MELBOURNE —All that buzz in your garden may be more than just the sound of bees hard at work pollinating your flowers. There may be a math competition going on. A new study finds, believe it or not, that bees have the ability to perform basic mathematics, such as addition and subtraction.
Yes, bees can perform basic arithmetic, what’s your excuse?
Researchers from RMIT University in Australia, with help from French researchers, built upon their previous finding that honeybees actually understandthe concept of zero by training them to gravitate towards images with the lowest quantity. So they sought to determine whether the insect can follow more complex mathematical concepts.
To accomplish this, the authors put together a specialized maze in which honeybees received a sugar water reward when they made a correct choice, and a bitter quinine solution when they made the wrong one.
After the bees flew into the Y-shaped maze, they were presented with a set of different shapes. The shapes were either blue, signifying the bee had to add one, or yellow, signifying the bee had to subtract one. The bee then viewed the initial number and fly through a hole into a “decision chamber,” where it would choose to fly to the right or the left side of the maze.
One side had an incorrect solution to the math problem, the other side had the correct solution. The correct answer changed randomly to not allow the bees to learn to visit one side of the maze. Though their own choices seemed to be made at random at the beginning of the experiment, after more than 100 trials and anywhere from four to seven hours, the insects eventually figured out the meaning of the shapes and were able to correctly add or subtract for each set.
“Our findings suggest that advanced numerical cognition may be found much more widely in nature among non-human animals than previously suspected,” says co-author Adrian Dyer, an associate professor at RMIT, in a universityrelease ( INCLUDES VIDEO ).
With the finding, bees are now the newest members of the animals-that-understand-arithmetic club, which includes birds, human babies, some primates, and even spiders.
“These days, we learn as children that a plus symbol means you need to add two or more quantities, while a minus symbol means you subtract,” says co-author Scarlett Howard. “Our findings show that the complex understanding of math symbols as a language is something that many brains can probably achieve, and helps explain how many human cultures independently developed numeracy skills.”
Thestudywas published in the journal Science Advances.
For Parents who during the Coronavirus Crisis are beginning to Homeschool, whose interest is in making sure their kids are adequately being taught to read, we suggest they consider using Alpha-Phonics. It has been used successfully for over 37 years by tens of thousands of Parents to easily teach their children to become excellent readers. With Alpha-Phonics Parents can make a lot of progress in a short period of time. Learn all about it below:
NEW YORK — How many of your childhood math or science lessons do you remember today? If the answer is barely any, you aren’t alone. A recent survey of 2,000 U.S. parents finds the average parent these days has the math and science skills of an 11-year-old.
Respondents were asked what grade they would be placed in today if they had to take a placement test, and the average answer was sixth grade for both math and science.
It’s unrealistic to expect anyone to remembereverythingthey were taught in school as a child, of course. Yet the extent to which many American adults feel clueless when it comes to academics is shocking. In all, 42% say they would be “lost” trying toteach their child mathematics. Another 35% express the same sentiment regarding scientific topics.
Parents put to the test
This research, commissioned byMongoose, feels especially timely considering how millions of parents suddenly find themselves taking on a more active teaching role with their kidshome from schooldue to the pandemic. Time to dust off the old multiplication tables.
When asked how they performed academically as a child, 55% remembered struggling with math and close to 40% said the same for science topics. On that note, it seems the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Math (49%) and science (31%) are among the top subjects listed by parents when asked what topics their kids struggle with today.
Over half (58%) of respondents say they’ve been asked by their child for help with a math or science problem. Junior may clearly be better off looking elsewhere for a tutor. For instance, just under 40% of parents can’t say whatSTEMstands for (science, technology, engineering, math).
How about the formula for calculating speed? Despite that lesson being a standard sixth grade level topic, a full 20% of parents can’t recall that formula. (In case you forgot, it’s distance divided by time). Similarly, only 36% believe they are capable of calculating the circumference and diameter of a circle diagram. Also, less than a third can name a correct example of “potential energy” (a stretched rubber band being one answer).
Remote learning not so helpful when kids are struggling
Most parents (72%) worry that the switch over to remote learning this year may end up hurting their child’s developing math and science skills. Among that group, 62% feel remote learning just doesn’t provide enough “hands on” academic experiences. Another 64% agree that science and math lessons often require one-on-one instruction between student and teacher. That’s something that is exponentially harder to attain through a computer screen.
Overall, 80% of U.S. parents are in agreement that hands-on learning and experiments are essential ingredients when it comes to fullyunderstanding mathand science topics. Also, 76% believe their child personally benefits from hands-on learning experiences across all school subjects.
It’s never too late to get back to learning (or re-learning). Many parents (72%) say they plan on learning math and science right alongside their kids this school year.
It is NEVER too late to get started teaching your OWN Child to be a great reader. Whether youare a new Homeschool family, or have a public school child who is not yet a good reader. Regardless of what level you begin Alpha-Phonics will enable you to teach your student to become a very good reader in a relatively short time . The lessons can be as short at 15-20 minutes a day. Alpha-Phonics has been chosen by parents for over 37 years to teach their children because it is simple, effective and inexpensive. Find out all about it below:
Graduating seniors wait to go up on stage, standing cones to keep socially distant. At Koziar’s Christmas Village in Jefferson Township, PA Friday afternoon July 17, 2020 for the graduation ceremony for the 2020 graduating class at Conrad Weiser Area High School. Photo by Ben Hasty/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images
American high school seniors’ math scores didn’t improve between 2015 and 2019, while their reading scores fell, according to thelatest roundof federal test results.
The scores highlight the country’sbroader failureto boost student test scores over the last decade and the particular stubbornness of high school reading results, which have actually declined since the early 1990s.
Meanwhile, the gap between the highest- and lowest-performing 12th graders is widening. The same trend was visible in thelatest resultsfor fourth and eighth graders.
“In both math and reading, we have noticed a pattern of declining scores that have been concentrated among lower-performing students,” said Peggy Carr, the associate commissioner of the arm of the federal education department that administers the exam. “This is a troubling indication that too many students are falling behind, and it’s something that we want to know more about.”
The scores, released Wednesday, offer a grim picture of American educational outcomes at a moment when the coronavirus pandemic is creatingunprecedented new challengesfor students. The only piece of potential good news: it’s possible that the lack of progress is connected to rising high school graduation rates, which mean a bigger range of students are remaining in school to take the test in 12th grade.
The National Assessment of Educational Progress, given to a sample of students across the country, is widely seen as one of the best benchmarks of student learning. Unlike many other standardized tests, it does not come with high stakes for students or schools.
Twelfth graders are usually only tested every four years and their results aren’t broken down by state, unlike themore frequent testsof fourth and eighth graders.
In math, 12th grade scores have not budged since 2005, the first year the exam was administered in its current form. Overall, about one in four American high school seniors is proficient or advanced in math, while 40% have math skills considered “below basic.” (NAEP’s benchmark for proficiency is considered fairly high.)
In reading, 12th grade scores are lower than they were in 1992, the first year the exam was given, and have barely changed since 2002. About 37% of high school seniors score proficient or advanced in reading.
Notably, in both reading and math, gaps between the highest and lowest performers have grown since 2013. While the top performing group held steady or slightly improved, the lowest performers lost ground.
