anomalies related to property taxes which were allocated 30 years ago when this was a rural farming community. The local schools are in terrible condition – much worse than neighboring communities including inner city Oakland.
Actually, MSJHS could be cited as evidence of an inverse relationship between school funding and academic performance. Of course the real reason for the high performance is all of the pushy Asian parents.
Regardless, the California public school system can't handle an influx of 160,000 home schooled kids. If the parents of home schooled children started signing up for education classes in the community colleges, the situation would be catastrophic, because young people studying for a career as public school teachers would be competing for scare classroom space.
As the husband of a high school science teacher, I think you would be shocked by the basic pieces of education that a lot of kids don't know — like algebra, writing skills etc.. A great teacher can help get an otherwise ambivalent student excited and motivated for short periods of time, but it takes parents to actually get their child to make school a priority in their life. Everyone wants to lay this at the feet of the teachers, but there is only so much they can do. I strongly agree that we need more money for education (paying teachers) and we need to make it more of an emphasis in our culture. But I think parents who are too involved (helicopter) are much more preferable to parents who are absent. So homeschoolers are really not part of the problem, but part of the solution IMHO.
As the husband of a high school science teacher, I think you would be shocked by the basic pieces of education that a lot of kids don't know — like algebra, writing skills etc.. A great teacher can help get an otherwise ambivalent student excited and motivated for short periods of time, but it takes parents to actually get their child to make school a priority in their life. Everyone wants to lay this at the feet of the teachers, but there is only so much they can do. I strongly agree that we need more money for education (paying teachers) and we need to make it more of an emphasis in our culture. But I think parents who are too involved (helicopter) are much more preferable to parents who are absent. So homeschoolers are really not part of the problem, but part of the solution IMHO.