Yes. I would love this. As a gifted kid myself who got one lousy grade skip (which is more than kids today get!) and having a 2.5 yo who is dying to go to school (and ready), I would love to see kids with their peers but working at their individual pace. I understand that this is asking a lot from teachers and class sizes would have to go down to like 10 for it to be feasible, but oh my goodness, a girl can dream right?
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Taking your children for holidays during school is illegal in the UK
- Thread starter Ember
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Yes. I would love this. As a gifted kid myself who got one lousy grade skip (which is more than kids today get!) and having a 2.5 yo who is dying to go to school (and ready), I would love to see kids with their peers but working at their individual pace. I understand that this is asking a lot from teachers and class sizes would have to go down to like 10 for it to be feasible, but oh my goodness, a girl can dream right?
And forget about starting your gifted child in school early. The districts where I live are super strict with the cutoff dates, so good luck having your advanced child start kinder at 4 via the public school.
Luckily we have JK here that starts at 4. I couldn't imagine forcing him to stay home for 2 more years!! But yes I think most districts are super strict. Ours here is (Canada) and when I was young we lived in the States and my mom tried to get me early entrance without luck. And then you hear about red shirting (holding kids back a year before starting school)! I get that 5 is still super young to be away from family all day, but I couldn't imagine DS starting late! Another reason why it would be wonderful if all kids could just work at their own pace but be with their peers!!
Who knew I'd find so many people to relate with on a post about skipping school! But if they aren't going to teach my kid what he wants to know, then I reserve my right to take him out for as many days as I see fit.
bumbershoot
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Mar 5, 2007
I agree.
It's just so sad.
Uh, hmm. Well what I have read is that when you compare the equivalent of sitting at home and staring at a wall to going to school and having a teacher there, then YES, early-years work is important. But if you are comparing having an involved, talkative parent with a child who isn't just staring at a wall, then it's nowhere NEAR unanimous.
My son was learning for YEARS before I started any sort of official teaching with him. As I bet you did. As I did. I started reading at TWO. No one taught me. I just did it. And read out loud (how else would my mom know I was reading?). From the newspaper. In 1971. NOT pretty news back then.... Kids are absolute sponges. So if a kid has nothing to do but stare at a wall, YES please put him in school. But otherwise, no, early-sitting-in-a-classroom isn't better than what a child *could* get at home.
I totally agree.
Exactly.
DH does all the time. Sends an email at midnight. "taking TIL or PTO or vacation, be back in a day". OK! He makes sure there aren't any conference calls, etc, but other than that, he's good to go.
They were in the room for more teacher-time. But "education"?
wiki has a nice paragraph about the definition.
This is from dictionary.com:
noun
1.
the act or process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge, developing the powers of reasoning and judgment, and generally of preparing oneself or others intellectually for mature life.
2.
the act or process of imparting or acquiring particular knowledge or skills, as for a profession.
3.
a degree, level, or kind of schooling:
a university education.
4.
the result produced by instruction, training, or study:
to show one's education.
5.
the science or art of teaching; pedagogics.
There's a lot of ways to define "education".
My teachers lectured from notes. I then copied it all out. If they had just given me the notes so I could read it and copy it, I would have learned it faster. I'm not an aural learner. I have to write it and write it and write it again.
So for me there wasn't much *learning* going on in a classroom. There was a lot of annoyance. I was in the G&T program through elementary. Then I hit puberty and decided I didn't want to be smarter than the boys. Alas, the boys weren't really showing their intelligence at that age in my classes (it was like being in an episode of Beavis and Butthead most days, though that show hadn't been created yet), so I really dumbed myself down. Finally hit my limit sophomore year of HS when a girl I'd known since 1st grade complained about reading a 20 page story and answering the questions in the book in ONE night. I couldn't take it anymore. Didn't want an English textbook with *questions in it* anymore. Bumped myself to Honors in English and History Jr and Sr years. I was already taking tons of math, was in Drama and Spanish then Japanese. I learned *at home*. I sat through lessons in class.
Exactly.
You are making the assumption that everyone has YOUR school schedule. Not everyone does.
Exactly.
If ways can be made for sick kids or athletic kids or "mathletes" etc to make up classes, then ways can be made up for traveling kids to make it up. To not do so is just being rude and silly.
I tell you, it's been attendance for decades now.
I wonder WHAT in-class learning? Staring at the cute boy (I fell in love in 3rd grade and went to school with him until we graduated...sigh...the two shyest kids in the school and we never spoke to each other except for him making me a valentine's day card that said he loved me), wondering if my hair looked OK, if I was sucking in my belly enough, did my feet smell, why was that kid chewing gum, is Mrs Wilson going to have a nervous breakdown THIS year, too (my 5th grade teacher melted down in front of us, then we got her again for 6th), etc etc. Where was there room for learning?