It’s not clear why that gap is growing. “We can’t be sure,” said Carr. “We think there are a multitude of factors.”
There are large disparities between students of different races and students with parents of different levels of education, but they haven’t changed much in recent years. (NAEP does not collect any data on 12th graders’ family income.)
There are no clear answers to why the scores haven’t improved overall, either. But there is one optimistic explanation:America’s rising high school graduation rate. Because fewer students are dropping out, the latest NAEP tests likely include scores from lower-performing students who in past years might not have been in school at all. The country’s overall graduation rateincreasedfrom 83 to 85 percent between 2015 and 2018, the most recent year with federal data available.
“It’s a good thing — these students who would normally not be in the assessment are now in the assessment,” said Carr. “Some of what we see here is probably safely attributable to improvements in graduation rates.”
But it’s difficult to prove whether this explains what’s going on, or how big of a difference it makes. “We didn’t find a smoking gun, but it’s still out there as a possibility and I think a strong one,” said Kristin Blagg, a researcher at the Urban Institute who hasstudiedtrends in NAEP scores.
What about other explanations — like theCommon Core, or changes inschool funding, orschool choice policies, or factorsoutside of school? There are too many variables at play to know, even though pundits and politicians often seize the raw NAEP scores to make the case for policies they have long promoted.
“To say X caused Y is not appropriate,” said Blagg. (Researchers who have carefully analyzed NAEP data to isolate the effects of specific policiesusually look at fourth and eighth grade scores, rather than 12th grade scores.)
It’s also not necessarily fair to attribute the declines to high schools alone, since the results reflect students’ experience throughout their schooling careers.
“We should be careful not to assume that it’s entirely the fault of our high schools,” the Fordham Institute’s Michael Petrilli wrote in ablog postearlier this week.
Indeed, the 12th grade scores track withstagnatingfourth and eighth grade scores. (Surprisingly, this hasn’t always been true. Fourth and eighth grade scores have previously improved more than high school scores, a fact that hasnever beenfully understood.)
Another shred of good news: There is no evidence that American high schoolers are falling behind their international peers. The recent PISA exam, given to 15 year olds,showed thatU.S. students have made modest gains in recent years relative to other countries, and are currently ranked above average in reading and science, though they remain below average in math.
Most concerning, though, might be the results still to come in thewake of the coronavirus. Another round of NAEP tests is planned for fourth and eighth graders this year, though the sample of students will besmaller than usualbecause of the additional costs of administering the exam during the pandemic.
It is not too late to get started teaching your OWN Child to be a great reader. Whether you are a new Homeschool family, or have a public school child who is not yet a good reader. Regardless of what level you begin Alpha-Phonics will enable you to teach your student to become a very good reader in a relatively short time . The lessons can be as short at 15-20 minutes a day. Alpha-Phonics has been chosen by parents for over 37 years to teach their children because it is simple, effective and inexpensive. Find out all about it below:
Students attend the first day of school in the small town of Labastida, Spain, on Sept. 8. A recent study found no link between coronavirus spikes and school reopenings in the country.
Alvaro Barrientos/AP
Despite widespread concerns, two new international studies show no consistent relationship between in-person K-12 schooling and the spread of the coronavirus. And a third study from the United States shows no elevated risk to childcare workers who stayed on the job.
Combined with anecdotal reports froma numberofU.S. stateswhere schools are open, as well as acrowdsourced dashboardof around 2,000 U.S. schools, some medical experts are saying it’s time to shift the discussion from the risks of opening K-12 schools to the risks of keeping them closed.
“As a pediatrician, I am really seeing thenegative impactsof these school closures on children,” Dr. Danielle Dooley, a medical director at Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C., told NPR. She ticked off mental health problems,hunger, obesity due to inactivity, missing routine medical care and the risk of child abuse — on top of the loss of education. “Going to school is really vital for children. They get their meals in school, their physical activity, their health care, their education, of course.”
While agreeing that emerging data is encouraging, other experts said the United States as a whole has made little progress toward practices that would allow schools to make reopening safer — from rapid and regular testing, to contact tracing to identify the source of outbreaks, to reporting school-associated cases publicly, regularly and consistently.
“We are driving with the headlights off, and we’ve got kids in the car,” said Melinda Buntin, chair of the Department of Health Policy at Vanderbilt School of Medicine, whohas arguedfor reopening schools with precautions.
Emerging evidence
Enric Álvarez at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya looked at different regions within Spain for hisrecent co-authored working paper. Spain’ssecond waveof coronavirus cases started before the school year began in September. Still, cases in one region dropped three weeks after schools reopened, while others continued rising at the same rate as before, and one stayed flat.
Nowhere, the research found, was there a spike that coincided with reopening: “What we found is that the school [being opened] makes absolutely no difference,” Álvarez told NPR.
“We are not sure that the environments of the schools may not have a small and systematic effect,” said Álvarez, “But it’s pretty clear that they don’t have very major epidemic-changing effects, at least in Spain, with the measures that are being taken in Spain.”
These safety measures includemask-wearing for all children older than 6,ventilation, keeping students in small groups or “bubbles,” and social distancing of 1.5 meters — slightly less than the recommended 6 feet in the United States. When a case is detected, the entire “bubble” is sent home for quarantine.
Insights for Education is a foundation that advises education ministries around the globe. For theirreport, which was not peer reviewed, they analyzed school reopening dates and coronavirus trends from February through the end of September across 191 countries.
“There is no consistent pattern,” said Dr. Randa Grob-Zakhary, who heads the organization. “It’s not that closing schools leads to a decrease in cases, or that opening schools leads to a surge in cases.”
Some countries, such as Thailand and South Africa, fully opened when cases were low, with no apparent impact on transmission. Others, such as Vietnam and Gambia, had cases rising during summer break, yet those rates actually dropped after schools reopened. Japan, too, saw cases rise, and then fall again, all while schools were fully reopened. But the United Kingdom saw a strong upward trend that started around the time of reopening schools.
“We’re not saying at all that schools have nothing to do with cases,” Grob-Zakhary said. What the data suggests instead is that opening schools does not inevitably lead to increased case numbers.
What about the U.S.?
On Oct. 14, the Infectious Diseases Society of America gave a briefing on safe school reopenings. Bottom line? “The data so far are not indicating that schools are a superspreader site,” said Dr. Preeti Malani, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Michigan’s medical school.
One place in the U.S. where systematic data gathering is happening — Utah — seems to echo the conclusions drawn by the new international studies. Utah’sstate COVID-19 databaseclearly reports school-associated cases by district. And while coronavirus spread is relatively high in the state, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Sydnee Dickson believes that schools are not, for the most part, driving spread.
“Where you see cases on the rise in a neighborhood, in a county, we see that tend to be reflected in a school,” Dickson said. “[But] we’re not seeing spread by virtue of being in school together.”
Tom Hudachko of the state’s health department said that after both colleges and schools reopened in early September, there was a rise in cases among the 15-24 age group. But with targeted public health messaging those cases have started to come down.
For the most part, Hudachko said, K-12 school clusters have been concentrated at high schools. “We have had some outbreaks in middle schools. They’ve been far less frequent. And elementary school numbers seem to be one-offs here and there.”
