BS: Home Education UK

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:11 PM

"no Lizzie it's simply a question of getting your facts correct before you start one of your 'passionate' posts."


No, Emma.

In my 'story' 'junior' piped up about Pete Seeger's song, because he picked up on the 'tickytacky' word. As I wrote above, those words ARE in the song.

My facts were entirely correct.

Your interpretation of them, entirely wrong.



Thank you.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: SINSULL
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:16 PM

Butterandcheese - you too need to read all of every post before you jump in half cocked.
Lizzie wrote:
"So, please, don't give me this shite about Home Ed parents all being nutters, abusers, thickos, who can't add 2 and 2 together."


I see no mention of anyone accusing homeschoolers of being abusive parents. Nor has anyone said they can't add two and two. Several said just the opposite. I do see and agree with a post that homeschooling can leave children unprotected from abusive parents if they are kept out of public sight.

This is what Jack said:
"Without exception they were all neurotic obsessional cranks, and the idea of allowing anybody that weird to have total control over a child's experiential environment gave me the willies."


and most disagreed.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:18 PM

I think if parents feel that their children are better served in the schools, they should definitely keep them there. But I also think it's very important for there to be the option for parents to home school their kids if they feel or believe that their kids would be better served that way.

By the way, there were no curriculum requirements or required standards for the people who were home schooling in the area where I lived when I was doing that, but all of the children I met who were being home schooled were getting very good instruction, academically. For the ones from very religious households, they were getting their education tinged with a significant amount of religious training, but not really to any greater extent than kids do in private parochial school settings.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:20 PM

Sigh.......

My children wear clothes, yes. But they don't live their life to the Corporate Boxes...and Education has become just another Corporate Industry, which was born with the birth of the National Curriculum. The NC has been screwing up children and teachers alike, ever since its birth, together with producing a multi-million dollar industry of 'How To Get Your Child Through School Exams', which now line the entire walls of many of our bookshops.

It also gave birth to the Parental Worry Situation...

This of course, has been exacerbated by the Decimation of Motherhood, where mothers, riddled with worry and guilt over leaving Little Junior at the Breakfast Club, because they no longer have the time to feed their own children, can now declare, with pride and certainty that "My Little Junior is doing SO well at school! He's studying for 37 GCSEs...and after that he's going for 11 AS Levels, 52 A Levels AND a BSc degree in Football! We are just SO damned proud of him!"

Of course, Little Junior is really down in Wetherspoons, watching the Hen Night Girlies drink their cocktails through penis shaped straws (I kid you not!)....whilst he thinks "Is this shit REALLY what my life is all about? Is this REALLY *why* I was born?"

But, it takes away the anxiety of the over-stressed, over-anxious working parent, who knows in their heart that actually something is Megaenormously WRONG with the way kids are these days, but hasn't a clue how to live with it...

"And they're all made out of tickytacky and they all look just the same.."

:0)

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:24 PM

Oh...and my Facebook page is very different to the norm, Sinsull, because it's about the music....or at least, it will be, once again, when I get it more on track, having cancelled it for the umpteenth time again recently...

I certainly don't do Facebook (or anything else) in the 'conventional' way.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: SINSULL
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:25 PM

That was my experience too, Carol. The home schooling parents I know took their children's education VERY seriously. In addition, the education included things like cooking a meal, cleaning laundry, budgeting, etc while not taking away from academics.

In Catholic School, religion colored every single aspect of our education. I can remember a nun telling us that it was a mortal sin for President Eisenhower not to take care of his health because he was president and responsible for the free world. For me it was only a venial sin - who cared if I died, I guess. LOL

The parents I know who home school for religious reasons seemed (I can't say I know) more interested from protecting their children from ideas that contradicted their religious beliefs. Valid, in my mind.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Emma B
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:27 PM

'No, Emma.

In my 'story' 'junior' piped up about Pete Seeger's song, because he picked up on the 'tickytacky' word. As I wrote above, those words ARE in the song.

My facts were entirely correct.

Your interpretation of them, entirely wrong.



Thank you.'

I give up! what's the point of attempting any sensible discussion ?

Ok Lizzie 'junior' got it wrong - ok?

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: SINSULL
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:30 PM

Sigh...more baseless claptrap. Your opinion only.