I practiced at home, and discussion was NOT something that was allowed in MY school. At least, not unless you were in Honors and AP classes (and with English and History they were the same classes, but AP kids took the AP tests at the end), but still it was mainly lecturing.
But you could if you WANTED TO. You don't want to. I do. I say to treat them the same. Both are missing class. Both should be able to make it up. Who CARES what the reason is? They only care because they've decided to care.
But WHY? Why the distinction? You've decided to make that distinction. You don't *have to*.
Exactly.
You're in CA. That's true in CA.
I think you are not aware that it's NOT true everywhere. In WA, the age of compulsory education is 8.
Ayep.
YES.
Because schools punish, in grades and scores, the kids who have worse attendance. Whether it's not giving them the work ahead of time, whether it's giving them 0s, whether it's failing them no matter what, there is a reason OTHER THAN kids just not knowing the stuff, that kids who are absent aren't doing as well.
But even if what you said were true, isn't THAT the punishment? Why pile on?
That is all just so SAD. That's all I have to say. It's SAD. Schools and the teachers who agree with this just don't care about the education of the kids. Sad.
After their first year a teacher IMO should have a variety of test problems made up; this shouldn't be a reinvention of the wheel every time they have a sick kid or whatever. And because they KNOW they'll have sick kids, they should already have "sick kid packets" ready to be put together, and therefore they could, if they wanted to, create "absent for some other reason" packets at the ready.
Honestly? If a kid who didn't study can memorize the answers to a test? They could have passed that test anyway. Normal people cannot just DO that.
He didn't. He was in 1st grade. I assume he was in WA as your location said. He didn't even have to BE there until he was 8. Who knows what amazing things could have happened at home?
My son is 11 and is finally FINALLY reading very well. Holy moly has this been a long road! If he'd been in school there would have been all sorts of problems. Then one day, like magic (like me reading at 2, but older), it was just THERE. He could do it. If he had been forced, as DH was, it would have been torture for him. DH was forced to read. He was pressured and bullied and screamed at (not all at home). He's 43 and is finally a reader. DS is 11. We did better with DS than was done with DH. And I'll tell you it was DH, who went through all of that torment, who kept me OK through it all. He promised me that when it clicked it would click. And he was right.
This little 1st grader is in the land where he has to keep improving and there's no room for him to be 11 when he finally learns to read, or tie his shoes or multiply. He's in a land where being AMAZING at math is great, but means nothing when it's reading time (that was DH's situation). Poor guy.
Nearly any homeschooler would say "yep" to that. There is SO MUCH time wasted in school-school. When you have an engaged, ready, fed, awake kid there ready to learn, it's magic.
My cousin's son (and now daughter) goes to a school where they have the classrooms set up so that kids CAN be engaged and alert and ready, and not so impacted by others. It really works for her kids (especially her son) though I would imagine a very social child would have an issue, or they would feel lonely; there are dividers between the kids, and if you need help you put up a flag. It's very education-focused, and they keep the distractions to a minimum.
On the OTHER side, in a mixed-age group school, the repetition helps the older kids. If it's not being presented as "sigh, now we have to go over this AGAIN because Miss Molly doesn't get it", if it's presented in a different way, it can really help the other kids. I was in 4th grade in a mixed class, 4-6 (and one 7th grader whose mom wasn't ready for him to "go down the hill" to the jr high school). The olders heard things over and over again, so they were super-smart by the time they moved to a different school, and the youngers weren't made to feel stupid for needing to hear it again. It was a terrific school. I was only there that one year. We started every morning with calisthenics outside. Brilliant place.
As I've learned since becoming a person who will raise her hand and ask that stupid question...if ONE person is wondering, at least 5 quiet ones were, too. And they will appreciate the extra time spent on that.
I think the issue here is that the UK has recently *started* this?
I'm sorry. I remember some moments of school. Mr Orloff telling us that we can do ANYTHING we want to do, no matter what. That we just have to take the consequences. (hey, wait, that sounds like you, Sam) I remember having the part I'd won in a school play taken from me because another girl's parents were divorcing and she wanted it (meanwhile my teachers had never KNOWN me with an in-house dad b/c he was gone when I was 2). I remember the first time EVER to stand up for myself, when I got a girl suspended because she was relentless in her teasing me (we'd call it bullying now); I finally "told on her" and the principal deemed her behavior suspension-worthy. She was an A name and I'm a B and we were directly in front of Mrs Weiss' desk, and Mrs Weiss never did a THING. Not one thing as this girl was tormenting me.