And these clusters — includingone large reported outbreakwith at least 90 cases — have largely been traced to informal social gatherings in homes, not to classrooms. (Álvarez, in Spain, also said that clusters among young people there have been traced to social gatherings, including rooftop and beach parties).
Few states are reporting school-related data as clearly as Utah. And that’s a shame, said Buntin at Vanderbilt. “One might argue that we’re running really a massive national experiment right now in schools,” Buntin said, “and we’re not collecting uniform data.”
Buntin and other experts said it’s likely that the dashboard is biased toward schools that are doing an exemplary job of following safety precautions and are organized enough to share their results. Also, the dashboard doesn’t yet offer the ability to compare coronavirus cases reported at schools with local case rates.
In the absence of data, there are scary and tragic anecdotes ofteachersaroundthecountrydyingof COVID-19. But it’s hard to extrapolate from these incidents. It’s not immediately clear whether the educators contracted the virus at school, whether they are part of school-based clusters, or what safety precautions were or were not followed by the schools in question.
Arecent studyfrom Yale University could potentially shed some light on these questions. It tracked 57,000 childcare workers, located in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, for the first three months of the pandemic in the United States. About half continued caring for very young children, such as the children of essential workers, while the other half stayed home. The study found no difference in the rate of coronavirus infections between the two groups, after accounting for demographic factors.
Walter Gilliam, lead author of the study and a professor of psychology at the Yale Child Study Center, cautioned that it’s difficult to generalize this report to a K-12 schools setting, because the children were mostly under the age of 6 and kept in very small groups — and, he said, the childcare workers were trained in health and safety and reported following strict protocols around disinfection. However, he said, “I think it would be great to do this study with school teachers and see what we can find out.”
Risk and benefit
When you add up what we know and even what we still don’t know, some doctors and public health advocates said there are powerful arguments for in-person schooling wherever possible, particularly for younger students and those with special needs.
“Children under the age of 10 generally are at quite low risk of acquiring symptomatic disease,” from the coronavirus, said Dr. Rainu Kaushal of Weill Cornell Medicine. And theyrarely transmit it either. It’s a happy coincidence, Kaushal and others said, that the youngest children face lower risk and are also the ones who have the hardest time with virtual learning.
“I would like to see the students, especially the younger students, get back,” said Malani at the University of Michigan. “I feel more encouraged that that can happen in a safe and thoughtful way.”
Chicago Public Schools, one of the largest districts in the country, seemed to take that guidance into consideration when itannounced recentlya phased reopening starting with pre-K and special education.
Kaushal said it’s important to keep in mind that Black, Latinx and Native American communities are much more severely affected by COVID-19. And that many of the “children that are at the severest risk of disease, are also at the severest risk of not having a school open, whether it be for food security, adult time, security, losing the time to learn or losing the skills that they have acquired over the last year or so.”
Any decision made on school reopening, she said, has to focus on equity as well as safety. There are no easy trade-offs here
For Parents who during the Coronavirus Crisis are Homeschooling, whose interest is in making sure their kids are adequately being taught to read, we suggest they consider using Alpha-Phonics. It has been used successfully for over 37 years by tens of thousands of Parents to easily teach their children to become excellent readers. It is simple to teach, very effective, complete, no experience required, not time consuming and inexpensive ($ 19.95) ! With Alpha-Phonics youCANdo it !!
For Parents who during the Coronavirus Crisis are now homeschooling, whose interest is in making sure their kids are adequately being taught to read, we suggest they consider using Alpha-Phonics. It has been used successfully for over 37 years by tens of thousands of Parents to easily teach their children to become excellent readers. No special experience is required of Parents. Families can make a lot of progress even in a short period of time. Learn all about it below:
How to help your student study for a test, tackle a science project, and beyond.
ISTOCK/ARIELIONA
Create a routine
The faster homework begins to occur on autopilot, the better. Achieve this by establishing a routine. Ann Dolin, former teacher and president ofEducation Connections Tutoring, recommends younger children start homework either right after school or after a half-hour break, as most kids need a bit of downtime before diving back into their studies. High school kids, she says, tend to start their work later in the evening. “I recommend they create a list of assignments before dinner,” Dolin says. “Having that visual lineup will help them get started.” Check out thesesecrets of straight-A students.
ISTOCK/RIDOFRANZ
Don’t check homework for quality
While you’ll want to skim homework to make sure it’s complete, don’t get into a habit of checking for content or judging quality. “If your child needs to write a paragraph, you don’t need to check its grammar—let the teacher handle that,” says Dolin. “Otherwise, it creates a lot of power struggles when you get into discussions with your child about what’s ‘good enough.’ You want to be a parent, not the homework police.” Here are12 grammatical mistakes even smart people make.
ISTOCK/STEVANOVICIGOR
Know when (and how) to reach out to the teacher
If you notice your child struggling with a certain subject or aren’t sure his or her work is sufficient enough to make the grade, contact the teacher. “When I was a teacher, parents would always complain weeks later,” says Dolin. Try emailing or calling with your question. Start with something along the lines of: “I’ve noticed Jimmy is not writing out the steps when he does his math homework. Would you like him to do that, or is this OK?” Simply reaching out can get parent, teacher, and child on the same page. These are33 things your child’s teacher is secretly thinking.
ISTOCK/GBH007
Let your child choose his or her study spot
Every child is different in the way her or she learns and works best. If your student prefers standing at the kitchen island, let him. If she’s more productive tucked into her desk in her bedroom, that’s fine too. “I tell kids to be detectives and see where they can be productive and focus the best,” says Dolin. Check out thesemorning habits of successful students.
ISTOCK/KERKEZ
Resist hovering
While most kids will need some oversight when it comes to homework, it’s best not to hover over them. After around third, fourth, or fifth grade, ask children to show you what they have to do and show you that they’re getting started. “Then walk away,” says Dolin. “It isn’t the parent’s job to be sitting next to the child during homework.” Too much hovering could even send kids the message they can’t do work without a parent present. These arethings parents say that ruin their child’s trust.
ISTOCK/WAVEBREAKMEDIA
Work through a difficult problem like this
If a child is stumped on a particular problem, resist the urge to show them exactly what do to (which could be inconsistent with the method they’ve learned in class and cause even more confusion). Instead, ask if there is an example of the problem in their notes, or if there is a similar problem in their textbook. By encouraging your child to go back and find a guide, you’re giving them the skills they need to work independently.
Alpha-Phonics is a PHONICS reading instruction program used by tens of thousands of Parents for over 37 years to teach their OWN on children to be excellent readers. It does not require the Parent to have any prior teaching skill or classes. It is simple, easy to teach, very in expensive and produces top readers. It is all explained below:
WEBSITE TESTIMONIALS CATHY DUFFY REVIEW
OTHER REVIEWS AWARDS HOW TO ORDER
ISTOCK/ANYABERKUT
Make a special plan for weekends
Along with tackling any weekend assignments, use either Saturday or Sunday to plan and discuss any long-term projects your child might have coming up. Ask questions about approaching deadlines. “Say, ‘I see you have a science project coming up, what are the steps you’re going to take to start getting that done?” suggests Dolin, who also recommends outlining these steps in an assignment book or Google calendar.
