by VorJack
I tell ya, I LIKE this kid …
Home-school mom Susan Mule wishes she hadn’t taken a friend’s advice and tried a textbook from a popular Christian publisher for her 10-year-old’s biology lessons.
Mule’s precocious daughter Elizabeth excels at science and has been studying tarantulas since she was 5. But she watched Elizabeth’s excitement turn to confusion when they reached the evolution section of the book from Apologia Educational Ministries, which disputed Charles Darwin’s theory.
“I thought she was going to have a coronary,” Mule said of her daughter, who is now 16 and taking college courses in Houston. “She’s like, ‘This is not true!’”
… and a round of applause for Elizabeth, if you please.
This is a selection from the San Francisco Chronicle on the prevalence of creationism in the text books available for home-schoolers. It’s been mentioned in the past that we don’t have really good data about the numbers and composition of home-schoolers. But I think we can tentatively assume that the majority right now are conservative Christian. If so, it’s not surprising that they would drive the market.
“The majority of home-schoolers self-identify as evangelical Christians,” said Ian Slatter, a spokesman for the Home School Legal Defense Association. “Most home-schoolers will definitely have a sort of creationist component to their home-school program.”
Those who don’t, however, often feel isolated and frustrated from trying to find a textbook that fits their beliefs.
Case in point:
In Kentucky, Lexington home-schooler Mia Perry remembers feeling disheartened while flipping through a home-school curriculum catalog and finding so many religious-themed textbooks.
“We’re not religious home-schoolers, and there’s somewhat of a feeling of being outnumbered,” said Perry, who has home-schooled three of her four children after removing her oldest child from a public school because of a health condition.
Perry said she cobbled together her own curriculum after some mainstream publishers told her they would not sell directly to home-schooling parents.
This is why home-schooling needs to be regulated by law. Nothing dramatic, just a quick bill which says “If you’re going to teach your kid at home, what you teach needs to follow a curriculum that would be recognisable to a decent school teacher, and you need to take account of their need to socialise with other kids”.
It’s not only science books, but also history. With history, it is easier to find good secular books, but I was reading a review of a providential history book the other day and it is just sad that kids are learning such an incomplete and downright false view of history. It takes “America is a Christian Nation” to a whole new – and scarier – level.
Even public schools don’t test or check up on science teaching–only math and reading are part of NCLB, so that is what schools focus on. I know plenty of public school kids who believe in creationism despite a hs biology class.
Second, any parent who can’t find secular material never bothered to actually look for it. These companies, like A Beka and BJU sell to private schools, and then found a homeschool market and offered packages (get all you need for any grade in a bulk buy) to homeschoolers.
Many homeschoolers starting out buy a packaged curriculum because here is so much out there it can make your head spin, and it is easy to just get everything in a homeschooling-for-beginners package. Many end up making different decisions as the years progress and they can tailor their curriculum specificly to their child.
And most states do have some regulation of homeschoolers. Some consider them private schools and some consider them a third kind of school, and the amount of regulation varies.
I’d like to point out that regulation has not helped public schools, and there is no reason to think it would help homeschools. Colleges and universities can (and often do) simply control things by not counting creationist material as a course, so a family whose child wants to go to college will start looking at requirements and make sure what they teach fits in those parameters.
And can we stop with the socializing canard already? Most homeschoolers are better socialized to be a functioning member of society then most, because they are exposed to many different people and a wide range of ages, something that more accurately reflects real life. Yes, there are always a few fringe folks who lock their kids in the basement, but that is a social services and parenting issue, not a homeschooling one. And that is regulated by the states.
I agree with all that Darlene has noted. I’m a secular homeschooling mom, and have never had trouble finding science material. We primarily use our public library and local universities rather than buying a specific curriculum, but there’s plenty out there. The woman in the article above almost sounds like she was tricked into buying creationist materials…but it’s not like creationist publishers are hiding the fact that they are religious rather than science-based. Apologia markets itself as an educational MINISTRY. Learn, Live, & Defend the Faith. You know what you’re getting into there. If you really have difficulty discerning real science when you’re looking for curriculum, you probably shouldn’t be homeschooling to begin with.
And back to Darlene’s comments, socialization is not, not, NOT a problem for any homeschoolers I’ve met, ever. Speaking for my family, we are out and about on field-trips or collaborative educational projects almost every single day, interacting with tons of other children and families, and we are not unique in this. My kids are able to socialize and learn with (and from) children and adults of all ages and backgrounds. Not a problem.