Ah, good times...so much learning...
Now, we never took vacation during school, either. Too broke! But I remember playing hooky when my mom allowed it. Awesome. I remember asking my mom Every Single Day if I could stay home. I remember coming home from school with hives on my face and upper chest, because the social interaction with the kids that I'd known my whole life was just too much for me. That's what I remember.
But even with that...I know that you and I both learned. My son refused to admit that he had learned a thing when he was 5 (he said this when he was 5, about his life up until then), when he had learned a ton! He wanted butt-in-seat time. He wanted workbooks. Hey, I liked workbooks, too. So we did that. And he used the knowledge he had gleaned during those 5 years when he "wasn't learning", or didn't remember learning, to do those workbooks. Despite not being "a reader" he found an error in the Scholastic Kindergarten workbook.
I don't remember my honeymoon.
But I bet we all know that we did learn things, we got info, we had a honeymoon...even if we don't remember them.
YES.
Where the heck is MY funding then?
OK OK DH funds me and DS. But we're also, through our rent money trickling down through our landlady, funding other kids' educations. Drat. I want some of that! I'm striking!
Agreed.
I'm really freaked out that you, as a tenured teacher, don't think you could do a better and/or faster job!
Good gosh, if I can teach myself Singapore/CommonCore-ish math so I could better meet my son where he is (that's just how he does math...his dad, too, the stinkers), you, a teacher, could learn what your kids are about to learn and teach them.
Agreed.
Those can be done in ways outside of school, though. The person you're talking to (and me, too) have kids who are involved in other activities, which is WHY there are choices being made to educate outside of school. Lots of dance/gymnastics kids end up partially homeschooled, because of competition. They aren't on the football team, so THEIR absences aren't excused, so they have to educate elsewhere.
I HATED art in school. Loved art at home. OH! I remember learning something in school. Perspective in art class. Then the rest of the time was talking about Mt St Helens (though I lived in CA at the time) and wishing I'd been at the school the day our art teacher wore his hot pink hot pants. Just a bit too late to see him wear those...
We took piano and one other instrument outside of school. My brother and I were in symphony. etc. Not in school. CA had already cut those programs. I did Drama in HS, but no musicals b/c that was cut.
But math will never be cut. History. etc. Those are what people talk about when they talk about "kids need an education". The other stuff can be done in other ways.
That's really too bad that he was so shocked.
Dude I dated in '85ish had dropped out of our school and was going to Voc. He took Small Engines. Bet he's making more than most of us "normal" HS graduates are!
But it COULD be. There's the choice being made to diminish the needs of the family. The choice could be changed.
In mixed-age classrooms, I imagine that is how it was.
My grandmother was born in 1903 in Montana. As a young teen she went on horseback and stayed in peoples' homes to teach their kids for a month or so, then moved on. She was THE teacher.
But now we're mixing up home and school again. This isn't because of the teacher, or where their rear end is. This is because of where their bed is, and what they aren't getting there.
Though we were broke for a long time, and my mom said she couldn't help me once I got to 5th grade and had "the new math" (this would have been, oh, '79?) because she didn't understand it. (I'm going to assume she was taught something VERY much like common core math curriculum but I can't ask her b/c she's no longer on this planet, and her sister, 2 years older, was taught math like I was taught math...that fast their math curriculum changed) I was a latchkey kid from the age of 9 on. I could VERY easily fall into that bracket.
But I was G&T for some years. And got bored very easily. But then part of the G&T program was to be sent out of class and into others, which did NOT work for my personality. Having attention called to me? NO. I was already the second youngest in my grade (10/12 birthday...the youngest was 10/30) and was socially in NO way ready to be even with my grade group, let alone older kids! I didn't act out, but I didn't TRY, either. I was a solid B student *without studying* all that much.
I could have easily have been one of those kids. I probably would have done better if my mom had figured out a way to teach me, because the social part of school just about did me in!
But that's home life vs school. Doesn't mean school is awesome. Can just mean that home sucks.
I swear almost all of the people working in the schools I went to were like that! I suppose the shining exception was that one-room schoolhouse I went to for 4th. But I don't remember my teacher's name (he was also the principal). Sad, eh?
I do, too. If it were about the work, about the education, they would allow it. They allow it for super-sick kids in some districts/states/schools.
That's very interesting.
In no way is being enrolled in school, learning at home, and going to the school for the tests "homeschooling".
Even in WA, where we have 3 different ways of doing it, is that under a definition of homeschooling. Come on now.
In WA we can full on homeschool.
We can homeschool and, especially once at HS age, send them to a class or put them on a team, without them being considered enrolled.