Sigh...Decimation of Motherhood...claptrap

Sigh...Little Junior is really down in Wetherspoons, watching the Hen Night Girlies drink their cocktails through penis shaped straws ...how do they manage to fit every public school child in that little club? And don't they check age - I find it hard to believe that 8 year olds are even interested in Hen Girls.
Sigh...
"And they're all made out of tickytacky and they all look just the same.."

All except you, right Lizzie?

Sigh

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:32 PM

A lot of parents who send their kids to religious schools also do it to protect them from being taught things that are against their beliefs. I know a lot of people who are that way.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:34 PM

Little Boxes was written by Malvina Reynolds.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: SINSULL
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:42 PM

Mine certainly did. But I have to admit the quality of education at the local Catholic School was light years ahead of the public school. It did not outweigh the physical abuse that went on.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: ButterandCheese
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:44 PM

sorry SINSHULL I hate to disabuse you of your favourite notion that nobody reads ALL the posts except you. I read every single one the more interesting twice

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: SINSULL
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:46 PM

But missed several key points. Selective reading to make your point?

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:46 PM

OK, you want me to send my children to school? Then you build me a school that works!

Fill it with people of ALL ages, mix the children up, let them have ONE school, all their school-life long, where they are like one family, all growing together, staying friends together. Let adults who want to, learn alongside the children, so that kids see that learning is a life-long joy. Let the little ones help the older ones and the older ones care for the little ones.

Give them tests in Kindness, Tolerance, Compassion, Love.

Make their Sex Education into Love Education.

Teach them that every single one of them is valued.
Teach them that every single one of them has a skill and tell them that is why they are in school, so that the caring teachers can help them discover that skill and build upon it...

Give them nothing but confidence, even if you have to criticise what they do, you do it kindly and constructively.

Throw out any teacher who tells any child that their work is 'crap'....as my daughter was told about her beautiful artwork, because the damage that one person can do to another, especially when the person receiving that criticism is a very young person, can last for years and years and years, sometimes even a life time!

Get rid of ANYONE who thinks that children should wear ties!

Get rid of ANYONE who thinks that children should still all day!
(would you make your DOG sit still all day?)

Get rid of ANYONE who thinks they are better than the children, because they have one of the most special jobs in the world, nurturing the next generation, and should realise that every single child is a Spirit-in-Waiting.

Throw out crap lessons that teach nothing!

Bring in Bean Bags to sit on...

Let the children drink water whenever they want.

Let them go to the toilet, whenever they want, without having to ask, and let them have a bathroom that is decent, well looked after and cared for, preferably at the back of the classroom itself.

Sing with them.

Play with them.

LAUGH with them!

Let them run free every other lesson.

Throw out all the crappy lessons and replace them with Freedom To Be Children lessons...

Our 'puppies' are being kept in 'kennels' throughout their formative years, with no toys to play with, no bones to chew, no fields to run in. They are kept on permanent leashes, so that 'The State' can be in control at all times, tugging them back into their kennels whenever they should try to get out.

If we treated our animals in the same way we treat our children, then the RSPCA would be worn out!

Let them jump and shout and run and play..and then you'll find they'll want to sit down and read too, have quiet times....because children need space too..and sometimes, especially for the quiet children, space is the most important thing of all.

If a child loves sport, great....but don't make all children play sport. Geez, I hated it! All those competitive people getting angry around me, simply because I didn't catch the rounders ball??? Weird!

Build me a school which believes in the words of this man....



"Curiosity has no important place in my work, only conformity."

"School is a twelve-year jail sentence where bad habits are the only curriculum truly learned."


"I don't think we'll get rid of schools any time soon, certainly not in my lifetime, but if we're going to change what's rapidly becoming a disaster of ignorance, we need to realize that the school institution "schools" very well, though it does not "educate"; that's inherent in the design of the thing. It's not the fault of bad teachers or too little money spent. It's just impossible for education and schooling ever to be the same thing."


"I've come to believe that genius is an exceedingly common human quality, probably natural to most of us... I began to wonder, reluctantly, whether it was possible that being in school itself was what was dumbing them down. Was it possible I had been hired not to enlarge children's power, but to diminish it? That seemed crazy on the face of it, but slowly I began to realize that the bells and the confinement, the crazy sequences, the age-segregation, the lack of privacy, the constant surveillance, and all the rest of national curriculum of schooling were designed exactly as if someone had set out to *prevent* children from learning how to think and act, to coax them into addiction and dependent behavior."


"...'How will they learn to read?' you ask, and my answer is 'Remember the lessons of Massachusetts.' When children are given whole lives instead of age-graded ones in cellblocks, they learn to read, write, and do arithmetic with ease, if those things make sense in the kind of life that unfolds around them."


