Unsure About Homeschooling

[Amy Z]

Ebony wrote:
 
> What do we do with the other 90% of the kids whose parents can not 
> (or in many cases will not) feasibly home school their children?

The same thing we do now.  They go to school--private if they want to 
and can afford it, public if not.  

I was never homeschooled, BTW, except in the sense that we all learn 
at home (e.g. I learned to walk, talk, read, print, use a fellytone, 
cook, draw, do crossword puzzles, garden, pray, read music, sing in 
harmony, deal with house emergencies, ride a bicycle, etc. from my 
parents or sheer immersion in the world, not from school).  I went to 
public school through 12th grade and had some wonderful educational 
experiences, some bad.  I had some good socialization there, some 
bad.

Jenny's students are extraordinarily lucky, not only to have Jenny as 
a teacher but to have such a thing as Advisory at all; I had something 
like that in school, but only because a very devoted teacher created a 
Friday-afternoon seminar on his own time and without any recognition 
or support from the school (and it was only for a few hand-picked 
students, not at all something you could do if you paid any attention 
to fairness . . .).  It was the best part of my education, hands-down, 
and it was a vital part of my social life/social education as well.  
Most students have nothing like this; it goes against the grain of 
most US public, even private, education.  There are many kinds of 
socialization in schools, but a small group led by a loving teacher in 
serious conversation about issues that the kids themselves identify as 
crucial is rarely one of them, more's the pity.

As long as there are people around, there will be opportunities for 
socialization.  I don't worry about that aspect of homeschooling at 
all.

Amy