We can enroll in a Virtual Academy and toe the line and follow their rules, and get free (included with your taxes!) curriculum and sometimes a computer, and some get money for books and classes and such... And they are educated at home BUT they are not actually "homeschoolers". They fall into the umbrella because they are being taught at home, but it's not the parents, ultimately, who get the credit or blame for what they know, because they are actually enrolled in a school district.
None of that is getting the info from the teacher, learning at home, then going to school for the tests.
But how COOL would it be if that were an option? Awesome.
A friend of mine would have loved that. She had a mentally ill mom, she had a cheating dad, she had a horrible hard home life. She read a book called something like Guerilla Homeschooling and dropped out her last semester of HS. We thought her life was over. Why not just go a few more months? She couldn't. The pressures were too high. She couldn't take it, couldn't keep it together.
She is now a 2nd grade teacher. And from what she say and talks about, I think she's likely one of the best teachers out there. Awesome person. Imagine how much faster she could have gotten to this place in her life, if she could have just finished up her schooling at home, without needing to drop out and educate herself. Her life could have easily gone another direction.
How about just enrollment? Does it have to be butts in seats every day?
But why should there be such a policy? We don't have to just accept that. We don't always have the choice. Another one of my friends has been super-involved in her boys' educations until just this last year, when finally, at long last, the public schools for them were GOOD ones, and good for them. She's charter schooled, she's private schooled, she's done everything but homeschooled (she says they'd kill each other). Not everyone can do that. She edits books and articles from home. Her husband is a teacher at a SoCal community college. (talk about having a hard time working out family vacation, with 3 separate school schedules to work with!) She's in a unique position to take that time. Not everyone can do that. Not everyone can just say "no, that school has a rotten policy".
So let's rage against that nonsensical machine and change things. Make them better. Make them work better. Make it about the kids learning things, not just about them sitting in their seats to get the money for them.
?
You get that the govt' doesn't actually provide things willy nilly. That even with ACA you pay premiums? That with other social funding you have to prove you need it? etc. They provide some very basic stuff. That's it. Other than that, they make roads and pay for the military. And sometimes not even roads (the house I grew up in is still on a gravel, muddy road that's not taken care of by the county).
Do you have a true Montessori school around? Actually a true one won't take a child that young; a child that young has work that is play, and you can set up your home in amazing ways to help him? her? thrive even before heading to school. Then at 4 if you have a great, true, Montessori school (Maria-based, not her son's offshoot), that would be amazing for a younger learner wanting to work at her pace.
In case you're unaware, the piece of my post that you quoted was where I was quoting directly from the article. And then I argued against it.
Either you didn't read my full post or you misquoted. Either way, I'd prefer my name not be attached to a thought that I was actually opposing.
sam_gordon
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jun 26, 2010
tl;drI agree.
It's just so sad.
Uh, hmm. Well what I have read is that when you compare the equivalent of sitting at home and staring at a wall to going to school and having a teacher there, then YES, early-years work is important. But if you are comparing having an involved, talkative parent with a child who isn't just staring at a wall, then it's nowhere NEAR unanimous.
My son was learning for YEARS before I started any sort of official teaching with him. As I bet you did. As I did. I started reading at TWO. No one taught me. I just did it. And read out loud (how else would my mom know I was reading?). From the newspaper. In 1971. NOT pretty news back then.... Kids are absolute sponges. So if a kid has nothing to do but stare at a wall, YES please put him in school. But otherwise, no, early-sitting-in-a-classroom isn't better than what a child *could* get at home.
I totally agree.
Exactly.
DH does all the time. Sends an email at midnight. "taking TIL or PTO or vacation, be back in a day". OK! He makes sure there aren't any conference calls, etc, but other than that, he's good to go.
They were in the room for more teacher-time. But "education"?
wiki has a nice paragraph about the definition.
This is from dictionary.com:
noun
1.
the act or process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge, developing the powers of reasoning and judgment, and generally of preparing oneself or others intellectually for mature life.
2.
the act or process of imparting or acquiring particular knowledge or skills, as for a profession.
3.
a degree, level, or kind of schooling:
a university education.
4.
the result produced by instruction, training, or study:
to show one's education.
5.
the science or art of teaching; pedagogics.
There's a lot of ways to define "education".
My teachers lectured from notes. I then copied it all out. If they had just given me the notes so I could read it and copy it, I would have learned it faster. I'm not an aural learner. I have to write it and write it and write it again.