ISTOCK/LOUIS PAUL ST ONGE
Get caretakers involved
Encourage your child’s babysitter or afterschool program leader to assist with some assignments, even if the most they do is oversee an independent task. Dolin recommends asking children to complete familiar, reoccurring assignments, such as reading or spelling sentences. “Sometimes kids are reluctant to do hard assignments with a babysitter,” she says. “So maybe save one difficult assignment for when a parent get home.” Here are16 tips for remembering challenging spelling words
ISTOCK/MONKEYBUSINESSIMAGES
Teach your child to utilize small pockets of time
For students with busy afterschool schedules, short periods of time—say 45 minutes between band practice and dance rehearsal—can be lifesavers when it comes to getting things done. What’s more, research has found that kids might even be more productive when work is separated into short stints. Teach kids to make use of the time they have, not to wait until they can sit down for two hours on end to push their work out all at once. Check out these19 secrets only the parents of ‘A” children know.
ISTOCK/CMSPIC
Help a disorganized child like this
For students who tend to be scattered, add structure. Know where the teacher posts homework assignments, and make sure your child writes down assignments and prioritizes them. Dolin recommends creating a “launching pad” to make sure projects and assignments are organized the night before school. “A launching pad is a bin or box that goes by the door,” she says. “So maybe at 8 p.m., the kids pack their binder and their backpack and put all those things in their launching pad. Then all their belongings are in one place for the next morning.”
ISTOCK/SHINYFAMILY
Help a perfectionist like this
If you notice your child spending far too much time on homework, help them prioritize. Create must-do, could-do, should-do lists to help. And set a time cap on assignments. “If kids are working inefficiently or are too insistent on it being just right or perfect, then they need an end-time,” says Dolin. Set a hard stop by saying all homework must be complete by a certain hour. And don’t miss these 6 time management techniques successful people use.
ISTOCK/ANTONIOGUILLEM
Don’t make this studying mistake
When studying for a test, students shouldn’t reread their notes not oblivion. Instead have them read through and stop as they go, asking what’s important and writing those notes in the margins. Discussing the material also works. Going through a study guide on FaceTime with a friend will help information stick. And don’t forget to plan ahead: Break up an hour of studying into 20 minutes of review for three days before a test. Here’s how todevelop a super-human memory.
Lindsey T. Powell is a Patent Administrator in the Office of Technology Development at Harvard University.
By many standards, I would be considered a homeschooling success story. I graduated summa cum laude from an Ivy League institution, am gainfully employed by Harvard University, and will be applying to law school in the fall. In third grade, I begged my parents to homeschool me, a plea that I still regret.
Harvard Law Professor Elizabeth Bartholet recently made waves withher article suggestinga presumptive ban (not a complete ban, as her remarks have been mischaracterized) on homeschooling in America, requiring parents to “prove they are capable of providing an adequate education in a safe environment.” Bartholet emphasizes the lack of regulation and accountability governing the practice. Among other objections, she discusses cases of undetected abuse, and uneducated parents’ failed attempts to teach their children. While these are valid concerns worthy of debate, many families make the decision to homeschool with the belief that doing so serves their child’s best interest. For that reason, I’d like to discuss the less sinister, but still very real consequences of homeschooling.
As Professor Bartholet notes, a sizable majority of homeschooling families are motivated by religious or ideological reasons. Despite participating in numerous homeschool groups and extracurricular activities, I never met a student with religious or political views differing from my own until I arrived at college. Of course, I knew these individuals existed, but they were always the hypothetical, easily vilified other. It took collegiate friendships to break down internalized stereotypes and see the good in people of different faiths and political persuasions.
Parents often act with the best of intentions when choosing to shield their children from negative influences, but raising them in echo chambers is a dangerous breeding ground for intolerance and misunderstanding. Exposure to opposing viewpoints is crucial for the development of critical reasoning skills. This is especially important for high school students, who will soon encounter disparate viewpoints in college or the workplace.
Advocates cite studies claiming that homeschool students outperform their traditionally schooled peers. However, these findings do not tell the full story. As Professor Bartholet explains, data on homeschooling outcomes is difficult to collect. Data showing high performance only represents the experiences of students who took standardized tests and applied to college. What about those who never will? Furthermore, poster children for homeschool success often come from backgrounds correlated with higher levels of success in traditional schools (higher income, two-parent households, etc.).
The trope of the high-performing homeschooler who gains admission to an elite college is not representative of the reality for many homeschooling families.The Cardus Education Survey, a random sample of 1500 high school graduates, found that religious homeschoolers are four times more likely to end their academic career after high school, and are 60 percent less likely to obtain an advanced degree. For particularly gifted students, homeschooling may be a boon. But it is far from clear that the average homeschooler fares better academically than they would in conventional schooling.
Looking back on my homeschooling experience, I realize that many of my “unique opportunities” would have been available to me in a traditional school setting. I participated in Bible studies, tennis lessons, and even successfully lobbied my state legislature to amend the adolescent driving curfew. But homeschooling, even with these experiences, came with a dangerous sense of isolation and an inappropriate self-emphasis on productivity to compensate for missing out on “normal” rites of passage. Homeschool prom is just as it sounds, and a graduation of three is quite the letdown after twelve years of hard work.
While Professor Bartholet’s proposal of stricter government regulation conflicts with my own Lockean leanings, her critics in the homeschooling community largely miss the mark. The reactions to Bartholet’s work ignore the downsides of the homeschooling experience. Any adequate rebuttal to Bartholet must at least consider the many homeschooled students who do not attend college, and those who, like myself, suffered painful social isolation because of homeschooling. Responsible homeschooling has a place in the academic realm. But far too often, parents choose to homeschool based on an idealized narrative of close families, high test scores, and perfectly sheltered children, without considering the risks of intense groupthink and social isolation.
Lindsey T. Powell is a Patent Administrator in the Office of Technology Development at Harvard University.
The original printing of this article stimulated a lot of comments, even among the Harvard Crimson readers. We have reproduced 17 of them below these words about Alpha-Phonics. Simply scroll down to see them.
For Parents who during the Coronavirus Crisis are Homeschooling, whose interest is in making sure their kids are adequately being taught to read, we suggest they consider using Alpha-Phonics. It has been used successfully for over 37 years by tens of thousands of Parents to easily teach their children to become excellent readers. Learn all about it below:
The opposition to homeschooling decries stereotyping and then jumps into it with both feet, utterly failing or refusing to see the amazing diversity that is homeschooling. We do not judge all of public schooling by the failing schools at the bottom, but they would have every homeschool tarred and feathered with the broad brush of insular and ideological/fundamentalist fervor that in no way typifies the entire homeschooling community.
Just as there will be tremendous variance in the educational quality and social experience of public school students hailing from diverse urban settings versus extremely rural ones, and even between students in different neighborhoods and schools within a given city ( cf. NYC specialized science high schools with some of the poorer performing neighborhood schools, for example), there is as much variability in homeschooling.
Why are Bartholet, et al, willing to sacrifice the vast number of homeschools that provide a superior individualized education that embraces diversity for the very few aberrant cases of abuse or ignorance?