"It's absurd and anti-life to be part of a system that compels you to sit in confinement with people of exactly the same age and social class. That system effectively cuts you off from the immense diversity of life and the synergy of variety; indeed it cuts you off from your own past and future, sealing you in a continuous present much the same way television does..."


"Whatever an education is, it should make you a unique individual, not a conformist; it should furnish you with an original spirit with which to tackle the big challenges; it should allow you to find values which will be your road map through life; it should make you spiritually rich, a person who loves whatever you are doing, wherever you are, whomever you are with; it should teach you what is important, how to live and how to die."




"By preventing a free market in education, a handful of social engineers - backed by the industries that profit from compulsory schooling: teacher colleges, textbook publishers, materials suppliers, et al. - has ensured that most of our children will not have an education, even though they may be thoroughly schooled."

...ALL quotes from John Taylor Gatto


....and then I will send my children back to school.

Basically, build me a school that treats children with dignity and respect, no less than you expect from your job, and then, watch them blossom!

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Chris Green
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:46 PM

For what it's worth, going to school taught me to express my opinions succinctly and to make points without resorting to hyperbole...

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:49 PM

Pete Seeger will always be associated with Tickytacky boxes, because he used to sing it to me, under the bedclothes....and I used to wonder about this song...about those who lived in the litte houses, the pink one and the yellow one....

Junior loves Pete Seeger too.

Bruce has Malvina Reynolds on his Myspace page, I believe.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:51 PM

To be fair, though, there's more than enough people who attended school outside the home who are also guilty of using hyperbole to make their points.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: ButterandCheese
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:51 PM

selective. hardly

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:54 PM

I think the 29 Sep 09 - 04:46 PM post is a pretty fair description of Waldorf Schools. I would love to have been able to send my son to one of those.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Chris Green
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:55 PM

True. I was being mischievous, I'm afraid!

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: SINSULL
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:57 PM

"OK, you want me to send my children to school?"

Actually with the exception of Jack everyone is saying that parents should have the right to home school their children if they choose. Of course, this is a discussion on a website and is not legally binding.


And once again you are off and running spouting a lot of nonsense that in no way makes for a logical discussion.

Only one for instance:
"Get rid of ANYONE who thinks that children should wear ties!"
What about the parents (Mormons, for instance) who think their children should wear ties? And what about the parents who want their children to wear bra tops or Speedos? What about nudists? Who decides, Lizzie? You?
No dress code except your own?

Hop down off that soapbox and contribute. Do you rant on like this when you are teaching your children?

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 04:58 PM

I should just clarify that Pete Seeger *himself* wasn't er...under the bedclothes with me, just the radio from which his voice was reaching me... :0) Teeheee!

School taught me that I wanted to be anywhere BUT school!

"Your brother is like you. He has a fine brain, but he's too lazy to use it."

....my French teacher, to my French class......

Course, she was so dumb that she never knew Leigh had dyslexia. He didn't either, because no other person picked up on it either, not until he was 31...and then...it was me. "You're taking ages to read that letter, Leigh, bung it over here" says I. "I have trouble reading, the letters jump around a lot and I have to make them sit still, but I *can* read." said he...

A lifetime of school and no-one ever bothered to ask him if he was OK, if he was struggling...

Now, if he'd been in my school above, they'd have picked up on his woodwork abilities, his artistic abilities, his uncanny way of making money...Oh, the antique and second hand shops I was dragged around on Harrow-on-the-Hill, as my brother bought second edition books from one shop, then sold them, at a profit, to the next shop along the road...

To his teachers though, he was stupid, because he didn't fit in the 'academic' box. Pah! My brother was no more stupid than they were, he just wasn't 'made' for school, that was all. Had he been Home Educated, he'd probably have been a Millionaire in his early 20s, but as it was, he was lacking in confidence about many things, angry and bitter, after years of being told how lazy and stupid he was...

Hey, that's school though, pick you up on the faults, not the amazing things that make you, YOU.

Ho hum.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:00 PM

Parents only put their kids in ties, because the schools dictate they should.

Ban ties altogether.

Bring back pirate shirts!

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:09 PM

I had the same problems with school because of my multiple learning disabilities. I think a Waldorf school would have addressed all of our problems (those of us with learning disabilities), because they teach the kids through creativity and hands on working with things. And they always think outside the box.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:14 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:16 PM

Oops.