And if you don’t mind lacking the teacher’s edition, used textbooks are definitely the way to go. You can easily save hundreds of dollars that way, and there is no limit to what you can find. You can just buy the same texts another local school uses if you aren’t sure what to get.
I believe this is one home schooling company that is not religious.
http://homeschool.calvertschool.org/index.php
I saw this article last week, yet it didn’t surprise me. Especially after reading Rechelle’s blog over at MySistersFarmhouse. It’s so sad, yet people refuse to see the correlation between the Xtain fundamentalism in this country and our world ranking in education.
Also, after reading the comments a question came to me….do those private Xian colleges actually offer courses on creationism as a science credit? Cuz frankly, that’s BS.
Yes. Yes, they do.
Or at least science “from a Christian world-view” or a “biblical perspective”. I homeschool, and those are some key phrases that make me not look at a particular publisher.
Or a particular college.
Scarier than home schooling is the effort by a number of state legislative bodies to mandate that creationism be taught, as an alternative to evolution, in their science curriculum. Teaching the bible as scientific fact, you can not dumb down education further than that.
Fuck the publishers. Another reason not to be sad that their business model is obsolete. (O HAI gigapedia)
I agree. I am troubled that the companies who are, in part, responsible for teaching the next generation can be so beholden to what a bunch of lunatics believe (yay capitalism). I am reminded of the fiasco ensuing in Texas right now and how the textbook companies are/will be bowing to McElroy and his cronies. It’s downright scary that our education system is so vulnerable to this kind of foolishness. I feel like we need nationalized teaching standards to nip this shit in the bud. Screw states rights.
I was homeschooled growing up. From an early age, we were taught extensively about evolution precisely because of this fundie crap.
Could someone please tell me what homeschooling parents are so afraid of? Because, let’s face it: they’re afraid of something. Is it what’s being taught in regular schools? Is it how “outside” children behave in regular schools? Is it a combination?
Oh, sure, homeschoolers brag about going on field trips with other like-minded homeschoolers, and how confident their children are out in public (meaning: my child is very social, very normal). But, as an ex-teacher, who has taught only a handful of homeschooled kids in a public school, I’m telling you this: these parents are raising socially odd children who are frightened of the “outside”. They might behave perfectly precociously around their homeschooled peers, but they behave in a very frightened way, treat everyone with great suspicion or caution, when they’re in a public school.
With the exception of guns or drugs being brought to school, most children should be perfectly safe in elementary school. It’s a bit like Bush’s Homeland Security’s Advisory System.
If it is indeed “fear”, then it is unwarranted and out of control.
…
Broadly classifying reasons for homeschooling as “fear” is a blatant over-generalization. It’s so blatant, in fact, that I’m going to assume you knew that when you wrote it.
There are some people who homeschool their kids because of fear: fear that their children will be taught badly, fear that their children will be shot, or even fear that their children will somehow “de-convert.”
There are also people who homeschool their children because they know that they will move from state to state with abnormal frequency, or have a low opinion of elementary school education in this country, or have children with ADD, or whatever else.
If you’d like to seriously argue that every reason for homeschooling boils down to fear, then I’ll offer as a counterargument the idea that all parenting decisions are ultimately made out of fear. I have at least as much support for that assertion.
I homeschool my children because public education in AZ is bottom-of-the-barrel. We briefly enrolled in a public charter school as an alternative, but discovered they were switching my left-handed daughter to right-handed writing so as not to encourage the materialistic side of her brain!?!? Seriously. Also, this school would not teach science to children before puberty, because before “fourth grade, children have not yet developed the capacity for critical reasoning.” So that’s what I’m afraid of. My child not being taught anything–or worse yet, being taught bullshit.
Because we have several universities in our small town, we are able to work with professors and graduate students in providing in-depth workshops and classes for our children, piggy backing on college field trips as well as developing our own. My kids have tons of both homeschooled and non-homeschooled friends, and aren’t awkward in any social setting. Probably the homeschooled kids you’ve run into in the public schools are just shell-shocked with transitioning into the overly structured, mind-numbing, one-size-fits-all, management-focused style of traditional public schools. And with arbitrary rules like having to raise their hand to go to the bathroom. When was the last time you had to get permission to pee? Just saying.
My husband and I are hoping to start a Sudbury School in our town in the next few years, but in the meantime, homeschooling is the best way for us to ensure a quality education for our kids.
