Homeschoolers: What are the three best things and three worst things about homeschool?

Question

Are you a homeschool parent or a student?

ksgirl

Universities actively seek out homeschool students because they are academically superior and are more involved in campus activities (social skills)

Try finding out the facts:

http://www.hslda.org/research/ray2003/Socialization.asp

ksgirl

What you call the "best curriculum" and Certified teachers have taken us from the best educated population in the world (pre-public education) to one of the worst educated westernized populations.

Answer 1

I'm a homeschool parent.

Three best things:
1) Seeing my children grow up during these early precious years.
2) The flexibility we have in what we do and when.
3) I'm finding it hard to decide on the third among the other great things about homeschooling: they're protected from an unhealthy environment (fluorescent lights, sitting in desks all day, being bullied or witnessing bullying...), they get to work at their own pace, my kids are really close...

Three worst things:
1) Other people who don't get homeschooling and judge it without actually knowing much about it.
2) For my kids, few French-speaking friends (their first language is French but we live in a predominately English city; most of their friends are English-speaking, which would not be the case if they went to a French school we have here).
3) ?

Answer 2

I'm a homeschool parent.

Three best things about homeschool:
1) learning what the children want to learn about so they are genuinely interested (whether it be dragons or myths or the human body or dinosaurs, etc.);
2) learning at each child's level so it is less stressful and boring for them;
3) spending time and having fun with your kids and enjoying learning (can I count that as one?). It is really fun to do art projects and dinosaur digs (we did that yesterday) and the other things we get to do!

Three worst things about homeschool:
1) My son expects every book we read to be the most exciting and interesting book ever! I have totally spoiled him by having chosen interesting books thus far, and I think he is going to be in shock when he goes to college and starts reading some of the drier stuff.
2)Homeschooling critics, many are family members, who don't know anything about homeschooling but yet are quite critical and negative despite having done zero research and knowing basically nothing about it. Where does that attitude come from?
3) All the books and projects and science stuff all over the house. If we weren't homeschooling, I would have so much less stuff. We have basically the equivalent of a library and a school and a small science lab right now. Someday I would like to have an entire room devoted just to homeschooling, but right now we have our homeschooling stuff all over the house!

I wanted to add one thing also. One person had posted that homeschoolers could not buy books that were used in the schools. That may have been true in the past, but is not true anymore at least. I have several books I use with my children currently, that are public school texts that I have bought from the publishers (Pearson and Steck-Vaughn). I was able to purchase their books directly from their websites with no problems at all. Just wanted to add about that because I didn't want that to possibly discourage anyone from homeschooling that was thinking about it. And of course Rainbow Resource is about 1000 pages of curriculum now at: http://www.rainbowresource.com/index.php!

Answer 3

Former home-school student.

Best:
1. It is flexible (You can spend extra time on stuff that you are having trouble with or are especially interested in)
2. You can have more 1-on-1 support
3. There are less distractions (depending on circumstances)

Worst:
1. There is very little support from the government
2. Less social interaction with peers
3. It is a lot of hard work for the parents

I believe that I'm doing better in later life because I was homeschooled. My brother and sister were also homeschooled and I think it helped that I wasn't just doing it alone because I could do group activities. I also did drama on the side to meet people my own age.

Answer 4

I'm in grade 9 and I'm homeschooled.
Good:
I got to skip a grade last year because I was doing so well.
You don't have to do homework after your school work is done.
You develope better friendships with people because you choose to be friends with them you don't have to be because they are in your class or something, and contrary to what most people think I have just as many if not more friends than the average public school student.
Bad:
I get teased about being homeschooled sometimes
Sometimes I feel like I'm missing out on something in school.
I find it more distracting because there are so many other things to do at home, so I distracted.

Overall I find that the good outweighs the bad, I have been given the choice many times to go to public school, espesially this year going into highschool my parents wanted to make sure that I was happy staying at home. I chose to stay at home because of the good reasons, and there are so many more benifits than the three I listed, but I can't think of any more bad things about it.
I find that I understand things better because I can work through things at my own pace and if I get it I can just move on, and if I don't I can ask for help and work on it until I get it, and I won't move on until I understand what I'm doing. And I guess the only other bad thing about homeschooling is all the people that think that homeschoolers are homeschooled because we're to stupid or socially akward to be in public school. And then people always ask me, "Oh if you're homeschooled, don't you get lonely?"
My answer is no, I don't because I'm in sports 4 times a week and I attend youth group 3 times a week, if I didn't then I probably wouldn't know any of my friends. Sorry to make it so long :)

Answer 5

Homeschool student.

Best:
1) The freedom to choose what I learn.
2) Being more social. Instead of being stuck in class all day, I work from 8-10 or 10:30 AM and then have the rest of the day free.
3) Increased self-confidence.

Worst:
1) Dealing with the closedminded bigots who will hate me, pick on me and assume a lot of nasty things about me just because I don't go to school.
2) It can feel sort of alienating, not doing what everyone else is doing.
3) I can't coast along on the easy work like I did in school.

Answer 6

I was homeschooled during middle school...


3 best:
~5 hours of work = 2 days of school
~breaks whenever you want
~extra sleep

3 worst
~less time with friends
~no extra time with girls
~missing out on time when people change "social groups"

When I came back to school, things were alot different. Luckily for me, just about all of my friends were already football players so i didnt have to find a whole new group of friends.

My brothers are homeschooled and im kinda worried about them since even my parents have agreed that they are not as mature as i was at their age so who knows how they will react when put back into a school enviroment.

Answer 7

(As a parent who homeschooled her children thru elementary and them let them attend public school)
GOOD:
1. They received a very strong learning foundation. (able to skip a grade)
2. They received a very strong sense of self. (able to withstand peer pressure very easily)
3. We could study the things they were most into by taking lots of FUN field trips.
(They meshed into the public school life well and loved it and the time they were homeschooled)

BAD:
1. They didn't get to work in groups with all types of personalities.
2. They didn't get to experience the fact that the world is made up of many many personalities very different from our family and friends.
3. They had to get used to working with alot of distractions when they started public school.

Answer 8

PROS: (Homeschooling Mom View Point)

1. My daughter is home being taught on her level.

2. Can learn about God daily.

3. I have control over who and what influences her.

4. Flexibility (if she gets sick then feels better later, we don't lose a school day)

5. Get to do things together and grow a stronger family unit.

CONS:

1. Can't really think of any other than you have to buy your own teaching materials, but I find that pretty fun lol.

Answer 9

i'm a homeschooled student
1. i learn better and understand thins better
2. I Get more sleep and have less distractions
3. I have a better attitude because i am more relaxed

Worst
1. Some people look down on homeschooling
2. If i walk down the street cops will think im skiping school when i'm just going to get the mail
3. Well i can't really think of anything else
3.

Answer 10

The 3 best

I got to sleep in
I got to stay up late
I got to do my school work as fast or as slow as I wanted

The 3 worst

I had no friends
I was behind in my education
I was lonely and I developed an eating disorder because of it