How many here were homeschooled?

by Highlander 20 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  Super_Becka

  Welcome to the board, Nolita, glad to have you here!!

  Now, on to the topic...

  Hmm, I was never homeschooled, it just never came up, why would it?? School is a perfectly normal thing, plus my parents both work outside the home, so it wouldn't have been possible anyway. And we never had any reason to do it, why would we?? Granted, I was a shy kid (still am) and I often thought that homeschooling would be so much easier than going to school and dealing with all of the people every day, but now that I think back, I can't imagine being homeschooled - sure, sometimes school was hard, high school especially, but I still had a great time with all of my friends, and I wouldn't give up those memories for the world!!

  I asked my JW boyfriend about high school and stuff once, just to see what it was like for him, especially because he was raised as a JW and I was curious as to how he handled high school and dating. For one, he didn't date at all in high school, because everyone knew he was a Witness and avoided him, and I don't think he had many friends at all, except maybe for a couple of JWs. When I asked him about the prom and his prom date, etc., he said that he didn't go to the prom. I was a little shocked, it's almost a rite of passage to go to the prom, so I asked him why he didn't go. He said he was homeschooled for his last year of high school because his family moved a lot.

  Personally, I think that growing up as a JW, along with being homeschooled in his last year of high school and not going to the prom (which is a JW thing, too, isn't it??) stunted his social development, he's really not much good with people. He lacks tact in a lot of things, he doesn't understand a lot of things, he's not good with new people and he's just immature and child-like about a lot of things. I think it's because he didn't interact and learn from experience, so now he's nearly 30 years old and has the social graces of a 10-year-old.

  I feel bad for people who grow up like this, I really do.

  -Becka :)
• 

  Balsam

  Sadly I let my husband talk me into homeschooling, which I had mixed feelings about. I only home schooled my oldest son from 9th grade and up. I will forever feel I did him a total dis-service. I did my best with my own highschool education to give him all I knew myself. He had learning disabilities and he did poorly, he needed more help than I could give him. He did later take a GED class and he got his GED diploma, but I know it is not adaquate in my opinion. Thankfully at 23 he works hard and has a good work ethic but his reading ability is limited because he didn't get the help he needed, I believe from extra help he would have gotten at public school.
  
  
  
  

  I knew Unique1, but she did better than most kids I knew in the JW who were home schooled.
  
  
  
  
  
  
• 

  Nolita

  This is a pathetic admission, but just after I graduated I actually used to have a little daydream about enrolling in high school, just to experience it...however, I'm fairly certain that it's really something you can only do when you're the right age for it. College, yeah I'm all for 80 year olds going back to get their degress, but high school seems more like a rite of passage than it does an education.

  Don't get me wrong, I'm not a complete embarassment to myself in public, but I just don't know how to form a friendship, I'm too afraid someone won't like me. I guess I have no real way of knowing if home school is the main contributor to my friend-making ineptitude or not. No one can...especially when you're being raised in an environment that, for the greater part, is an aberration. Who knows which aspect is the nail in the social coffin!

  and not going to the prom (which is a JW thing, too, isn't it??) stunted his social development

  Super_Becka, I guess you haven't heard that prom is just another word for fornication! Hopefully you can help your boyfriend make some sense out of the way he was raised at some point in time.
• 

  Super_Becka

  and not going to the prom (which is a JW thing, too, isn't it??) stunted his social development

  Super_Becka, I guess you haven't heard that prom is just another word for fornication! Hopefully you can help your boyfriend make some sense out of the way he was raised at some point in time.

  Ooo, if "prom" = "fornication", then I definitely did something wrong at my prom!! I didn't even have a date!! I just went to the prom, then I went to the Safe Grad, stayed up all night, ate lots of junk food and slept the whole next day. I didn't even drink, much less "fornicate"!! Hell, I didn't even get my first kiss until almost a year later, when I was in university!! Heh, I don't make no wonder I'm still a virgin at 20 (nearly 21), I missed out on the whole "prom=fornication" thing!!

  I do agree that high school is a rite of passage, though. Sure, it can be sheer hell some days, there are plenty of times when you just don't want to be there. It's not much fun watching everyone else being happy and cheerful and popular while you're too busy worrying about next week's math test to even consider being happy, but overall, it's a very good, very valuable experience. Heh, my high school years weren't exactly my glory days (heh, I think I missed those all together, no glory days for Becka), there was a lot of turmoil and broken friendships (most of my friends completely abandoned me for my younger brother when I was 15) and teen angst, but all of these things build character and mold you into the adult you'll be in a few years. Without high school and all the trouble that went with it, I wouldn't be the person that I am today.