So for me there wasn't much *learning* going on in a classroom. There was a lot of annoyance. I was in the G&T program through elementary. Then I hit puberty and decided I didn't want to be smarter than the boys. Alas, the boys weren't really showing their intelligence at that age in my classes (it was like being in an episode of Beavis and Butthead most days, though that show hadn't been created yet), so I really dumbed myself down. Finally hit my limit sophomore year of HS when a girl I'd known since 1st grade complained about reading a 20 page story and answering the questions in the book in ONE night. I couldn't take it anymore. Didn't want an English textbook with *questions in it* anymore. Bumped myself to Honors in English and History Jr and Sr years. I was already taking tons of math, was in Drama and Spanish then Japanese. I learned *at home*. I sat through lessons in class.
Exactly.
You are making the assumption that everyone has YOUR school schedule. Not everyone does.
Exactly.
If ways can be made for sick kids or athletic kids or "mathletes" etc to make up classes, then ways can be made up for traveling kids to make it up. To not do so is just being rude and silly.
I tell you, it's been attendance for decades now.
I wonder WHAT in-class learning? Staring at the cute boy (I fell in love in 3rd grade and went to school with him until we graduated...sigh...the two shyest kids in the school and we never spoke to each other except for him making me a valentine's day card that said he loved me), wondering if my hair looked OK, if I was sucking in my belly enough, did my feet smell, why was that kid chewing gum, is Mrs Wilson going to have a nervous breakdown THIS year, too (my 5th grade teacher melted down in front of us, then we got her again for 6th), etc etc. Where was there room for learning?
I practiced at home, and discussion was NOT something that was allowed in MY school. At least, not unless you were in Honors and AP classes (and with English and History they were the same classes, but AP kids took the AP tests at the end), but still it was mainly lecturing.
But you could if you WANTED TO. You don't want to. I do. I say to treat them the same. Both are missing class. Both should be able to make it up. Who CARES what the reason is? They only care because they've decided to care.
But WHY? Why the distinction? You've decided to make that distinction. You don't *have to*.
Exactly.
You're in CA. That's true in CA.
I think you are not aware that it's NOT true everywhere. In WA, the age of compulsory education is 8.
Ayep.
YES.
Because schools punish, in grades and scores, the kids who have worse attendance. Whether it's not giving them the work ahead of time, whether it's giving them 0s, whether it's failing them no matter what, there is a reason OTHER THAN kids just not knowing the stuff, that kids who are absent aren't doing as well.
But even if what you said were true, isn't THAT the punishment? Why pile on?
That is all just so SAD. That's all I have to say. It's SAD. Schools and the teachers who agree with this just don't care about the education of the kids. Sad.
After their first year a teacher IMO should have a variety of test problems made up; this shouldn't be a reinvention of the wheel every time they have a sick kid or whatever. And because they KNOW they'll have sick kids, they should already have "sick kid packets" ready to be put together, and therefore they could, if they wanted to, create "absent for some other reason" packets at the ready.
Honestly? If a kid who didn't study can memorize the answers to a test? They could have passed that test anyway. Normal people cannot just DO that.
He didn't. He was in 1st grade. I assume he was in WA as your location said. He didn't even have to BE there until he was 8. Who knows what amazing things could have happened at home?
My son is 11 and is finally FINALLY reading very well. Holy moly has this been a long road! If he'd been in school there would have been all sorts of problems. Then one day, like magic (like me reading at 2, but older), it was just THERE. He could do it. If he had been forced, as DH was, it would have been torture for him. DH was forced to read. He was pressured and bullied and screamed at (not all at home). He's 43 and is finally a reader. DS is 11. We did better with DS than was done with DH. And I'll tell you it was DH, who went through all of that torment, who kept me OK through it all. He promised me that when it clicked it would click. And he was right.
This little 1st grader is in the land where he has to keep improving and there's no room for him to be 11 when he finally learns to read, or tie his shoes or multiply. He's in a land where being AMAZING at math is great, but means nothing when it's reading time (that was DH's situation). Poor guy.
Nearly any homeschooler would say "yep" to that. There is SO MUCH time wasted in school-school. When you have an engaged, ready, fed, awake kid there ready to learn, it's magic.
My cousin's son (and now daughter) goes to a school where they have the classrooms set up so that kids CAN be engaged and alert and ready, and not so impacted by others. It really works for her kids (especially her son) though I would imagine a very social child would have an issue, or they would feel lonely; there are dividers between the kids, and if you need help you put up a flag. It's very education-focused, and they keep the distractions to a minimum.
On the OTHER side, in a mixed-age group school, the repetition helps the older kids. If it's not being presented as "sigh, now we have to go over this AGAIN because Miss Molly doesn't get it", if it's presented in a different way, it can really help the other kids. I was in 4th grade in a mixed class, 4-6 (and one 7th grader whose mom wasn't ready for him to "go down the hill" to the jr high school). The olders heard things over and over again, so they were super-smart by the time they moved to a different school, and the youngers weren't made to feel stupid for needing to hear it again. It was a terrific school. I was only there that one year. We started every morning with calisthenics outside. Brilliant place.