I don't know if they have Waldorf Schools in the UK, but this is some information about them from the website for the Association of Waldorf Schools of North America...

"Waldorf schools offer a developmentally appropriate, balanced approach to education that integrates the arts and academics for children from preschool through twelfth grade. It encourages the development of each child's sense of truth, beauty, and goodness, and provides an antidote to violence, alienation, and cynicism. The aim of the education is to inspire in each student a lifelong love of learning, and to enable them to fully develop their unique capacities."

http://www.whywaldorfworks.org/

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: paula t
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:19 PM

as a teacher, I have met many home- schooled children. Many have been well adjusted children , but a huge percentage of these children have found the work difficult. I have worked in both primary and secondary schools. When these children have re-entered primary school, many have usually managed to catch up within about a year.However,some enter secondary school still finding the work difficult - because things are moving on while they are trying to "fill in the gaps". However, the vast majority of school returners I have met have been in secondary school.They have returned because their parents feel unable to teach them to the standards required - and have realised that their children need qualifications if they want to have more freedom of choice when looking at careers(This is unfortunately a hard fact of life in our society).Many of these children have been disadvantaged when they have returned, because they have fallen well behind over the years. I have known a number of these children who have grown to resent their parents because they "Let them down".This is really sad. Their parents felt they were doing what was right. Everything was done for the best motives, and the children in most cases had enjoyed their time at home.
Home schooling can be extremely valuable, but it is not to be entered into lightly. It has a far reaching effect on the children involved, and they are the ones who finally have to face the consequences if they have a substandard education - not the parents.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:27 PM

I don't know what country the above poster teaches in, but in the US, home schooled students tend to perform above average.

"Standardized test results for 16,000 home educated children, grades K-12, were analyzed in 1994 by researcher Dr. Brian Ray. He found the nationwide grand mean in reading for homeschoolers was at the 79th percentile; for language and math, the 73rd percentile. This ranking means home-educated students performed better than approximately 77% of the sample population on whom the test was normed. Nearly 80% of homeschooled children achieved individual scores above the national average and 54.7% of the 16,000 homeschoolers achieved individual scores in the top quarter of the population, more than double the number of conventional school students who score in the top quarter."

http://www.hslda.org/docs/nche/000000/00000017.asp

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:31 PM

This one's more recent...

http://www.educationreport.org/pubs/mer/article.aspx?id=10918

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: paula t
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:31 PM

I teach in the UK and have spoken about my experience of working with these children. I have no idea what the statistics are in this country. I don't even know if there are any. Anyone out there know?

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:33 PM

The Waldorf schools sound great, Carol. We have Steiner schools over here..but they seem to be associated with Waldorf as well....One and the same? Same outlook, at least, I'd say...

Steiner


There are many school educated children who have sub-standard eduction, imo, paula.

Teachers have no time.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:33 PM

Schools can be dangerous. The pack mentality is not adequately controlled.

But home education can be dangerous too.

I can see merit in rigorous testing of the home educated, but I am alarmed at the suggestion of government set texts.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Sorcha
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:36 PM

Good god.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:37 PM

I'm guessing that the Steiner schools are the same thing as Waldorf schools. I think the Waldorf schools were started by Steiner, or based on his work or something like that.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Emma B
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 05:57 PM

Does anyone else find this 'answer' on wikianwers a tad disturbing?

Q. How well do home schooled children do academically all around compared to public schooled children?

A. This is unknown/at least unknown to me, because there are 1-2 million homeschoolers and millions more public-schoolers, it would be difficult to take a survey/test.

But I think, that yes, homeschoolers MAY be smarter than the average public schoolers. Because:

1) If the homeschooler is a Christian the child learns about Creation and God without being ridiculed or gets ridiculous ideas about evolution into their head.

2) The child is not corrupted by bad friends/peer pressure, and can make decisions on his own confidently.

3) The child is taught in a better format and place. At a public school there are bullies, "mean" teachers, peer pressure, etc., that may prevent a child from doing his best/focusing on doing his best.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Gervase
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:04 PM

I think it speaks volumes about home schooling!

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Folkiedave
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:09 PM

OK, you want me to send my children to school? Then you build me a school that works!

and then I will send my children back to school.

For the benefit of people reading this Lizzie - exactly how old are your children?

Have you taught your children the benefits of precis?

Or like you do they just copy and paste?