  And there are lots of fun parts to high school, too - I loved being a member of the drama troupe as a stage manager, I loved helping out on the yearbook and Safe Grad committees, I loved doing the charity work ("World Vision 30-Hour Famine" and the "Canadian Breast Cancer Society's Run For The Cure"), there were lots of perks to being a normal high school student. And the friendships are priceless - high school really lets you see who's a true friend and who isn't, and I still have all of my closest friends from high school, they stuck with me and I'm sticking with them. Maybe my social skills didn't improve a hell of a lot in high school, but I'm definitely a more well-rounded person because of high school.

  -Becka :)
• 

  Buster

  Homeshooling is the best way to produce a blithering idiot.

  I can think of two reasons that make parents decide that their children should get all they need, academically and socially from them:

  1. The parents have little or no faith in their kids to handle the normal issues of growing up

  2. The parents are so selfish and self-centered that they think they can satisfy all their children's academic and social needs.

  I feel like hurling whenever I see some christian fundy say that she is homeschooling.
• 

  Nolita

  Homeshooling is the best way to produce a blithering idiot.

  Aye, but not the only way! I've met blithering idiots a-plenty who have not been home-taught. I am merely a blundering idiot...so I have freedom of speech in this regard.
• 

  diamondblue1974

  In the UK it is illegal for a child not to attend an educational establishment if he or she is of a compulsory school attending age; that is unless it can be shown that the child is receiving a suitable alternative. s.7 Education Act 1996

  Personally I think the law stinks and children should be made to attend schools for the sake of their social development as much as it is for their education.

  DB74

  Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.

  Martin Luther King Jr. , Strength to Love, 1963
• 

  limbogirl

  there were several "sisters" at my KH that decided to homeschool their children. none of them even had a high school diploma and none were too sharp -- one in particular could barely read yet they were going to start their own homeschool for all of their collective children. this was highly encouraged by the elders. they went out and had some stationary printed up with the name of the "school" and then they went to garage sales and flea markets looking for old text books. I quit going shortly after that so don't know the end result -- that was many years ago -- I can only imagine how those kids are doing today. very sad.
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  Nolita

  Someone mentioned earlier that in the U.S., the state mandates whether home education is permitted or not. I don't know if things have changed, but in Florida all one had to do was send a letter into the School Board Superintendent for the state, who then sent back an acknowledgment letter and what I believe was a copy of a few basic statutes that applied to the situation. The only other requirement was that the student had to visit a certifed teacher for an evaluation each year until the student reached the age of 16. Nothing else was required. Then again, the Florida school system leaves much to be desired, or so I am told.

  Interestingly, 16 is the age at which a person can make the decision to drop out of school...so I can't help but wonder, does the state of Florida consider children being schooled at home past the age of 16 as high school drop outs?
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  SWALKER

  I admit that I home-schooled my kids at various times for various reasons. I always made sure they had plenty of friends though. 1 reason that I home-schooled my youngest son was that he was very, very active. I decided to harness some of that energy...so I put him through Kindergarten at age 4 and when he went to public school at 5, they put him in the 1st grade. He was taller than most kids in the 1st grade and they were almost tempted to move him to 2nd. (This was in the 80's!) Then when he got in High School he wanted to home-school again...we got a very top-notch home-school system, where all the work was done and graded online...(cost a lot but worth it) It was difficult to make him do all of his work sometimes and I think he would have done better in HS. However, that said, he is very smart academically. Usually he goes off the chart in reading/comprehension. Now, if I could just get him to understand how much a college education will benefit him!!! My oldest son went to college...computer science degree. I home-schooled him for 2 years...again very smart in reading/comprehension....

  One of the years that I home-schooled my sons, my husband and I decided to travel all across the US and take them with us. We've been to every state except 3 (ND, Alaska, Maine). They both took scuba lessons, pilot training, and a host of other activities. (They were avid water and snow skiers) We've been all through the Carribbean and parts of Mexico and Canada. I tried to make part of each trip educational as well as fun.

  Some of the kids that I saw home-schooled shouldn't have been, but others really blossomed. In most states, home-schoolers can still participate in school activities like band, sports, etc. I don't like to see kids isolated by staying at home...I think that's one of the biggest problems. They need friends their own age and it's up to the parents to see they get that association.

  Swalker