Public education woefully fails a very large number of students. Look at the drop out rates and the sad statistics on proficiency in various subject areas. It is patently ridiculous to give institutional schools a free pass to fail, while turning the presumption of innocence on its head and requiring homeschoolers to prove they deserve to be limited exceptions from a presumptive ban. The educational insiders who benefit financially from forcing up attendance numbers in public education are far from the disinterested advocates they would have us all think them.
Homeschooling is about individualizing education for the particular student. Public schools give lip service to differentiation, and then bash those who actually provide it. We have a faculty to student ratio that institutional schools can only dream of.
Stop stereotyping and generalizing on the basis of outdated statistics or the rare anecdote. Religion is no longer the driving motivation of most homeschoolers. Current statistics show that academic quality and safety of the educational environment are the predominant reason people now choose to homeschool.
I am an ivy league educated retired professional who homeschools a highly gifted kid who would be completely underserved in a traditional school setting. I chose to take on the responsibility of catering to his needs. We are part of the NYC homeschool community, which is diverse in every possible meaning of the word, including viewpoints and opinions.
Choice is the key to providing every student with an appropriate academic experience. Homeschooling may not be perfect for every child, but neither is institutional school. Families are free to choose what works best for them, and it will be a sad day if authoritarian busybodies with delusions of superiority take that away.
“Despite participating in numerous homeschool groups and extracurricular activities, I never met a student with religious or political views differing from my own until I arrived at college.”
Do kids who attend Waldorf schools encounter people with conservative viewpoints? What about a public school in Berkeley? The unspoken assumption here is that conservatives would cease to be conservatives if only they were exposed to other viewpoints, and that the government has a compelling interest in making sure they are, lest they remain conservative.
It does not.
“Data showing high performance only represents the experiences of students who took standardized tests and applied to college.”
This is false. Homeschooled children are generally required to take standardized tests throughout their schooling, and outperform their publicly educated peers. Like Bartholet, the author pretends this away.
There is no evidence supporting the trope homeschooled lack for socialization. Again, the evidence belies this, whether or not Harvard chooses to ignore it.
Personal anecdotes (and even this one is light on specifics) aren’t terribly relevant. The previous article misspelled “arithmetic” in its artwork. Am I to therefore conclude Harvard is an institution promoting illiteracy? This is why data are important.
If, in fact, data are just too difficult to collect, that is an argument against government action, not for it.
“For particularly gifted students, homeschooling may be a boon.”
Unless it can be proven that homeschooling has MORE problems than traditional schooling, there is no argument. Every “negative” here can be countered by a negative about traditional schooling.
If what’s listed in the article is the worst that you can say about your homeschool experience, then I’d say you didn’t miss out on a whole lot. I went to a small Christian High School that had a prom that was “just how it sounds”. I graduated with less than 100 people; our local homeschool graduation had more graduates than that last year. How did those kids miss out?
Academics always want to talk about the difference in data and anecdotal evidence, but that seems to be all that is presented in the debate against home schooling.
I am a single mom, low-income, secular, raising a lifelong homeschooler. We live in Wyoming, 98% white. We live in a town of 4500 people, isolated in the Big Horn range of the northern Rockies. Yet, my son’s friendships are more diverse than were mine were even though I grew up in a large city in formal education in the highly populated Southeast.
My son’s friendships are both “in real life/local”, and stretch across the globe with online friendships (I am sure you have many such friendships via your own social media interactions).
My homeschooled child’s best friend (in real life) is female with Nigerian roots – and she goes to school. Another good friend is Hispanic, and he goes to school. Yet another close friend has special needs/brain disorder, and he goes to school. They hang out at our house, in the community, and at activities, as well as game together online. In his martial arts program, there have been other non-white students, and students with special needs. We are close with yet another large Hispanic family and have supported each other as our children have grown over years. We are as close as relatives, still, with Muslim friends who moved from being our literal neighbors to another state. Where is our lack of diversity?
Besides all of that – our world is connected. It isn’t isolated like your childhood. The internet brings us to places we might otherwise never go. We have friends (locally, as well as online) who are Christian, Asatru, Atheist, Muslum, and more. My niece is LGBTQ. We are not exclusive.
My homeschooler won 2nd place in regional, and 4th place in the state among – wait for it – not homeschoolers, but government middle schoolers in speech and debate tournaments. Yet, my son has NEVER followed a curriculum. He is a self-directed learner. The world is his curriculum. If he is so isolated, then how on earth did he manage to seamlessly move into the conventional paradigm over a five-week period, and walk away with such awards?
He is a green belt in martial arts and has helped teach the younger students. He has attended after school programs, participated in numerous community activities, and performed in community theatre. Together, my homeschooled son and I established the first local Jr. First Lego League in our town. We traveled twice to state tournaments for robotics. There were many homeschoolers participating in these activities as well as schooled kids.
We’ve taken trips to Chicago and Yellowstone, met up with long distance online friends, and he even took a MOOC on dinosaurs from the University of Alberta when he was five years old and immersed in paleontology (and he performed better than me on the tests).
Did I mention I am a single mom?
Did I mention I am low-income?
Your defenses of Ms. Bartholet are myopic and simply repeat her stereotypes of homeschooling.
I am sorry your parents raised you in a vacuum. But, you do not speak for all or even the majority of homeschoolers. Where is your peer-reviewed research, what are your controls?
What is your foundation for determining what is a normal rite of passage?
After his speech and debate performance, I reluctantly asked my son if he is sure he doesn’t want to go to school. He does not. He enjoys our connection and his freedom to dive down the rabbit holes of his choosing. He knows that schools are the true authoritarian paradigm!
He is an extrovert who rides his bike with schooled friends, hits the popular hangouts and swimming pool, and when his schooled friends are being restricted from life by their parents and institutionalization, he enjoys his online homeschool friends, gaming, and learning about the world through endless sources in media.
My son doesn’t care about the peer-emphasized rites of passage you claim are valuable. He knows in his short life of 12 years, he has already done more, seen more, experienced more, and will have more doors available to him as a result of homeschooling than his peers. His schooled peers will spill out into a void that did not prepare them for the dynamic world beyond the doors where they are not allowed to develop discernment. They can’t even go to the bathroom without asking.
You are wrong about homeschooling. You aced it by overcompensating – all the way to an Ivy League institution. But you still seem indoctrinated, no matter how much you feel you managed to escape your unfortunate childhood prison. I do not mean to be dramatic here, but your experience does not qualify nor quantify predictable outcomes or characteristics for other homeschoolers.
I suggest you heal the child within, forgive your parents, and do some investigation of the myriad developments in self-directed learning. The world has evolved since you entered the Ivy Tower. I wonder if it is you who has never truly experienced the real world.
“But it is far from clear that the average homeschooler fares better academically than they would in conventional schooling.” Ok so they only fare “the same” as conventional schooling but they have one on one experiences that allows them to progress at their own pace rather than the set pace of the curriculum. This aids not only your “particularly gifted students,” but those who need more time to master subject matter. It also keeps them out of the “peer pressure” groups that do so much damage to adolescents while providing an environment free from distractions. I know a number of people who were homeschooled and all of them seem more mature in their decision making. Many of them decided not to follow the crowd and go to college right away preferring to dabble in a number of areas to determine which they liked the best in terms of possible careers. One who wanted to be a doctor became a paramedic but in the end decided medicine wasn’t want he really wanted. Imagine the waste of going to school for four years and then medical school and then finding out this wasn’t what you wanted to do with your life. Another obtained a job with a graphic arts studio and liked it so much he pursued a computer and graphic arts degree through a variety of online and resident courses. He is happily employed as a team leader in graphic arts for a major research laboratory. I also know two PhD’s who would like to work at the same laboratory but are waiting tables at a local restaurant part-time while tutoring high school students during the day. The graphic artist makes $90,000/year while the PhD’s are just making ends meet. Homeschooling paid off for him.
