JW's and home schooling? (page 3)

NINfan05

I should add that I did want to do homeschool so I could sneek out with my boyfriend during the day while mom and dad were at work haha!!!

I grew up at least as socially inept as any home-school person. I went to catholic school in another town about 30 miles away from home, and had very few neighbors with kids anywhere near my age. Until my parents finally switched me into public school I only played with friends outside of school around once every 1 or 2 months on average, since it involved someone's parents driving, which none of them ever wanted to do.

Of course, once in public school I was an absolute outcast since everyone else already had established their friendships and social standings. What fun ... not.

noni1974

My best friends mom refused to let her kids go to school. It wasn't so bad for my best friend. She at least went to normal school until she was in 7th or 8th grade. Her younger brother and sister never got to go to school. They ended up teaching themselves to read and write. They both are uneducated to this day. My best friend got a job at 16 and put herself through a correspondence high school. The younger brother and sister got workbooks from the store for lessons. The mom worked so she never taught her kids like they were supposed to be taught. They were never socialized outside of the kingdom hall. The mom didn't want them exposed to the world.

My mom pulled me out of school to home school me but I ended up getting a job. I got my GED last month so I can go to college. I never got home schooled after I was pulled out.

Balsam

I home schooled my oldest son through high school, it was a complete and utter disaster. I did schooling with him every day for about 4 to 5 hrs a day 5 days a week. My son had learning problems I could not overcome without a lot of help. My JW husband thought home schooling would be great and it wasn't. My son never did get his diploma till later on. I still have serious regrets over that but maybe my son will over come the handicap my ex-husband and I saddled him with.

WTWizard

There are good reasons to home-school, and there are bad ones.

Good reasons: A parent realizes how the Establishment is pushing a dumb-down America agenda through the public school system and wishes to bypass that. A parent can do a much better job than the public schools, and has the resources to do so. A child has special needs that the public schools cannot address, but the parents can. A child will not attend public school without a big fight, and the parents are able to do the job well.

Bad reasons: A parent realizes that the schools teach something that differs from their own agenda, and wishes to force their own agenda on the children. The school has an atmosphere that encourages independent thinking and the parents wish to bypass that. Pride--thinking they can do the job, when they are not able. A religion tells the parents to home-school the children to sequester them from the world. Parents read the religion as telling them to home-school children so they cannot function in the real world. Parents (or hounders) wanting to "shield" children from the real world, except in the case where bullying is the issue.

Home schooling is very difficult and very expensive. You need to commit at least 6 hours a day, 5 days a week, for at least 180 days a year. You need supplies that may have to be bought at great cost, when in schools these are shared. You cannot stint on social activities that actually fit into the real world. Additionally, you cannot have a personal agenda (like a religious bias). You have to be objective in teaching your children--not giving them all perfect grades to make them look good or crap grades just to punish them for something unrelated.

It can work--in fact, if the parents are able to teach the children to think and solve problems, it can be better than the crap "education" we have. Parents can teach children phonics when the "look-say" method is used in public schools. Parents can teach children how to construct their own times tables, often in first or second grade, while classmates are forced to use rote memorization. Parents can teach the children to look at the "what is" of the situation, where the schools teach them factoids only. Throw in plenty of opportunities for these children to develop socially, and they could potentially come out much better than those in our factory "education" system.

However, home schooling can backfire. If you are trying to get out of the worldly class influences or science teachings, you are going to impair your children. Teach them lies, they will always have problems. Many witless parents will skimp on audio-video aids, relying instead on the Asleep! magazine. You cannot learn anything more than factoids, many of which are blatantly false, using the Asleep! rag. Keeping them out of the world is going to prevent them from functioning in the real world. Those children will be stuck in the cancer forever. Plus, most witless parents simply lack the resources and time to properly home-school a child. Instead of being able to teach them to solve problems, they teach children to not solve problems--and rely on textbooks that may or may not even be approved by the Establishment, let alone accurate.

If anyone is going to home school a child, they should ask what their real motives are. Do they wish to push an agenda? Do they wish to promote a religious belief and prevent them from functioning outside that religion? Do they have the resources and time to properly home-school? Do they have access to sufficient support materials in case a child has trouble in a subject? Are they going to make ample opportunity to develop skills they will need in the real world? Are they willing to dedicate up to 30 hours a week teaching, plus another 20-30 hours a week researching, correcting and preparing tests, and more time to prepare them for the real world? Do they have the money to buy all the A/V aids that are shared in schools? Can they buy, rent, or download all the movies the children need to see in order to have a fully integrated education? Are they aware that home-schooling a child can cost more than $10,000 just to start up? Do they know everything they are going to need, before they begin?

If the answers are unfavorable, the factory "education" system is, bad as it is, better than what you can give.

sir82

In my experience: JWs who have been home-schooled are some of the most seriously messed-up JWs in existence.

They have enormous difficulties coping with even the slightest bump in the road, and seem to have the hardest time finding gainful employment.

They also make the worst elders and MS - closed-minded doesn't begin to describe it.

And don't get me started on the social issues.....

nugget

I feel fairly ambivalent about home schooling. In our congregation I know one young man who received his secondary school education at home. I read some of his assignments and was appalled at the lack of structure and coherent argument. In addition he didn't want to know about any flaws he only wanted to know how good his essay was. He seemed to do ok in his exams so it may have been my standards were too high in the first place. I have known other witness children who were homeschooled, they were bright kids but never seemed to reach their full potential since the home schooling was really there to limit their ambitions rather than cultivate them.

My son has special needs and school seems more concerned with teaching him social interaction than educational elements. This means that reading, spellings etc are done at home not at school. He follows a routine at home that encourages him to achieve at school. However I cannot give him the range of social experience he receives in mainstream education. School works well if you fall within a norm, if you are outside of that norm it can struggle. This doesn't mean ordinary schools can't be successful it just means harder work for all concerned.

cattails

Ninfan05 I heard of that school before, correspondence school if you can call it that, mostly online now. The kiddo who used it wasn't doing much studying, and the parents weren't doing much teaching. When I was in school six hours daily in boring classrooms the homeschooling arrangement sure looked good. But I guess I have to be thankful for the learning I did receive and the fact that I learned some social skills and can manage my budget, etc. But you hardly saw him in service and me, I was expected to be out every single stinking weekend when all I could think of was getting extra sleep.

The now 26 year old who got Pearblossomed still lives at home, like I do, so reason for me or him to boast how preparatory our different experiences were in getting "a life". :-)))

iMARX

I was taught at home along with my brother. It was my idea for it to happen because I begged my mum to take me out of school because I was constantly being offered cigarettes and being invited to birthday parties and my poor little brainwashed mind, at 11 years old, couldn't handle it.

So we joined up with the other, millions, of JWs teaching their kids at home and went on various educational outings and it was really fun. But I totally understand why it's a bad thing in terms of our education about life.

I thought, up until a year ago, I'm 21 now, that India was in Africa, and I still believed that the humans have only been on the Earth for 6,000 years.

So I still struggle with general knowledge especially with history, science and geography.

Quillsky

Obviously most people who have responded on this thread have some experience of homeschooling. I haven't, don't know anybody who has. So I merely ask as an astonished observer...... are JW's really encouraged to homeschool their children?? In all my years as a JW I never heard such a thing.

JW's and home schooling?