As I've learned since becoming a person who will raise her hand and ask that stupid question...if ONE person is wondering, at least 5 quiet ones were, too. And they will appreciate the extra time spent on that.
I think the issue here is that the UK has recently *started* this?
I'm sorry. I remember some moments of school. Mr Orloff telling us that we can do ANYTHING we want to do, no matter what. That we just have to take the consequences. (hey, wait, that sounds like you, Sam) I remember having the part I'd won in a school play taken from me because another girl's parents were divorcing and she wanted it (meanwhile my teachers had never KNOWN me with an in-house dad b/c he was gone when I was 2). I remember the first time EVER to stand up for myself, when I got a girl suspended because she was relentless in her teasing me (we'd call it bullying now); I finally "told on her" and the principal deemed her behavior suspension-worthy. She was an A name and I'm a B and we were directly in front of Mrs Weiss' desk, and Mrs Weiss never did a THING. Not one thing as this girl was tormenting me.
Ah, good times...so much learning...
Now, we never took vacation during school, either. Too broke! But I remember playing hooky when my mom allowed it. Awesome. I remember asking my mom Every Single Day if I could stay home. I remember coming home from school with hives on my face and upper chest, because the social interaction with the kids that I'd known my whole life was just too much for me. That's what I remember.
But even with that...I know that you and I both learned. My son refused to admit that he had learned a thing when he was 5 (he said this when he was 5, about his life up until then), when he had learned a ton! He wanted butt-in-seat time. He wanted workbooks. Hey, I liked workbooks, too. So we did that. And he used the knowledge he had gleaned during those 5 years when he "wasn't learning", or didn't remember learning, to do those workbooks. Despite not being "a reader" he found an error in the Scholastic Kindergarten workbook.
I don't remember my honeymoon.
But I bet we all know that we did learn things, we got info, we had a honeymoon...even if we don't remember them.
YES.
Where the heck is MY funding then?
OK OK DH funds me and DS. But we're also, through our rent money trickling down through our landlady, funding other kids' educations. Drat. I want some of that! I'm striking!
Agreed.
I'm really freaked out that you, as a tenured teacher, don't think you could do a better and/or faster job!
Good gosh, if I can teach myself Singapore/CommonCore-ish math so I could better meet my son where he is (that's just how he does math...his dad, too, the stinkers), you, a teacher, could learn what your kids are about to learn and teach them.
Agreed.
Those can be done in ways outside of school, though. The person you're talking to (and me, too) have kids who are involved in other activities, which is WHY there are choices being made to educate outside of school. Lots of dance/gymnastics kids end up partially homeschooled, because of competition. They aren't on the football team, so THEIR absences aren't excused, so they have to educate elsewhere.
I HATED art in school. Loved art at home. OH! I remember learning something in school. Perspective in art class. Then the rest of the time was talking about Mt St Helens (though I lived in CA at the time) and wishing I'd been at the school the day our art teacher wore his hot pink hot pants. Just a bit too late to see him wear those...
We took piano and one other instrument outside of school. My brother and I were in symphony. etc. Not in school. CA had already cut those programs. I did Drama in HS, but no musicals b/c that was cut.
But math will never be cut. History. etc. Those are what people talk about when they talk about "kids need an education". The other stuff can be done in other ways.
That's really too bad that he was so shocked.
Dude I dated in '85ish had dropped out of our school and was going to Voc. He took Small Engines. Bet he's making more than most of us "normal" HS graduates are!
But it COULD be. There's the choice being made to diminish the needs of the family. The choice could be changed.
In mixed-age classrooms, I imagine that is how it was.
My grandmother was born in 1903 in Montana. As a young teen she went on horseback and stayed in peoples' homes to teach their kids for a month or so, then moved on. She was THE teacher.
But now we're mixing up home and school again. This isn't because of the teacher, or where their rear end is. This is because of where their bed is, and what they aren't getting there.
Though we were broke for a long time, and my mom said she couldn't help me once I got to 5th grade and had "the new math" (this would have been, oh, '79?) because she didn't understand it. (I'm going to assume she was taught something VERY much like common core math curriculum but I can't ask her b/c she's no longer on this planet, and her sister, 2 years older, was taught math like I was taught math...that fast their math curriculum changed) I was a latchkey kid from the age of 9 on. I could VERY easily fall into that bracket.
