by Steven David Horwich
The following is an excerpt from Mr. Horwich’s new book, Not Alternative Education – Universal Private Education. This is part one of his article, Common Bad Sense Says Run The Other Way. It deals with reasons why one should homeschool.
Public school is “free.” Well, at least the family in question doesn’t need to come up with tuition or tutoring fees. (You pay taxes, but the cost of public schooling is unfairly and unreasonably spread out amongst all tax payers.) Even the apparency of free is good. I understand.
Public school (or any school) provides other illusions of freedom. Public school is freedom from the kids. Public schooling create time that Mom and Dad can get other things done, important things like work. It provides a predictable period of time during each week day when the parents are free to pursue other loves than being a parent.
From a strictly egocentric view, school is free and freedom for parents, and that’s good.
Public school has even greater upside for some people. It is an actual passing of the torch of responsibility for their children to others. If the kids don’t get an education, well, it’s not mom or dad’s fault, it’s that damned school. If the kids are hurt at school, it’s the school’s fault. If the student’s interests and dreams are crushed while being carefully “educated”, well, the school did that, didn’t they!
Throughout part one of this book, I painted a very grim picture of the results that public schools arrive at with students. I won’t weary your eyes and your heart with more of the same. But there are going to be many parents who might get to this point and say “Okay. Schools are terrible. But I’m sure as hell not going to homeschool.” They’ll have powerful reasons to not homeschool, the same reasons millions of other people use to not homeschool, and even to attack homeschooling.
Upon investigation, none of the reasons to hate homeschool or to not do it hold an ounce of water. Most of them are based on lies started by teachers and their unions and supported by laziness on the part of the parent.
Your instincts may well say run away. Given schooling’s “perks” for the parent, common sense may whisper “are you kidding – send Junior to school!”
That is actually uncommonly bad sense and not just for the poor student. It will backfire onto the parents in ways you may not wish to imagine. It damages your community. By sending your child to public school you financially support those schools and keep them in business. If after reading this book to this point you still believe public schools deserve support, well… um…read it again.
Here’s a grim truth, mom and dad. Kids who finish “school” and who still have no education tend to live at home longer than their actually educated “peers”. (The same could be said for homeschoolers who are not successfully educated.) They have to stay home because they have no dream and no skills. They weren’t provided an education. Their own interests were never investigated and, in fact, were crushed. For you lazy moms and dads who use public schooling for the sake of the freedom it provides you, imagine an additional four-five years with unemployed or underemployed and uninterested Junior still living at home – after he “finishes school”. He won’t be much fun, either, because people without a future usually aren’t. Still want to avoid educating your child?
Well, there’s always Jr. College, where Junior can waste another two years having his dreams ignored. And that might be the least of the harm done by a school.
Steven Horwich is an Emmy and Dramalogue award-winning writer/director, who has split his life between the arts and education. A teacher with over 35 years and over 20,000 hours of experience from elementary school through university-level teaching, he started homeschooling his own children in 2002. This led him to author over 300 courses since 2002, a complete curricula (excluding math) for ages 5-adult, called Connect The Thoughts. Over 20,000 people have used CTT since making it available via the Internet in 2007. His curricula is presented at www.connectthethoughts.com. There is over 5 hours of film explaining his courses and approach. He has authored a book about education today, Poor Cheated Little Johnny, and a teacher training program to go with it. He currently presents a free webinar about education and homeschooling every third Tuesday.
The following is an excerpt from Mr. Horwich’s new book, Not Alternative Education – Universal Private Education. This is part one of his article, Common Bad Sense Says Run The Other Way. It deals with reasons why one should homeschool.
Public school is “free.” Well, at least the family in question doesn’t need to come up with tuition or tutoring fees. (You pay taxes, but the cost of public schooling is unfairly and unreasonably spread out amongst all tax payers.) Even the apparency of free is good. I understand.
Public school (or any school) provides other illusions of freedom. Public school is freedom from the kids. Public schooling create time that Mom and Dad can get other things done, important things like work. It provides a predictable period of time during each week day when the parents are free to pursue other loves than being a parent.
From a strictly egocentric view, school is free and freedom for parents, and that’s good.
Public school has even greater upside for some people. It is an actual passing of the torch of responsibility for their children to others. If the kids don’t get an education, well, it’s not mom or dad’s fault, it’s that damned school. If the kids are hurt at school, it’s the school’s fault. If the student’s interests and dreams are crushed while being carefully “educated”, well, the school did that, didn’t they!
Throughout part one of this book, I painted a very grim picture of the results that public schools arrive at with students. I won’t weary your eyes and your heart with more of the same. But there are going to be many parents who might get to this point and say “Okay. Schools are terrible. But I’m sure as hell not going to homeschool.” They’ll have powerful reasons to not homeschool, the same reasons millions of other people use to not homeschool, and even to attack homeschooling.
Upon investigation, none of the reasons to hate homeschool or to not do it hold an ounce of water. Most of them are based on lies started by teachers and their unions and supported by laziness on the part of the parent.
Your instincts may well say run away. Given schooling’s “perks” for the parent, common sense may whisper “are you kidding – send Junior to school!”
That is actually uncommonly bad sense and not just for the poor student. It will backfire onto the parents in ways you may not wish to imagine. It damages your community. By sending your child to public school you financially support those schools and keep them in business. If after reading this book to this point you still believe public schools deserve support, well… um…read it again.
Here’s a grim truth, mom and dad. Kids who finish “school” and who still have no education tend to live at home longer than their actually educated “peers”. (The same could be said for homeschoolers who are not successfully educated.) They have to stay home because they have no dream and no skills. They weren’t provided an education. Their own interests were never investigated and, in fact, were crushed. For you lazy moms and dads who use public schooling for the sake of the freedom it provides you, imagine an additional four-five years with unemployed or underemployed and uninterested Junior still living at home – after he “finishes school”. He won’t be much fun, either, because people without a future usually aren’t. Still want to avoid educating your child?
Well, there’s always Jr. College, where Junior can waste another two years having his dreams ignored. And that might be the least of the harm done by a school.
Steven Horwich is an Emmy and Dramalogue award-winning writer/director, who has split his life between the arts and education. A teacher with over 35 years and over 20,000 hours of experience from elementary school through university-level teaching, he started homeschooling his own children in 2002. This led him to author over 300 courses since 2002, a complete curricula (excluding math) for ages 5-adult, called Connect The Thoughts. Over 20,000 people have used CTT since making it available via the Internet in 2007. His curricula is presented at www.connectthethoughts.com. There is over 5 hours of film explaining his courses and approach. He has authored a book about education today, Poor Cheated Little Johnny, and a teacher training program to go with it. He currently presents a free webinar about education and homeschooling every third Tuesday.