I kind of think public school is crap, it’s shallow, and kids aren’t mostly concerned with getting more out of it than they get. I would tend to want to home-school, because I think mostly my public school was an experience of being babysat and taught a bunch of the same things over and over which were … you know, maybe true, but incomplete. Or mythological versions of history. It feels to me like a public school education gets one a very bare minimum of cultural information so as not to seem like a dummy next to someone with the same information. I have often thought of sending a child to public school and supplementing them information in some home-school kind of way, but kids get to be locked up in school all day with half-ass teachers mostly, and sent home with a lot of homework, there’s not going to be any time. Learning should be more fun than it is in school, but I’m not sure how well I can sell it as “fun” when it’s all they’ve been doing. The world and everything they need to know is interesting – I mean, like WOW – but I think school makes it so dull and makes dull humans. I fear raising a dull human who don’t know so much!
Hi Custador,
“If you’re going to teach your kid at home, what you teach needs to follow a curriculum that would be recognisable to a decent school teacher, and you need to take account of their need to socialise with other kids”.
Let’s hear it for authoritarianism! Yay!
Anyone catch the part in the provided quote where this poor, home schooled 16 year-old girl was taking college courses?
Apparently there’s something wrong with establishing minimum requirements of an education.
Such standards, as they exist in public education, are failing. Parents who are invested in finding a better way for their children should be allowed to do so.
min·i·mum Pronunciation (mn-mm)
n. pl. min·i·mums or min·i·ma (-m)
1.
a. The least possible quantity or degree.
b. The lowest degree or amount reached or recorded; the lower limit of variation.
2. A lower limit permitted by law or other authority.
I know what it means, silly;-) My point is that implementing these standards doesn’t seem to be helpful–and the worst case scenario is that the standards may be legislated by politicians who have a particular agenda not having much to do with education…meaning that we may be required to teach a minimum amount of BS (Intelligent Design, anyone?) and frankly, I would prefer to teach no BS.
So setting minimum standards to ensure creationists cannot teach any old twaddle as science to their children and students would be a bad thing because creationists could subvert the Entire Public Education System and force everybody including you to teach bullcrap as science?
Does not compute.
Creationists already ARE subverting the whole public education system. Have you ever been to a school board meeting? Particularly in a conservative, rural area? It’s terrifying.
Since neither of you are Brad, I wonder what this disagreement is about – setting a higher minimum…. ok, you both win. Some people think the public school minimum is too low, sometimes dangerously low, so requirements for homeschooling ought to have some standard that meets or is higher. I guess some homeschoolers do not care whether their children are getting a good education or overestimate their abilities to give a good education to their children and so need to be instructed what they have to put in to be allowed to do this on their own. However, some feel that the public schools teach all the wrong thing. I think Brad might be saying if the school says you have to demonstrate knowledge of X, and you disagree with X, it might not be the state’s place to define what you teach your kids.
We will say X is evolution for now – or a decent science education based in reality not fantasy. However, if we also include in X a demonstration of historical knowledge including a revisionism of it, like the Mayflower landed on Plymouth Rock and the Indians welcomed the intruders whole-heartedly, don’t you have the right to teach your kids what really happened? This happens in schools now, where there is a “minimum standard” and so teachers teach to the test instead of a complete understanding of facts and events, and at least in my case, several trips to a planetarium not to learn about how stars are formed, but to get a pretty good education about some of the major constellations and the myths that go along with them. “Stars are pretty pictures” is not science either, but I was taught that for science in a public school in a secular area of the country, well before “No Child Left Behind”.
Kodie, you illustrate my concern in your discussion of history and your planetarium experience. Schools often dumb-down their curriculum because they have to teach a specific kind of information to meet the minimum standards–at the expense of offering a complete understanding of the facts. If the same standards were implemented for homeschoolers, I might be required to waste my time teaching to a standardized test that includes revisionist history and pseudo-science–which would detract from time I could be spending teaching my children real science and critical thinking. I have high standards for my children–and I don’t want alternate standards imposed upon homeschoolers by the same groups that are mucking up public education. If such groups were good at creating standards that contributed to the education experience rather than robbing it of its richness, I wouldn’t be homeschooling!
So basically, “I got mine, screw Everyone else”.
That seems shortsighted.
I’m offering my particular situation as an anecdote for a far-reaching problem–not to suggest that I am only concerned about my own family. I work very actively in my community to improve public education here, and I can see that EVERYONE’S KIDS are harmed by this focus on standards that turn education into a shallow process of teaching to a test. Broadening this approach to include homeschoolers only makes the problem bigger. We need to adopt new methods that are successful (the statistics for homeschooling are great in this regard) and not push for more of what clearly fails.