In fact, I know no homeschooled people who are not happy in their chosen professions. As for statistics of going to college and then pursuing graduate degrees, well, that can be highly overrated and should not be used as a yard stick in determining the efficacy of home schooling. The outcome for the individual is what is important and the individual is the object of homeschooling. BTW the would be doctor went to barber school and then opened his own shop. He always has a line of people waiting and has taken on two other barbers. He is happy which is a lot more than can be said for the majority of recent graduate school departees who are looking at a dire job market and tens of thousands in student loan debt.
Bartholet is a little late to the rodeo. A new poll from RealClear Opinion Research has news that she, this author, the teachers’ unions and the public education establishment generally are going to find disturbing;
According to that poll, more than 40% of families say they’re now more likely to take up homeschooling or virtual schooling once schools open again. And nearly two-thirds of Americans now say they support school choice that would allow tax money for their children’s education to be spent to send their students to the public or private school of their choice.
Harvard Law Professor Elizabeth Bartholet is advocating for the evil forces of Socialist Solidarity to seize the children as a resource of the state to be trained by the state for the greater glory of the state. You are justifying that goal. Any disapprobation for either of you is well earned.
I don’t share that evil, vile, despicable goal, let’s visit.
In Hong Kong your Social Credit score is used to exclude the unhelpful from positions of trust and responsibility, in America’s Eastern Establishment your Socialist Solidarity score is kept [perhaps a bit less formally] and used for the same purpose.
If it wasn’t for the Great compromise of 1787 giving rural voters more say in the presidency and the Senate, I would fear for our future. But they did, and I don’t.
I have ten-year-old twin grandchildren in public school and I worry about the indoctrination that I can see that is already happening to them. It is well-known that the faculty at elite universities are virtually entirely left-wing. It is worse at the education schools. Much of the failure of today’s public schools can be traced to the “critical theories” that these ed school grads have imbibed. Home school is one way to escape from these corrosive theories.
I’ll mention a couple of things that were not already mentioned in the other (excellent) comments. First, many public schools are chaotic and dangerous. In many, especially those in poor neighborhoods, social promotion leads to classes with totally unprepared students. Mainstreaming of emotionally disturbed students is common. These policies make it nearly impossible for dedicated and prepared students to learn at their own pace, or at all.
Students who engage in bad behavior are too often not removed. The Obama administration actually promulgated a rule that required school discipline to track ethnicity (e.g., if the school is 40% black then only 40% of suspensions can be of black students). An anecdote: A friend of mine, a reading teacher with 30 years of service had a 9th grade student who continually cursed at her. Finally, having heard enough, she told him to “Shut up.” The student complained to the principal, who called her on the carpet. She was ordered to apologize and to submit to bias training. She quit on the spot.
I would venture a guess that close to zero home schooled children are confused about their “gender identity.” Similarly, I bet that close to zero home-schooled students believe that their purpose for pursuing higher education is to be an activist for social justice.
My observation (anecdotal) of university students is that maybe 40% complain of emotional problems. This strikes me as a huge increase from previous generations, and is largely a function of the educational theories foisted upon them in public school. A book could be written on this issue (Jonathan Haidt). They believe that ideas they don’t like make them “unsafe.” I can’t imagine a home schooled student believing that.
How many public school children are bullied? How many are abused by teachers? How does the supposed abuse at home compare?
Finally I think it’s important to mention the hatred that the opponents of home schooling have for any school choice, including vouchers for smart students in terrible schools. This is not a coincidence. They don’t want to lose the opportunity to indoctrinate any student into their culture of social justice and grievance against the patriarchy. This is the true purpose of public schools these days.
The fact that Bartholet has made comments also attacking private schools is a big red flag to me that it isn’t about mandatory reporters getting a look at kids to prevent hypothetical abuse. Private school teachers serve that function.
It’s all about promoting group think and indoctrination. Even those who meet her ridiculous standards for exemption from her proposed presumptive ban are supposed to follow an “approved” curriculum and submit to a certain number of hours in institutional schools.
That ensures exposure to the ideology Bartholet wishes to instill.
It also completely destroys the value of homeschooling in individualizing education to the particular student’s interests, achievement level, and learning style, and ignores the fact that many choose to homeschool to escape substandard curricula and implementation, which result in pathetic proficiency outcomes.
Her totalitarianism is showing despite her faux concern mask.
The thing that makes me frustrated about losing the right to homeschool (which I am worried may happen), is watching my children’s love of learning, creativity, and innovation be trampled by the box you must belong to to succeed in public schools. I have children that I both homeschool and some that are in public school for various reasons, so I can see the difference. It takes years to deschool and regain that natural curiousity. As far as social isolation, my children that were less social to begin with felt more isolated at home and at school. While those who were more inclined to be social were social in both environments as well.
In regards to the research you noted, did you notice that religious homeschoolers actually received higher grades in college than the other groups. They also were more likely to be self-employed (ie Entrepreneurs versus being employed by others). The research also went on to explain that many homeschoolers favor the associates route. My experience has been that they actually will do this during highschool, thus cutting their highschool experience short, but propelling them forward into meaningful work and employment (albeit perhaps less time in college). What this survey fails to actually measure is the meaning and joy that can be found in life beyond money and job status. The research itself acknowledges this. And I would say that most homeschoolers also value finding value and joy in life versus just how much money or education you attain.
What Professor Bartholet wants is the children inside a classroom so that she and her comrades can continue with the leftist indoctrination that has taken over all environments, from elementary school to colleges.
Lots of good points here. The current doctrine of “reducing the achievement gap” is also a reason to homeschool for parents of fast-learning kids. In pursuit of equality at public schools, fast learners are actively discouraged. No parents want that to happen to their children.
Illinois Gen Assembly Passes Cursive Handwriting Mandate
FACULTY FORUM
LEWIS UNIVERSITY
Despite the potential for imposing new costs on school districts, Illinois lawmakers overrode Gov. Bruce Rauner’s veto on a bill mandating cursive writing instruction.
This past fall theIllinois General Assembly passed a mandaterequiring public elementary schools to provide cursive instruction beginning in the 2018-2019 academic year. Some wonder why handwriting, especially given the trend in many school districts to move towards 1:1 technology, has become such a priority. While the need to become proficient and adaptable technology-users remains, handwriting is more tied to learning and academic achievement than many realize.
Some children appear to be innate handwriters. When provided with crayons, markers, or pencils, these children hold them correctly and see to know to draw a line from the top of the page down to the bottom and to make a continuous curved line in counterclockwise fashion to produce a circle. Innate or automatic handwriters are able to draw complex shapes and write their names before they head off to preschool. Once they get to school, automatic handwriters are able to copy words and fill up journal pages without much support. However, it can be difficult for parents and early childhood teachers to discern which students will pick up handwriting easily and which ones will need more instruction.
