Rogerian argument Essays

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Homeschooling

Every educational system provides great opportunities for children or students to learn new skills as well as the ability to harness own unique qualities and interests. Homeschooling is not different from any other modes of schooling such as in the private, charted or public schools. Like all the other models there have been various debates that are in support or opposition of these type of schooling. Whether homeschooling is a better options or not is still an area of debate.

According to Chang et al (201), the total number of homeschoolers are close to 1.5 million children. The research by Hovde (73) shows that the statistics account for about 2.9% of the total school-age population that is present in the U.S which presents a significant population. She noted that despite homeschooling being the a most preferred choice in the society today, especially among the urban parents that want the best education for their children, the idea of homeschooling and their benefits is still a subject of debate. The debate majorly is bases on the standards, safety and government involvement. Those in opposition of the homeschooling are in belief that homeschooling do not provide the best education in that parents are often left with too much work and thus can teach their children anything that they would love to and reduces contact with other perspectives. It also has been associated with extremist and abusive situations are hard to identify in that children have less limits to the external environments. Additionally they believe that parents choose the homeschooling reactively for the fear of the displeasure, instead of making thoughtful choices for their children’s needs.

The proponents of homeschooling provides plenty of healthy benefits in that that children interact one on one with learners in that they receive all the required attention from parents and that they also can be able to control their learning. This is based on the idea that parents always want the best for their children and thus homeschooling will be able to gear them to achieve what they regard as being the best for their children. Various research that this is true in some situations and in extreme cases. It is the responsibility of the state to ensure that children are safe all times and that they receive the necessary support that could be required for learning. For parents that want homeschooling they should be given all the necessary tools and materials to ensure that homeschool learning continues well and the desired goals are achieved. There are plenty of concerns that exists that tries to validate the reasons why homeschooling is not the best option.

The concerns for opposition is that state that most parents do not have control of the homeschooling environment. In many cases, parents do have total control over the homeschooling environment. For example, there are programs that monitors homeschoolers that require students to take standardized tests in grades three, five and eight (Hovde, 213). This is considered to be a major assessment. According to Joyce (209) there are many states that require less assessment for children in homeschool programs. 26 states in the U.S do not require any testing and 11 states do not provides any kind of notification from homeschooling parents. In many of the locations identified parental discretion has become a law in place of formal guidelines. In many cases the parental freedom stands to benefit plenty of children, but there are others who view not to gain from it. In the article Joyce (99) provides a narration of how several of the homeschoolers that had dangerous educational experiences and harmful due to their parent’s fundamentalist stance. In the narrative, there is a woman who explained that she was raised by someone that had a mental disorder and informed her that she had to obey her or she would be send to hell by God. Her mental disorder gave her the belief that she had control over everything, and that homeschooling and the religious beliefs provided her with the necessary justification for her actions.

In the same example that has been used above, it is clear that parents do not have interests in teaching their children, but instead prefer to teach them using schoolbooks and the encourage the pre-teens to teach themselves. Joyce claims that this is not a strange thing and site various websites such as the Homeschooler and No Longer Quivering among others which have also shared the same stories on homeschooling. The students are normally find themselves in detrimental situations which affects them emotionally, intellectually and socially. She further argues that there is little that can be done to protect them since there is little contact among the homeschoolers and the outside world. She further points that the outcomes are not only narrowed to the abusive situation. There is also arguments that the homeschoolers are in many instances have been found to struggle to achieve what the non-schoolers have achieved despite having their parent’s best intentions.

According to Martin-Chang et. (201), the parents that choose homeschooling have children that performance being lower than the non-homeschoolers. They argue that the unstructured form of homeschooling, the learning process is determined by the child while in the structured forms the parents regard themselves as the contributors of the children’ s education. The structured homeschooling could still be focusing on the interests of the children, but the parents are the ones that create lessons plans which guide the children through the learning process (Concordia University, 12). Some of the researchers argue this could be interpreted differently in that the study results could have been different in student achievement and that different tools could have been used. The results could for instances be obtained from a standardized test that do not present any connection between the public curriculum or the homeschool groups. The age should also be considered as a factor in conducting this types of research and also when doing the measurements. Despite this qualifiers Martin-Chang et al., (2011) initial results seemed to insinuate that parental engagement in child learning process is a positive factors in ensuring academic success of the child. There are some forms of schooling which the parents fails to be involved in the student learning. In other respects the homeschools children that had little parental involvement were scored higher on independently implemented test than for both traditional students and unstructured learners. The results are in support of the earlier potentially flawed research which stated that the homeschoolers were better achievers. In addition, this underscores the findings that the individuals could bring about huge benefits for the children. The success of homeschooling is majorly rooted on believe that success is brought about parental investment. According to Martin-Chang et al. (21) the advantages of homeschooling could be linked to the bigger learning spaces, individualized construction and that the students spend more time on more technical and hard to understand topics which is not the case in the structured learning. The flexibility present in the homeschool environments allows the parents to tailor make the learning materials and their schedules as a means to meet the children needs. This is not the same with the public schools teachers who spent little time on each students. This is not because of the fact that they do not like devoting the time, but rather because of the large number of children or students in the room who require the attention of one person.

It is clear that both sides the opposing and the proposing of homeschooling have well-articulated arguments. Homeschooling is an option that promotes high achievement and provides satisfaction for the students. In some of the situations, homeschooling could be harmful and hinder the social, psychological and emotional wellbeing of one’s child. The solution to homeschool controversy provides a balanced approach which uphold both the merits and demerits of homeschooling. As it is noted by Hovde abuse can only occur in the educational setting, with Joyce showing that homeschoolers find it hard to access help and that there is still more to be done by the state to ensure the safety of homeschoolers. Now survivors are coming up with legal reforms that can be used to access the homeschoolers. In order for the homeschooling to remain safe and the rewarding option for parents and students, the extreme cases have to be taken seriously. There is need for resources to be availed and any individual that might be found to have abused a child should be held accountable for their actions. The individuals that support homeschooling have to support reforms which increases safety in the homeschooling and make it safer for all individuals. There is need for more research on unstructured homeschooling using the holistic measuring tool since standardized tests are considered to be problematic. The parents that need to decide how to educate their children need to have access to the right information on children development and learning. If incase the freedom fails to offer the best option for children, parents needs to be encourage to seek alternative methods of homeschooling. It is true that parents have a strong influence on their children’s learning and thus have to be equipped with the right tools to make the right decisions for their children.

Works Cited

Concordia University. (2012, November 6). Are home-schooled children smarter? [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGp4KFLuQNc

Hovde, E. (2013, January 5). Sorting out the truth and myth in home schooling. The Oregonian. https://www.oregonlive.com/hovde/2013/01/elizabeth_hovde_sorting_out_th.html

Joyce, K. (2013). The homeschool apostates. The American Prospect Longform. http://prospect.org/article/homeschool-apostates

Martin-Chang, S., Gould, O. N., and Meuse, R. E. (2011). The impact of schooling on academic achievement: Evidence from homeschooled and traditionally schooled students. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, 43(3), 195–202. http://doi.org/10.1037/a0022697