I don’t know what the solution is. There should be a minimum standard, I’m just not impressed with that minimum and who is setting it. I’m not a libertarian yet and somewhat feel two ways about it – is the government really the only agency that can or tries to protect the education of children from outside interests in corrupting science with their religion, I mean due to the 1st amendment.
I spent at least 3 years in school going over the same period of American history: the overview. When history has the capacity to teach us things and be really fascinating, I think public school wasted its opportunities there. If they are teaching history one year, it ought to have been taught and not need to be reviewed and reviewed several more years. What is the message here? I should also recall, other than learning once about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, we didn’t actually read it or talk about it in any public school class I ever took, or how it’s interpreted in the branches of government via recent history or current events.
I do remember learning some real science in grade school in addition to basic Greek mythology, we learned about climates and volcanoes and a basic idea of the kind of star the sun is, assured it would not explode until many thousands of years from now, and going to high school, could elect out of science after 10th grade. High school science did not relate whatsoever to grade school science. I don’t think after 8 years in school, science should seem like a drastically new subject, and difficult to grasp, and just as easy to quit.
Social Studies and English were required through 12th, but themselves were divided into electives of personal interest. For one of my English electives, “dramatics,” rather than cover the elective subject, she spent half the semester making sure we learned grammar. In 11th grade. Now while one might say, “good for her, not letting anyone slip through the cracks,” it might have been a good idea if she just tested us and sent the failures to remedial English. Seriously, no plays or anything for 10 weeks, just sentence parsing, 2nd grade style. In poetry, we read, analyzed, memorized, and wrote journals of poetry. By comparison, much more demanding, but also, why again is this required and not science? None of my social studies electives rehashed history or geography or government, but I got to take psychology and… we watched movies and took sorting tests that are pretty much bunk. To keep us off the streets, I suppose. It certainly wasn’t vital information.
I just don’t know what these crazy minimum standards are aiming for and whether I agree with their intentions. Is it to make sure everyone who graduates isn’t a complete moron, or is employable in some capacity, or has been fortified with nationalism, has been babysat under the guise of actual education, etc.?
What I actually learned that is true and probably a minimum of what is necessary or sufficient for the average citizen to learn might have taken 4 or 5 years, if they were really interested in teaching what matters and taught it so it stuck. The other 7-8 years of babysitting could be spent (partially) in remedial if necessary, or filled out with other interesting areas or more in depth study, or a wide variety of necessary and useful information that is already the parents’ prerogative, like money management and sex ed and so many other things – the taxpayers generally do not go for that. Rather they spent twelve years repeating the same few things in case some of it stuck, with a lot of filler and nonsense. Their minimums are silly and arbitrary to me.
I don’t really have faith in such an organization, and so not sure I would have them regulating what minimums I should achieve if I were to homeschool, and yeah, I guess that means they leave all kinds of parents alone with that, parents who don’t know enough to teach, parents who let their kids watch tv all day whenever convenient, or parents who teach myths as scientific truth and fear of satan and evolution, or whatever. I want the country to care about making citizens of purpose, who contain knowledge and curiosity. I don’t know how to reconcile that with what the public school systems are empowered to say what a good minimum is that homeschooling parents need to follow.
Hi, Brad.
“Let’s hear it for authoritarianism! Yay!”
Let’s hear it for not allowing parents to turn their children into dysfunctional, unemployable freaks! Yay!
Rules are not always bad. And the girl in the example above WAS NOT TAUGHT CREATIONISM BUT IN FACT WAS WELL AWARE THAT CREATIONISM IS A MYTH. Did you get that last part? Goooooood.
Can’t fight city hall. Can’t fight stooopid.
the sad thing about the dumbing down of America is just how hard some people are working at it.
Meant to add a ;) after my ribbing Custador…peace.
I wonder if she tried to Ebay old science text books? They might be a year or two out of date, but that can be remedied by supplimenting online sources where needed.
I have a feeling she wanted three student copies and a teacher copy for each text, which might be harder to get a hold of. But honestly, I doubt it would be as much trouble as she expects.
The way I hear it, a year or two out of date is a lot better than most public schools can manage – and let’s face it, in most subjects it doesn’t really matter. It certainly wouldn’t in the UK, anyway. Physics GCSE (qualifications we go for at age 16, I have 12 of them which I think is pretty typical), for example, has a lot of stuff about basic quantum theory, Bohr’s Law, conservation of energy, conservation of momentum, inverse square law, the laws of motion (S=UV+1/2AT^2 and all that stuff), Boyle’s Law, etc. etc. It’s not about teaching String Theory or Chaos Theory or anything that advanced, it’s about a good grounding in the basics. You don’t need text-books that are bang-up with current research to acheive that.
