by James A. Bacon
Three percent of Virginia’s school-age population, about 43,500 children, is being home schooled, reports the Capital News Service. If home schoolers constituted a school division unto themselves, they would represent the seventh-largest district in the state.
The number of home-schoolers in the state has grown more than 20% over the past five years. The percentage of kids educated at home is highest in rural counties. Floyd County and Surry County lead the pack with 14% of children receiving their educations at home.
What accounts for this remarkable growth? One factor is that Virginia has relaxed its laws on home schooling over the past 15-20 years. For instance, a parent is no longer required to hold a four-year college degree. Another is that the home-school “industry” has increased in sophistication, creating teaching materials, online resources, and collaborative models whereby families can share resources.
The article notes that many home-school families are Christian. The unstated implication is that many families are uncomfortable having their children educated with secular values in school systems where the politically correct values of the dominant culture prevail. The reasons that Christians might prefer the home-school option, however, apply also to other religious or life-style minorities from Jews and Muslims to crunchy-granola hippies.
Bacon’s bottom line: The growth of a vibrant home-schooling movement is a positive development. Personally, I had zero interest in home-schooling my three kids. I had neither the time nor the temperament. I would have been a lousy teacher. But I think it’s wonderful if people want to take charge of their children’s learning. The movement has advanced to the point where online learning and home-school teaching collaboratives allow parent-teachers to offset deficiencies in their own educational background with outside resources to ensure that their children can master all subjects.
One of the greatest flaws in K-12 education in the United States, indeed around most of the world, is that it marches children through 12 grades at a standard pace, ignoring individual differences in how children learn and how rapidly they mature. No one knows children better than their own parents, and no school can replicate the flexibility and adaptability of a home-school environment.
Another drawback of the regimented approach to schooling is the creation of powerful peer groups that become the the dominant influence in a child’s social and emotional development. In the world outside of school, people interact with people of all ages and life experiences. The hot-house environment of K-12 schools is unnatural, it magnifies the angst associated with adolescence, and it contributes to many of the social pathologies we associate with the teenage years.
Why teach your kid at home? Let me count the reasons. First, construct a curriculum geared to your child’s individual interests, learning style, and pace of cognitive development. Second, raise your kid in an environment free from the pernicious influence of bullying and other peer pressures. And third, take charge of your child’s intellectual and moral development rather than outsource the job to teachers and administrators who may not share your values or understanding of the world.
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