But I was G&T for some years. And got bored very easily. But then part of the G&T program was to be sent out of class and into others, which did NOT work for my personality. Having attention called to me? NO. I was already the second youngest in my grade (10/12 birthday...the youngest was 10/30) and was socially in NO way ready to be even with my grade group, let alone older kids! I didn't act out, but I didn't TRY, either. I was a solid B student *without studying* all that much.
I could have easily have been one of those kids. I probably would have done better if my mom had figured out a way to teach me, because the social part of school just about did me in!
But that's home life vs school. Doesn't mean school is awesome. Can just mean that home sucks.
I swear almost all of the people working in the schools I went to were like that! I suppose the shining exception was that one-room schoolhouse I went to for 4th. But I don't remember my teacher's name (he was also the principal). Sad, eh?
I do, too. If it were about the work, about the education, they would allow it. They allow it for super-sick kids in some districts/states/schools.
That's very interesting.
In no way is being enrolled in school, learning at home, and going to the school for the tests "homeschooling".
Even in WA, where we have 3 different ways of doing it, is that under a definition of homeschooling. Come on now.
In WA we can full on homeschool.
We can homeschool and, especially once at HS age, send them to a class or put them on a team, without them being considered enrolled.
We can enroll in a Virtual Academy and toe the line and follow their rules, and get free (included with your taxes!) curriculum and sometimes a computer, and some get money for books and classes and such... And they are educated at home BUT they are not actually "homeschoolers". They fall into the umbrella because they are being taught at home, but it's not the parents, ultimately, who get the credit or blame for what they know, because they are actually enrolled in a school district.
None of that is getting the info from the teacher, learning at home, then going to school for the tests.
But how COOL would it be if that were an option? Awesome.
A friend of mine would have loved that. She had a mentally ill mom, she had a cheating dad, she had a horrible hard home life. She read a book called something like Guerilla Homeschooling and dropped out her last semester of HS. We thought her life was over. Why not just go a few more months? She couldn't. The pressures were too high. She couldn't take it, couldn't keep it together.
She is now a 2nd grade teacher. And from what she say and talks about, I think she's likely one of the best teachers out there. Awesome person. Imagine how much faster she could have gotten to this place in her life, if she could have just finished up her schooling at home, without needing to drop out and educate herself. Her life could have easily gone another direction.
How about just enrollment? Does it have to be butts in seats every day?
But why should there be such a policy? We don't have to just accept that. We don't always have the choice. Another one of my friends has been super-involved in her boys' educations until just this last year, when finally, at long last, the public schools for them were GOOD ones, and good for them. She's charter schooled, she's private schooled, she's done everything but homeschooled (she says they'd kill each other). Not everyone can do that. She edits books and articles from home. Her husband is a teacher at a SoCal community college. (talk about having a hard time working out family vacation, with 3 separate school schedules to work with!) She's in a unique position to take that time. Not everyone can do that. Not everyone can just say "no, that school has a rotten policy".
So let's rage against that nonsensical machine and change things. Make them better. Make them work better. Make it about the kids learning things, not just about them sitting in their seats to get the money for them.
?
You get that the govt' doesn't actually provide things willy nilly. That even with ACA you pay premiums? That with other social funding you have to prove you need it? etc. They provide some very basic stuff. That's it. Other than that, they make roads and pay for the military. And sometimes not even roads (the house I grew up in is still on a gravel, muddy road that's not taken care of by the county).
Do you have a true Montessori school around? Actually a true one won't take a child that young; a child that young has work that is play, and you can set up your home in amazing ways to help him? her? thrive even before heading to school. Then at 4 if you have a great, true, Montessori school (Maria-based, not her son's offshoot), that would be amazing for a younger learner wanting to work at her pace.
For those with children that are ahead (I'm not going to call them gifted. I was always ahead in school but I'm not sure that makes me gifted. I just pick things up quickly) The problem is that your kids will pass the tests no matter what the school does. So they don't care. I was in middle school when the decision was made to go to high stakes testing in my state and we started changing the curriculum. One of the first things I noticed is that instead of moving on when most of the class got something they waited until everyone did. However some students didnt care or just weren't able to get it... so that made school AWFUL for those of us that could grasp something quickly. By middle school I had figured out how I needed to learn and what I needed to do to get a subject no matter how the teacher taught it.
Everything became geared towards getting every student to the level to pass. ONce you hit that bar you were deemed good enough and no one cared again.