“S=UV+1/2AT^2″
Are those really the symbols you use? In America, standard would be something like Delta x = v0t + 1/2 a t2 for the second antiderivative of position with respect to time.
But yeah, I agree with your point. Nobody is going to learn string theory in high school (I mean, at least not anything beyond basic conceptual stuff you could get from books like The Elegant Universe
ARG, sup and sub tags not supported. I meant Delta x = v_0 t + 1/2 a t^2.
Hahaha, just looked up Bohr’s Law. “The crazier the theory, the more likely it is to be correct.” I like it.
^me
It breaks my heart that there isn’t more help for those who try to give their kids the best education at home.
Here in Ontario, the government offers grade 1-12 through the Independent Learning Centre. Each course includes lessons, texts, materials (such as lab kits), and an assigned teacher to grade the work /offer suggestions, online tutors, software, etc. all for $120.00 per year Kids are tested before they can pass a grade. It all follows the secular school curriculum. I took some high school courses when I was a young mother and enjoyed them. (Finally, something the government got right)
Anyway, I am posting a link to the textbook site in case it can help someone. You can buy new or used. One note, though, evolution is considered a “given”, so it is taught throughout the sciences rather than as a separate subject.
http://www.ilc.org/school/courses/elementary_required_text.php
Good luck to you brave people. I don’t know if I would want the little “darlins” around all day myself. :)
Why the constant home school bashing? I am amused by how often it is ex-teachers screaming the loudest. I suppose that having spent a lifetime embracing and maintaining mediocrity they have a nasty pill to swallow. I’m so very tired of choleric individuals spewing half truths and regurgitating stereotypes.
None of my friends who homeschool are christian although we all know people who are, I know more teachers who homeschool than christians (and weirdly dentists!). I homeschool my children because I have lived in Canada for ten years and have yet to meet an intelligent Canadian (Margaret Atwood where are you?). I once met an American general at a dinner party who refused to believe that Britain is an island (fine, yes, a group of islands, pedants!) because it is part of Europe. The ignorance of some North Americans is truly terrifying and there is no way I’m about to let my children get flushed down that lavatory.
The rest of you, however, are all gorgeous and wonderful. Please give Obama a second term!
I think your standards may be a bit high…
‘Scuse me? I’m Canadian…like to think I have a modicum of IQ…guess we didn’t connect in those 10 years! I tend to associate with other critical thinkers, and there are far fewer extreme xtrians and right-wingers here (well, they’re here, they’re just a little quieter :)
Janet, so your Canadian. Congrats on the gold medal in hockey. I live in Buffalo so Ryan Miller is the man. As much as I wanted the US to win, I know that it meant so much more to Canada as a country than to the US (except for us in a hockey mad town).
I’m an oddball Canadian – not that much into hockey, and I don’t live in an igloo or travel by dogsled – that said, I do occasionally say “eh”, and I agree that game was very exciting!!! Thanks for the thumbs-up!
We considered secular homeschooling for all the normal reasons. We didn’t want influence from religious teachers, we wanted a comprehensive science education based reality, we didn’t want our daughter bullied, exposed to drugs, exposed to sex, etc.
After lots of soul searching and talking to schools, we decided to do both. Our daughter is in public school, but we teach her at home too! This may sound a bit bizarre, but it’s working out great. Here in Oregon, we have the second shortest school year in the nation. That (pathetic) fact gives us plenty of time to teach our little one the periodic table, the phylogenetic tree, or the structure of a cell. We get the best of both worlds!
One byproduct of our choice is the influence we’re putting on the other children in her class. She is proudly non-theist, and very pro-science. Her (and our) passion for good science has provided the teacher with a great resource for her class room. We volunteer every chance we get. We’ve also had a few incidences where religion as popped up, and she swiftly put down the theists and their underdeveloped theology. By having us as part of the public school system, I feel that we are aiding the cause of atheism and rational thought.
Likes this and likes Revy.
That’s awesome and you’re making the world a better place by what you’re doing. Unfortunately, crazy rightwingers also appear to have the freedom to teach their kids whatever they want – and the results of that is, well, (sorry, LRA) Texas.
Hey, now! I’m a product of public school in Texas….
:P