I am a homeschooling mom...

[agilebrit]

And I will not wank. No, I won't. Not there, anyway. Eh. *grabs a tissue and cleans up* Seriously, I couldn't let that go.

However, all you have to do is look at the "quality" of fic at FFN to see the sort of "education" that public schools are churning out. Semi-literate snowflakes who bristle at the merest hint of criticism? Pretty much.

Yeah, not in my house. Da Boy already gets corrected if he doesn't capitalize "I" or the word at the start of a sentence, and he's seven. And I don't think I'm stunting his creativity.

Comments

[upstart-crow.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'll add some more thoughts :)

I loved middle school and high school, which probably makes me kind of a rarity among people. But I hated elementary school because I was bullied and even sexually assaulted by other students from about ages 7-11. This severely impacted my ability and interest in learning and kept me in pretty basic classes for the first two years of middle school, because I was about a D student throughout elementary school. I actually was abused so badly that I developed PTSD and have spent thousands in therapy trying to treat it. And this was in the 1980s and early 90s.

If I ever have a child (I don't want to and don't intend to, but hypothetically), I would prefer to home school him or her because I wouldn't want my child to go through what I did - which was to learn how to be traumatized, not to stand up for myself and "work things out on my own" (preposterous!). I don't think, however, that this is necessarily a flaw in public schools but rather a social flaw in understanding how much each individual child needs in the way of protection from their peers.

As far as the socializing argument goes ... I basically had only a few friends in high school and almost none in college because I was a depressive, socially stunted mess thanks in part to being bullied as a child. So I don't think I learned a darn thing about socializing from public schools, either. In fact, I think I learned awful socialization and coping strategies as my default.

However, I also had wonderful teachers at all stages of my education, and only one public teacher who was lazy and incompetent. The rest were fair to outstanding, and more often than not it was the students' fault for not wanting to learn from them. I'm not entirely sure how one can push education on a student who doesn't want it in any schooling arrangement, including home school. I mean, you can punish a child or teen for not doing his or her homework or goofing off, but you can't make them do it - or want to do it - in the first place, yeah?

[agilebrit.livejournal.com]

Most of my teachers were pretty good too, and we moved all over the country as an Army family.

I'm firmly convinced that children learn nothing good from each other. And involvement of parents in education is paramount. Unfortunately, I see a lot of attitude amongst public school teachers that "they know best," and no one screeches louder than they do when parents get too involved. As long as parents are going along with everything they're doing the teachers are all for parental involvment, but let a parent buck against the braces and the teachers don't like that at all, generally.

[upstart-crow.livejournal.com]

Oh I think I disagree a bit. I learned many good things from my friends as a child. From children as a group, perhaps not, but I wouldn't discount children learning good things from other kids entirely. :)

Parents definitely need to be involved with their kids' education. But I don't know as parents are always right or justified when they do buck against the braces (awesome phrase, by the way). When would you say that teachers get like this when parents get involved? (I would guess you mean sex education, but I may be wrong).

[agilebrit.livejournal.com]

Sex education, definitely, for one. Personally, I'm going to see to it that Da Boy gets a "comprehensive" sex education, but from the standpoint of "If you're going to be STUPID and have sex before you leave my house, here's how to protect yourself, marginally, and nothing is 100%, and, by the way, condoms won't protect you from HPV, so wait until you're married to be safest plz."

And the other major area is evolution. Which can of worms I'd really rather not open right now. :)

[upstart-crow.livejournal.com]

Hee . No problem at all on not opening up the evolution debate :).

Actually, I quite agree with you on your comprehensive sex ed. Waiting until you're married (or in my case, in a committed relationship) makes the most sense to me, and if I had a child I would definitely raise her or him with this belief - knowing, of course, that s/he may not follow it. And while condoms and the like can protect one and often do, they're not magical. It's good to note that.

My personal biggest problem is with abstinence-only programs. I can understand why people support them, but I don't think they're all that helpful. I wish more parents would actually talk to their kids about sex openly, and that more kids felt comfortable asking questions and having such discussions with parents. I could with my mother, and I think I'm pretty healthy for it.

[agilebrit.livejournal.com]

Abstinence works every time it's tried (except that once). I'm really planning on mainly arming him with reasons to say NO, because I'm a realist and understand that these pressures will be brought to bear on him. And he needs to learn how to stand up for himself and be true to what he believes in. Which is my job as a parent to teach him to do, and I'd rather not have a school system with a cavalier attitude teaching him that it's okay to have sex as long as he's really in love. Not that we do that in Utah (I don't think)--YET, anyway.

[upstart-crow.livejournal.com]

I don't think the idea is that it's ok to have sex if you're really in love - just that if you're gonna do it for whatever reason, there are safER ways to do it that you should think about trying. After all, even if condoms aren't 100% effective they can be the difference between getting an STD and not. Not that I disagree with you about abstinence - just that for every student who plays it smart, there'll be others who won't who might need options.

I think it's honestly about disease control and stopping teen pregnancies for students who won't be abstinent, not about teaching free love or amorality. I mean, I don't think you'd find many teachers who would say, "yeah, teens having sex is totally awesome and empowering!"

[agilebrit.livejournal.com]

You might be surprised, sadly. And I'm pretty sure they don't try to put a stigma on teen sex, because, you know, that might make the little darlings feel bad. Personally, I think it needs to be stigmatized. The last things kids need to be worrying about, on top of everything else, is getting pregnant or an incurable disease. If we teach them it's DUMB and try to put the opposite sort of peer pressure on it, I think that's far better than a dry "here's how you do it" with no morality (for lack of a better word; it's not quite the word I'm looking for) attached.

[upstart-crow.livejournal.com]

Well, my education in 1995 was abstinence-only, so I only have that to go on from personal experience.

IT's definitely good to teach them that it's a dumb idea (a dumb idea and a really awful choice though, not that they're somehow immoral or awful or bad if they make that choice - and especially not if they get pregnant or an STD because a fellow student rapes them - because that creates a ton of other problems).

I don't see how stressing abstinence while teaching students how to be safe if they don't remain abstinent is a conflict, though. Especially if you tell them that there may be consequences - such as disease and unwanted pregnancy - even if they try to be safe.

The thing is, teens have always had sex and I don't think the demographic ever will stop having sex no matter what adults do, say or offer. I do think the best way to stem it though is through a comprehensive sex-ed course and with parental involvement. Although, for kids who have parents who are unconcerned, or who even may have sexually abused their kids themselves, I don't know what you do there. :(

[agilebrit.livejournal.com]

Right with you on the rape issue. If I ever hear about Da Boy putting any kind of pressure on a girl, he'll be grounded until he's thirty. And I'll also be beating myself up, because if he does that, it'll mean that I didn't do my job as a parent to teach him that that sort of behavior is horrid.

Teen pregnancy rates have been dropping over the last few years. I don't know why, but I like to think that it might have something to do with abstinence education taking hold.