Quality handwriting writing instruction is more than providing students with worksheets and asking them to copy letters on a page. Handwriting instruction should begin with the selection of a handwriting curriculum. Systematic instruction of handwriting that follows an intentionally sequenced curriculum has been found to support students in achievingbetter legibility, faster writing speed, and fluency. Some common elements of effective handwriting curriculainclude progressing students from imitating and copying letters to writing letters from memory, the use of verbal and visual cues for proper letter formation, and writing on lines to assist with letter sizing and placement. Some examples of handwriting curricula that include these elements are:
Some children will need additional assistance to develop automatic handwriting skills. In the past, many interventions focused on developing the child’s fine motor skills, adjusting how the child held his or her pencil, or improving the child’s hand strength. However, there appears to beno evidence that these interventions are effectiveor consequential in improving a child’s handwriting speed, fluency, or legibility. Rather, acognitive approachto addressing handwriting that emphasizes practice, is based in the principles of motor learning, and includes self-regulated learning strategies is preferred. Throughguided practice, instructor feedback, and the process of self-appraisal and strategy identification, children can develop more automatic handwriting skills and become efficient writers.
Getting Help
Some children will continue to struggle with handwriting despite receiving formal instruction and getting extra help. Occupational therapists are able to provide services to children with handwriting difficulties in school and in private clinics. Prior to beginning intervention, an occupational therapist will conduct a comprehensive evaluation to determine the underlying causes of the handwriting difficulty. This evaluation may include an assessment of the following: handwriting speed, letter legibility and formation, perceptual skills, eye-hand coordination skills, volition or motivation to complete handwriting tasks, and the influence of the environment on task performance. Depending on the child’s unique needs, the occupational therapist might also evaluate sensory processing, postural stability and control, and vision. After the comprehensive evaluation, an individualized intervention plan is developed by the occupational therapist and recommendations associated with the frequency and duration of treatment, as well as strategies to try at home and at school will be provided. Because handwriting success is so tied to how children, particularly those in younger elementary grades, learn and feel about school, parents are encouraged to seek help quickly.
About Dr. Susan Cahill
Dr. Susan Cahill is an Associate Professor and Director of the MSOT Program at Lewis University. She is a Fellow of the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA) and a member of the AOTA Commission on Practice. Visit http://www.lewisu.edu/academics/msoccuptherapy to learn more.
The Publishers of The ALPHA-PHONICS Blog hope its Followers benefit from this story. They also hope its Followers will consider using ALPHA-PHONICS if they are interested in learning how to teach their OWN children to read. Parents have been using this simple phonics based instruction program to teach their OWN Children to become excellent readers for over 37 years, And they found it works easily! You CAN DO IT! Find out below:
Interest in homeschooling has “exploded” amid pandemic
There were about 2.5 million homeschool students last year in grades K-12 in the U.S., making up about 3% to 4% of school-age children. That number is expected to increase by 10%Homeschooling applications are surging in states including Nebraska, where they are up 21%, and Vermont, where they are up 75%. In North Carolina, a rush of parents filing notices that they planned to homeschool overwhelmed a government website last month, leaving it temporarily unable to accept applications.
There were about 2.5 million homeschool students last year in grades K-12 in the U.S., making up about 3% to 4% of school-age children, according to the National Home Educators Research Institute. Brian Ray, the group’s president, is anticipating that their numbers will increase by at least 10%.
“One day the school district says X and four days later they say Y,” Ray said. “And then the governor says another thing and then that changes what the school district can do. And parents and teachers are tired of what appear to be arbitrary and capricious decisions. They are tired of it and saying we are out of here.”
Interest in homeschooling materials also has been surging, driven in part by parents who are keeping their children enrolled in schools but looking for ways to supplement distance learning.
The National Home School Association received more than 3,400 requests for information on a single day last month, up from between five and 20 inquiries per day before the coronavirus. The group had to increase the size of its email inbox to keep up.
“Clearly the interest we have been getting has exploded,” said J. Allen Weston, the executive director of the suburban Denver-based group. “That is really the only way to describe it.”
Some parents in rural parts of Nebraska are turning to homeschooling because staffing and limited access to home internet leave districts unable to offer a virtual learning option, said Kathryn Dillow, president and executive director of Nebraska Home Schools, a support and advocacy group.
Homeschooling applications continue arriving in Nebraska, where the number of homeschoolers already had risen to 3,400 as of July 14, up from 2,800 at the same time a year ago, said David Jespersen, a spokesman for the Nebraska Department of Education.
Jespersen said there is “a lot of confusion” and that “parents are delayed in making their decision” because so much is changing.
Regardless of the final number, Jespersen doesn’t expect that the increase will bust districts’ budgets because homeschoolers will still remain a small fraction of about 326,000 students spread over the state’s 244 school systems.
Most other states don’t have homeschooling numbers, either because they aren’t collected at the state level or it’s too early. But all indications point to increases across the country.
“Now is when the reality sets in,” said John Edelson, president of Time4Learning, an online curriculum provider, which has seen business explode. “People have postponed the decision, but we are at this great inflection point. And it is hard to see what the angle is going to be, but it is definitely up.”
In Missouri, calls and emails pour into the homeschool advocacy group Families For Home Education each time a district releases its reopening plan, said Charyti Jackson, the group’s executive director. She said families are in a “panic” about virtual starts to the year and hybrid plans in which students attend classes parttime and study at home the rest.
“They are asking, ’What am I supposed to be doing with my children when I am working full time?’” she said.
Created to easily teach children to be able to read the WORD
For the families who only plan to homeschool for a semester or two, some in small groups or pods, her advice is focused on how to make sure students can transition back to public schooling smoothly when the pandemic ends. That’s trickier for students who receive special education services and high schoolers who need to meet their district’s graduation requirements.
There also are some indications the exodus to homeschooling could continue well into fall. Christina Rothermel-Branham, a psychology and counseling professor at Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, said she is going to attempt remote learning through her local school district for her 6-year-old son. But she said the virtual learning she oversaw in the spring was “very monotonous” and that she plans to switch to homeschooling if the first month goes poorly.
“If there is a lot of stress between the two of us it is probably going to get him pulled out,” she said.
Rothermel-Branham, 39, already has scouted out curriculum as a backup and has signed up for art and music classes through Outschool, an online learning platform that is reporting 30 times year-over-year growth since March.
“It is such a big mess,” said Outschool CEO Amir Nathoo. “A lot of schools spent all summer preparing for a social distanced reopening and now it looks like that isn’t going to happen because of the virus.”
He said the demand for classes has been particularly strong in states that moved aggressively to reopen, including Texas, Florida, Georgia and Arizona.
Chris Perrin, the CEO of Camp Hill, Pennsylvania-based Classical Academic Press, said curriculum sales to homeschoolers are up by 50% and that enrollment in its online Scholé Academy has increased by 100% amid the pandemic. He said some there was “understandably a lot of bad online learning” in the spring and that some parents were “appalled” as they oversaw it.
“They are saying I can’t stand by and do nothing,” Perrin said. “So they are becoming homeschoolers.”
