Re: Childproof locks/homeschool
>>do things to provide socialisation which seems to me to be one of the big concerns with home schooling....
That does seem to be one area that public school advocates choose to play up (i.e. the fact that kids won't have socialization unless they go to a "real" school). My experience tells me that that is not really a concern, and is more or less just something that teachers use to put the fear of homeschooling into the parents.
The basic strategy of the teachers unions has been as follows:
First they claimed that students whom are homeschooled, would not learn as much as student in public schooled; but now there is ample evidence that on average home-schooled students do much better than public schooled kids, so they abandoned that tactic.
The second phase of the critisim that they resorted to was what you mentioned, i.e. trying to make parents feel that there kids would be socially inept unless they went to public school. This has been pretty much disproved as well since in general, home schooled kids still get to play with other kids their age, and more importantly, they get to interact with kids and adults of all ages more so than a public school kid who only interacts with kids the same age.
Now, the latest critism that is floating around in my particular area (now that the first 2 attempts to critize homeschoolers have failed) is teachers in my area are actually arguing that in effect, parents actually OWE it to the other children to keep their own kids in school because the best and brightest are usually the ones that either get pulled out for homeschool (or else for private school). The teachers figured if all the good kids left, and then those involved parents started voting down (or at least not actively supporting) the year after year after year of budget increases (well beyond inflation adjustments) that those students still in the system would suffer (and by the way , the teachers might not get their raises every year).
Anyway, that has pretty much been the progression of the home school versus public school battle around here.
Not everyone can or should homeschool, but if you are willing to make the sacrifice, most people would not be disappointed in their investment...after all, very very few people on their deathbeds say "...I wish I had spent a little more time at the office..."
Definitely not critizing anyone that chooses NOT to homeschool, but definitely give a big round of applause to anyone that does.
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by ejb on 10/18/01 01:29 PM (server time).</FONT></P>