FAQ and FMC (Frequently Asked Questions and Frequently Made Comments)

1. Is homeschooling legal?

Homeschooling is currently legal in all fifty states in the United States. However, schools, wanting the money and high test scores homeschoolers bring, periodically try to pretend it isn't. So far, no state has won the fight.

2. Can homeschooling provide the full range of education a child could receive in public school?

Homeschooling can actually provide a much wider range of learning opportunities. Since most homeschoolers are not tied to mindless standardized tests, they can spend many hours learning to think and explore. Because they don't have to come up with the cost of a school bus, they can go on field trips every week if they choose. Because there is no state mandated curriculum or point of view, they can explore every possible way to view an issue, and even test it out through volunteer work. Homeschoolers have the whole world as their classroom, and hundreds or thousands of possible teachers through the use of books, internet, games, field trip guides, and people they know. Rather than plowing through a generic curriculum, they can explore the world in all its glory, and explore a far larger curriculum than whatever happens to be in style with the government at any moment.

3. Don't children need to learn more opinions than just those held by their parents?

When we studied the beginnings of the world, we learned about creation, evolution and a half dozen options in-between. In most states, such a range of choices in a public school classroom would be illegal. So would being allowed to make your own decision on the subject. (Children can have other opinions, but must give the official government opinion on tests, which sounds suspiciously like the Communist schools we heard horror stories about when I was a child.) We like to imagine that our schools teach democracy, but they don't. They are funded and run by the government. Naturally, whoever pays the bills gets to choose the point of view. In more racist days, schools taught racism. In today's society, children are often taught that everything is morally acceptable as long as you behave in school. The children are not receiving a wide range of possible views and then taught how to evaluate them. It's true that some homeschooling parents don't teach about options, but then again, neither do most schools. Many teachers might want to do so, but some laws actually prohibit it in certain areas. If the parents and school agree, the child is not receiving options. If the school and parents disagree, the child may become confused, because he isn't ready to evaluate yet and hasn't been trained to do so. Pitting schools and parents against each other damages the ability of either to do their jobs well. Parents are legally responsible for their children; therefore they should be allowed to choose what their child is taught, because they will answer to the courts if those beliefs lead to immoral or criminal behavior--even if the behavior was learned at school.

4. Some parents aren't qualified to teach what they are teaching.

This statement shows a lack of understanding of one of the best parts of homeschooling, and also presumes that all public school teachers are experts in the subjects they teach. Since many teachers are a lesson ahead of the children, (no one knows everything), some teachers work outside their major, and elementary school teachers don't have degrees in every subject they teach, this is not even true of public schools.

However, the more important factor is this: A teacher who knows everything robs the child of some essential learning. The teacher might be able to open the child's brain and dump in information, but what is a child really learning by that? He is learning facts he will forget as soon as the test is over. Suppose, instead, the child's teacher says, "I don't know. Let's find out together. How can we do that?" Then, instead of a lecture, teacher and child go on an exciting journey of exploration to find out what they both want to know. The teacher sets the example by showing excitement for the discovery process, and also teaches by example how to learn. The student then understands that learning isn't what you do in school; it's what you do in life. Isn't that the way school ought to work? Isn't creating a life-long learner the point of education? Who needs a degree to teach a child that learning is a joy?

5. But what about college?

Colleges That Admit Homeschoolers has a list of colleges that welcome our kids. Mine chose to start at the community college in order to avoid limiting their high school studies and to save money, but many go straight to a university.

6. What about socialization?

The point of school is education, not socialization. Children don't need to go to school to have friends, or even to meet people who are different from them. When I was in school, I chose friends just like me. Other kids were there, but I didn't hang out with them, and neither do most adults. My friends were in the clubs and elective classes I chose. Furthermore, schools are rapidly doing away with recess, gym, art, music and every other opportunity to socialize, in order to make more time for standardized test preparation. That should take care of that argument very soon.