I homeschooled for 3 1/2 years and when I started there was need for remedial work before I could take them into the next grade. They had problems in spelling, math (didn’t know their time-tables), and their reading level was below the third grade. It was shameful what I saw that the teachers failed to do in that school. They didn’t know how to write in cursive, let alone even know what that was. I found out from another parent that it wasn’t taught because they didn’t feel it was a necessary area to teach. As long as they could print legibly, they considered that enough. Frankly, a lot couldn’t print legibly either.

What I witnessed in that school, was more disciplining than teaching and even that was ineffective because it was a continuous daily battle between teacher and students. What was worse, because teachers were fearful of lawsuits, the students were winning. There were even parents that threaten teachers about discipling their kids and then would threaten them with a lawsuit. And these were usuallly the kids who were the bullies in the class. Look where they learned to be like that from. It was a no-win situation all around.

The kids knew exactly how to manipulate situations, like if the teacher touched a kid on the shoulder to get him to turn around, it turned into a type of child abuse scenario. Teachers ended up fearful of even laying a hand on a student for fear of being brought up on charges.

School playgrounds are war zones with possies of kids running who were to play where and with whom. If the rules weren’t followed as ordained by these kids, the victims ended up with heads smashed against brick walls and stepped on or kicked against the asphalt play surface. I heard about kids pushed off of jungle gyms because a group of kids claimed it and wouldn’t allow anyone else on it. And it seemed that victums of the incidents received the worse end of the deal when it brought up for disciplinary actions. The kid who started it up was alway good in coming up with a good story to get him out of the worst end of the deal. So where were the teachers? They never seemed to be around when these incidents occurred or claimed they didn’t see it even though they were on the playground.

The public schools have lots of problems that are in desperate need of attention. They are failing our children.

The claim that homeschool children are socially inept is so completely misunderstood. They are engaged with not only homeschoolers but with kids of the public schools as well. Outside activities for homeschooler is not only limited to kids who are homeschooled but activities such as boyscouts, little league, parks and reservation organizations activities from children in the community. Plus, they get out and about with other kids in their neighborhood who many attend public schools. Just because they are homeschooled does not mean that we shelter them away in our homes. Homeschooling is not a prison but a type of education where there is freedom to learn what you want and more. Some of that takes place outside of the home. Those are perhaps the best classrooms.