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:27 PM

I've taught my children to be kind, Dave.

Shame your school obviously overlooked teaching you that...




"I think it speaks volumes about home schooling!"

Oh, poo...Gervy! :0)

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Folkiedave
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:29 PM

From what you tell us, Lizzie, you have clearly made a success of teaching your children. Would you be kind enough to share the secrets of your success?

I don't mean in the vague terms that you usually use but some more concrete things.

Do you teach reading? What method(s)do you use? How long each day?

Did you teach your children to write?

How much per day do you spend on particular subjects if any?

How is the day structured? I spent some time at a school where children were free to do as they please. Were your children educated like that? The school I'm talking about had formal lessons though it was not compulsory to attend them. Do you do any formal teaching?

Since you clearly spend a lot of your day ranting on the internet, copying and pasting onto Myspace, and writing to Mudcat and discovering undiscovered musicians - how much time are you actually devoting to your children?

Finally since your full-time job seems to be educating your children how are you paid?

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:30 PM

My children are 22 and 15, if you must know...and....in my post I spoke of adults learning alongside children, young teaching old and vice versa...so yes, I've no doubt my kids wouldn't mind going to a school like that, if they were older...as they both have a love of learning..and a love of being kind.

I expect they could teach you some people a great deal.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Folkiedave
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:31 PM

For the benefit of people reading this Lizzie - exactly how old are your children?

Our regular readers may care to note the absence of an answer to this.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Folkiedave
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:34 PM

So I would imagine that you are no longer teaching the 22 year old.

Are you still teaching the 15 year old?

If so what are you teaching him? About love and kindness, marvellous.

Literature? Art? Science? Foreign languages?

Since you are clearly very succesful (from what you tell us) why are you not prepared to share the secrets of your success?

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:34 PM

"I don't mean in the vague terms that you usually use but some more concrete things."

My son's been learning about concrete today, helping to build a wall in the garden.

My daughter was over at her dad's, studying for her Open Uni degree in Art History.

Yawwwwwwwwnnnnnnnnnnn

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:35 PM

I don't think that Wiki Answers comment says a thing about home schooling. It does, however, say a lot about fundamentalist Christianity. Those kinds of comments could just as easily have come from someone who was talking about private fundamentalist Christian schools.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Goose Gander
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:39 PM

From the second link provided by Carol (article date September 2009) . . .

"The nation's home-schooled children score, on average, at the 88th percentile on standardized tests in reading, math and language, according to a study commissioned by the Home School Legal Defense Association and conducted by the National Home Education Research Institute."

"The average public school student taking the same standardized tests scored at the 50th percentile . . . ."

"Home-school scores showed little "achievement gap" by gender or household income . . . ."

Of course, the Home School Legal Defense Association may not exactly be an impartial observer. It would be helpful to know more about how the study was conducted.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:46 PM

I don't know how the study was conducted, but I do know they've won a lot of cases in court in which parents' right to home school was being challenged. I know the facts they are working with are a big part of their success. I was challenged in court for home schooling my son (I won). They didn't represent me in that court case, but they helped me a lot.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: Folkiedave
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:47 PM

That's marvellous Lizzie. Your daughter is studying with some highly qualified teachers. Well done. And I am a great admirer of the Open University. Set up by a Labour Government of course.

As for the 15 year-old son what are you teaching him about concrete and building walls? Or have you handed this aspect of his education to someone else too whilst you build your MySpace pages and write on Mudcat?

And what's on the cards for tomorrow? Concrete walls again? Literature? Science? Languages? Sport? IT?

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: SINSULL
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 07:26 PM

Given that some states do not require standardized testing I am not sure how you can compare.

But forget about test scores and rankings - they mean little or nothing in real life. By that I mean no one cares if you got an A or a D in Biology in the 6th grade.

It would be interesting to get a fair cross section of home schooled adults and see how they compare themselves to classroom educated adults of the same time period. It would also be interesting to see if they have chosen to home school their own children.

Another bit of information: in the US home schooling can take many forms including education in the home, in a group of homes, partially in home and a classroom, with a curriculum and testing, without a curriculum and testing. Hard to compare apples to oranges to pears.

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 07:41 PM

Our regular readers may care to note the absence of an answer to this.

well this reader deems it no one elses business how old Lizze Cornish's kids are, I know it's not importsnt to me

Subject: RE: BS: Home Education UK
From: ButterandCheese
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 07:46 PM

sorry that GUEST was me...mumble mumble..