The individualized plan some put together would have been great for me as I could have moved forward until I reached the point where I just didn't hold interest in alot of subjects. As others said you would need a floor that everyone had to get to in each subject. A level of reading that would allow someone to read news papers or reports at work (even the most math focused engineers at my job need to be able to do this and understand them), writing to write those types of reports (again the most math focused engineers would be out of a job if they couldn't write a paper to tell management why their design would work), math to be able to balance checkbooks and budgets (both for home life and work). Those types of things. However if Suzy that is an amazing artist and writer hates math and wants to stop after Algebra I that should be fine... because even with the word engineer in my title I can't tell you the last time I did math that was past what I learned in Algebra I.
Everything became geared towards getting every student to the level to pass. ONce you hit that bar you were deemed good enough and no one cared again.
The individualized plan some put together would have been great for me as I could have moved forward until I reached the point where I just didn't hold interest in alot of subjects. As others said you would need a floor that everyone had to get to in each subject. A level of reading that would allow someone to read news papers or reports at work (even the most math focused engineers at my job need to be able to do this and understand them), writing to write those types of reports (again the most math focused engineers would be out of a job if they couldn't write a paper to tell management why their design would work), math to be able to balance checkbooks and budgets (both for home life and work). Those types of things. However if Suzy that is an amazing artist and writer hates math and wants to stop after Algebra I that should be fine... because even with the word engineer in my title I can't tell you the last time I did math that was past what I learned in Algebra I.
Just thought of something, I wonder if schools were cheating and making up fake students that are enrolled... I mean if you have someone come to school and count the physical bodies that is hard to cheat (so it wouldn't be every day but if a school never knew which day they would show...) but I don't think it would be hard to add extra fake students to fill each class that just happened to be "absent" that day.
BearFamily
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Jul 22, 2012
Yes, there are cases of this. Or more often, schools that would have a kid move away and still keep them on the books.
Fake students at a charter school in Chicago:
http://www.chicago-bureau.org/stunn...llment-data-embezzlement-found-in-cps-report/
Deceased or moved students counted in NYC (from 1999, though)
http://nypost.com/1999/12/12/skeletons-in-ed-boards-closet-dead-kids-used-in-schools-scam/
In St. Louis:
http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/...cle_8bebfd2f-f6d3-5445-ac0f-751d6f665581.html
In Columbus, dis-enrolling and re-enrolling kids so their test scores won't count:
http://www.dispatch.com/content/topic/special-reports/2012/counting-kids-out.html
kaytieeldr
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jun 11, 2005
While a whopping 96% of states require students to start before that. Fifty percent have the compulsory age set at six, 30% at seven, and 16% as young as five.
godders
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jul 3, 2014
In the UK you have to be in education from 5 (usually start in the September and turn 6 during that school year - everything before that is optional) and then in full time education until 18 unless you have some kind of apprenticeship post 16. You can't "drop out" of the UK education system. You will be entered for exams at 16 whether you have been in school or not.
The fines and jail time weren't brought in to punish those who leave the country during term times but to combat the high rates of truancy from young people choosing to skip school or who's parents didn't care to enforce their kids getting educated. The fines have helped to make sure these kids get their butts into school because they've seen there are real and immediate consequences to skipping and it has done the same for the parents who had ambivalent attitudes to the problem (not all parents fall into this obviously. Many young people will skip out of school no matter how hard you try to get them there). The people who have difficulty taking time off during the school holidays or who can't afford it are unfortunately at the school's discretion for their children being able to be absent for vacations.
As for holidays, yes we are an island but England, Wales and Scotland are all attached and we have many beautiful and fun places to go on holiday right here. I was very lucky that I was able to go to Disney as a kid (think I got to leave school an hour early on the last day of term to go and catch a flight when I was 5) but some of my fondest memories are going to the Lake District an hours drive away from home with my Grandparents over night or up to a little cottage in Northumberland to stay on a farm where I got to feed the chickens and play with the lambs.
The fines and jail time weren't brought in to punish those who leave the country during term times but to combat the high rates of truancy from young people choosing to skip school or who's parents didn't care to enforce their kids getting educated. The fines have helped to make sure these kids get their butts into school because they've seen there are real and immediate consequences to skipping and it has done the same for the parents who had ambivalent attitudes to the problem (not all parents fall into this obviously. Many young people will skip out of school no matter how hard you try to get them there). The people who have difficulty taking time off during the school holidays or who can't afford it are unfortunately at the school's discretion for their children being able to be absent for vacations.
As for holidays, yes we are an island but England, Wales and Scotland are all attached and we have many beautiful and fun places to go on holiday right here. I was very lucky that I was able to go to Disney as a kid (think I got to leave school an hour early on the last day of term to go and catch a flight when I was 5) but some of my fondest memories are going to the Lake District an hours drive away from home with my Grandparents over night or up to a little cottage in Northumberland to stay on a farm where I got to feed the chickens and play with the lambs.
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