Homeschooling in the Tech Community
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@scottalanmiller said:
We don't do any tests here. Tests are one of the things that we feel is wrong with the public school system. We teach only for our kids to learn, not for them to "rate" against others. We want them to know the material, not memorize facts. There is a reason why I feel that SUNY Empire is one of the best universities around - they don't do tests either and only build portfolios. It's much harder not having tests, but when you want to really learn you don't use tests. Tests are an avoidance of education.
Finland, which is now the top rates public school system in the world, does not use tests either.
How do you gauge comprehension if not for testing? I'm certainly not saying you're wrong to say testing is bad - I'm a horrible test taker - I'm just curious how you gauge their understanding.
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@Dashrender said:
I'd consider you on the more rare side Scott - most kids really probably don't care about learning, at least not like we traditionally understand it.
Is that true? Most kids love to learn. It's the natural human state. Schools work exceptionally hard to beat the love of learning out of them at an early age. You don't have many kids to observe who haven't been to school to see what a love of learning looks like when not curtailed by "schools."
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
I'd consider you on the more rare side Scott - most kids really probably don't care about learning, at least not like we traditionally understand it.
Is that true? Most kids love to learn. It's the natural human state. Schools work exceptionally hard to beat the love of learning out of them at an early age. You don't have many kids to observe who haven't been to school to see what a love of learning looks like when not curtailed by "schools."
Kids love to learn how to spell words? and the history of the world - I'd bet not. If instead they were able to lead where the learning goes by their own interest with some of that needed information tossed in there, then maybe..
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We continued to do traditional testing methods. Partly because we lived in a state that required it for homeschoolers. But it was also a good gauge for us to keep us on track. We just tested once a year (unlike public schools that test constantly) this kept us on track for the most part. But as I said I missed some culturally acceptable things like nursery rhymes and fairytales. Not a huge deal but if you don't have those small bits of information you can miss things later on.
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@Dashrender said:
How do you gauge comprehension if not for testing? I'm certainly not saying you're wrong to say testing is bad - I'm a horrible test taker - I'm just curious how you gauge their understanding.
Testing doesn't gauge comprehension either. That's something specifically missing in normal school settings. Tests only test memorization (useless) and test taking ability (useful, but not in good settings.) Tests are used to avoid gauging comprehension. Tests are easy, figuring out what people know is hard.
It's a lot like interviewing. We all know that simple, memorization style questions in interviews are the norm, but we also know that they show almost nothing and cause good people to not get jobs and bad people to get them because they test random trivial memorization and not understanding of the material.
Just like in job situations, you can best gauge understanding through conversation and portfolio review. Anyone can tell you that the Spanish Armada was defeated in 1588. That's a useless fact drilled into every student for no reason. What students can't tell you is why the Spanish Armada was important, why it was the bane of the British, why the defeat was so important to world history and who the main players were and what their motivations were or what we can learn about people, events and history because of it. In school the defeat of the Spanish Armada was literally relegated to a single date to memorize. One of the most important events in modern history and no one even knows what it was.
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@Dashrender said:
Kids love to learn how to spell words? and the history of the world - I'd bet not. If instead they were able to lead where the learning goes by their own interest with some of that needed information tossed in there, then maybe..
Spelling not too often, that's why reading and writing is one of the few things you need to formally teach. But history of the world? Show me a kid that doesn't find that interesting until school makes it boring. Watching kids go through homeschooling, even spelling is something that my kids ask to do because they enjoy it outside of a school setting.
Kids are designed to learn, they enjoy taking in information and understanding the world around them. It's how kids naturally are. You just have to not stop them from wanting to do so.
I only get to see so many kids who never went to school, but those that I do see love learning those things. My kids LOVE world history, for example. It's a treat for them.
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@Minion-Queen said:
We continued to do traditional testing methods. Partly because we lived in a state that required it for homeschoolers. But it was also a good gauge for us to keep us on track. We just tested once a year (unlike public schools that test constantly) this kept us on track for the most part. But as I said I missed some culturally acceptable things like nursery rhymes and fairytales. Not a huge deal but if you don't have those small bits of information you can miss things later on.