The Publishers of ALPHA-PHONICS hope this information will be of interest to our Blog Followers. We also hope Parents of public grade school students might consider teaching their OWN children to read. The information below can show them how many thousands of Parents have taught their OWN children to read, and they found it was much easier than they thought…..and less time consuming than they thought. Take a look:
Harvard University publications continue to present a skewed perspective of homeschooling, spotlighting Harvard Law School professor Elizabeth Bartholet’s call for a “presumptive ban” on homeschooling while failing to provide an accurate picture of American homeschooling.
In addition to the recentHarvard Magazinearticleon “The Risks of Homeschooling,” both theHarvard Crimsonand theHarvard Gazetteran stories last week reinforcing Bartholet’s one-sided view of homeschooling. While Harvard’s invitation-onlysummitto address homeschooling’s “problems, politics, and prospects for reform” scheduled for next month has been postponed due to COVID-19, thedisinformation campaign against homeschoolinggoes on.
Interestingly, in the recent Gazette interview, Bartholet admits that most parents are quite able to homeschool their children. Shesays: “I believe that the overwhelming majority of parents are capable of providing at least a minimal education at home without presenting any danger of abuse or neglect.” Yet, in recommending a “presumptive ban” on the practice she would “require that parents demonstrate that they have a legitimate reason to homeschool—maybe their child is a super athlete, maybe the schools in their area are terrible.”
She would also require parents to “demonstrate that they’re qualified to provide an adequate education and that they would provide an education comparable in scope to what is required in public schools,” as well as “require that their kids participate in at least some school courses and extracurricular activities so they get exposure to a set of alternative values and experiences.” In other words, parents may be able to get permission from the government to homeschool their kids if they can jump through certain government-approved hoops and send their kids, at least part of the time, to the government schools from which they are fleeing.
Bartholet’s rationale for this heavy-handed approach to controlling homeschoolers is that, while most homeschooling parents won’t abuse or neglect their children, a tiny few may and so the entire homeschool population must be managed and monitored—including being subject to frequent home-visits by government officials to make sure they are not doing anything wrong. This guilty-until-proven-innocent approach is not only antithetical to American ideals, it sacrifices the freedom of an entire group out of concern that a small sliver of that group could potentially do harm.
The claim that homeschooling could lead to higher rates of child abuse is unfounded. In fact, three academics responded harshly to Bartholet’s conclusions, writing atEducationNext: “Professor Elizabeth Bartholet’s claims that homeschooling contributes significantly to the scourge of child abuse fail to survive scrutiny.” Someresearchshows that homeschoolers arelesslikely to be abused than their schooled peers. And as I’ve writtenpreviously, physical and sexual abuse by educators is rampant in public schools, which Bartholet holds up as the gold standard. Still, Bartholet argues that homeschooled children could be abused because they are not in the presence of school teachers and administrators who are “mandated reporters” of child abuse.
Join us in preserving the principles of economic freedom and individual liberty for the rising generation
Although Bartholet’s recommendations against homeschooling were initiated well before COVID-19 hit, she uses the current school shutdowns as further evidence that parents, unwatched by government officials, will abuse their children. Bartholet says in the Gazette interview: “I do think, though, that the present near-universal home education situation is illuminating. The evidence is growing that reports to Child Protective Services (CPS) have plummeted nationwide, because children are removed from the mandated reporters that schools provide.”
It is possible that declining CPS reports could indicate unreported child abuse, but it could also reveal a CPS system gone awry, with overly-aggressive reporting and investigative practices. A 2018 in-depthreportby The Hechinger Report and HuffPost, for instance, found that “schools often use child protective services as a weapon against parents.” According to this analysis, school employees use CPS as a way to coerce parents who resist a school’s recommendations or approach. Reporters Rebecca Klein and Caroline Preston write:
Fed up with what they see as obstinate parents who don’t agree to special education services for their child, or disruptive kids who make learning difficult, schools sometimes use the threat of a child-protection investigation to strong-arm parents into complying with the school’s wishes or transferring their children to a new school. That approach is not only improper, but it can be devastating for families, even if the allegations are ultimately determined to be unfounded.
Such a determination is how the vast majority of these investigations conclude, despite terrorizing parents and children. In her powerful book,They Took The Kids Last Night: How the Child Protection System Puts Families at Risk, family defense attorney and policy advocate, Diane Redleaf, finds that the CPS system has ballooned in recent years, with millions of calls and family investigations despite most of them being baseless. She writes in her introduction: “In 2016 alone, 7.4 million children were reported as suspected victims of child abuse or neglect. Of this number, 4.1 million had a case referred for some CPS responsive action, ranging from finding no merit to the allegations and closing the case, to referring the family for social services, to a placement of the children into foster care. At the conclusion of a CPS investigation, 676,000 children were then labeled the victims of abuse or neglect.”
The Hechinger/HuffPost report reveals that poor and minority families are the ones most likely to get caught in the CPS dragnet, and Redleaf’s research reinforces this finding. She writes: “The child protection system most disproportionately intervenes against families of color and those who lack other forms of privilege…A system that is supposed to protect childrenfromtheir parents ends up too often harming children’s precious attachmenttotheir parents.”
Child abuse is horrific and should never be tolerated, but the growing distrust of parents and the related trend toward increased intervention in family life under the guise of protecting children may hurt more children than it helps. When families are weakened and parents are disempowered, children suffer. As Redleaf concludes in her book:
Family advocates need to proudly proclaim that children’s best interests are one and the same as their families’ best interests, for there is no other way to protect children but to defend their families—and to fight for the right of families everywhere to raise their own children.
The FEE Daily
Fresh content in your inbox, every morning
1 Million Copies Sold Since 1946
Henry Hazlitt’s economics primer is more relevant than ever.
The Publishers of The ALPHA-PHONICS Blog hope its Followers benefit from this story. They also hope its Followers will consider using ALPHA-PHONICS if they are interested in learning how to teach their OWN children to read. Parents have been using this simple phonics based instruction program to teach their OWN Children to become excellent readers for over 37 years, And they found it works easily! You CAN DO IT! Find out below:
:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/67699757/1256790834.0.jpg)
administered in its current form. Overall, about one in four American high school seniors is proficient or advanced in math, while 40% have math skills considered “below basic.” (NAEP’s benchmark for proficiency is considered fairly high.)
“To say X caused Y is not appropriate,” said Blagg. (Researchers who have carefully analyzed NAEP data to isolate the effects of specific policies
children,” Dr. Danielle Dooley, a medical director at Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C., told NPR. She ticked off mental health problems,
keeping students in small groups or “bubbles,” and social distancing of 1.5 meters — slightly less than the recommended 6 feet in the United States. When a case is detected, the entire “bubble” is sent home for quarantine.
reopened in early September, there was a rise in cases among the 15-24 age group. But with targeted public health messaging those cases have started to come down.
they
explains, data on homeschooling outcomes is difficult to collect. Data showing high performance only represents the experiences of students who took standardized tests and applied to college. What about those who never will? Furthermore, poster children for homeschool success often come from backgrounds correlated with higher levels of success in traditional schools (higher income, two-parent households, etc.).
Alpha-Phonics
The Alphabet Song!
Water on the Floor
Alpha-Phonics the Book on CD Rom
Blumenfeld Oral Reading Assessment Test
How To Tutor
How To Tutor Cursive Handwriting Workbook