I don't remember getting those in school either. Maybe I did but I don't remember. I know them from before school age. I can even picture the books that I had that taught them.
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@Dashrender said:
Kids love to learn how to spell words?
Of course, my kids are my kids and I have read two histories of the Oxford dictionary and am currently reading "Made in America", a history of the American dialect of English
I'm pretty anal about spelling, using British (Queen's English) form when possible and using the full alphabet, not the American shortened one lacking letters like æ and œ.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
Kids love to learn how to spell words?
Of course, my kids are my kids and I have read two histories of the Oxford dictionary and am currently reading "Made in America", a history of the American dialect of EnglishI'm pretty anal about spelling, using British (Queen's English) form when possible and using the full alphabet, not the American shortened one lacking letters like æ and œ.
I use English-English spelling all the time, unless spell check changes it, or I make a strange mistake since English is not my first language. And of course I use French and Mediæval Latin letters like @scottalanmiller mentions, and I'm especially anal about this in words like résumé where not having them changes the meaning of the word, or if people misspell them and put stuff like "resumé," I actually had a guy apply for a job and spell it that way, I didn't correct him, but I did email him a response and spelled it correctly (résumé) and this moron emails me back to tell me I misspelled it.
Having a Hungarian keyboard makes this all pretty easy, especially with the dead key that lets me throw out basically any Latin-1 and Latin-2 character.
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At this point, our daughters are 3 and 6 so test taking isn't even a consideration. Later on, I plan to give the girls tests so that they will know how to take tests and what to expect. They need to be prepared, should they attend a college with tests or want to take AP exams. Test taking is a skill in and of itself, and I will teach it as such. As for assessing knowledge and comprehension, there are many ways to do that without taking tests. Projects, research papers and essays are all good ways to gauge and promote retention and understanding, and for Math, just demonstrating the ability to independently work problems is enough. No need for the unnecessary pressure of calling it a "test".
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That's one thing that I hate about American keyboards, so many standard letters are missing and it is often so complicated to get to them. Now that I have switched to using a Mac it is pretty easy to get to most alternative letters. Just hold down the a, o or e key and the options pop up. Although the autocorrect is a pain as my well spelled words show up, now, as American spellings
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@scottalanmiller Yeah 103 or go to hell!
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Is there a major downside to homeschooling? I know everyone always goes on about the social aspect, and it is clear that that can be solved. Do you find there is anything else missing in the homeschool environment?
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@s.hackleman said:
Is there a major downside to homeschooling? I know everyone always goes on about the social aspect, and it is clear that that can be solved. Do you find there is anything else missing in the homeschool environment?
It takes a lot of time and effort to do it correctly, and it takes some bravery (and money) to hire (or get someone) to help teach something you don't understand as your child advances. Anyone who mentions lack of "social interaction" as a downside, well all I have to say is: if your kid is only getting social interaction through school, your kid is probably pretty damn unhappy and lonely.
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@Dominica You're moving to Spain aren't you? What are you going to do then? I'd have thought going to a Spanish school would have considerable advantages - not least for learning Spanish. Is home schooling even allowed there?
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@s.hackleman said:
I know everyone always goes on about the social aspect, and it is clear that that can be solved.
Social aspect is actually often a positive. Read Hackers and Painters, which is a software engineering book, but it goes on and go about the negative social aspects of the normal school system teaching social interactions that have to be unlearned because in the adult world you can't act like kids in school. The author, a rather prominent figure, believes that homeschooling is better because it teaches how to function in an adult world rather than in the prison-like, "Lord of the Flies" world of the school system.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@s.hackleman said:
I know everyone always goes on about the social aspect, and it is clear that that can be solved.
Social aspect is actually often a positive. Read Hackers and Painters, which is a software engineering book, but it goes on and go about the negative social aspects of the normal school system teaching social interactions that have to be unlearned because in the adult world you can't act like kids in school. The author, a rather prominent figure, believes that homeschooling is better because it teaches how to function in an adult world rather than in the prison-like, "Lord of the Flies" world of the school system.
Plus also I'm sure we're all aware, there are no lonely, unhappy, or anti-social children in school, it's a massive, endless playground of constant social interaction and happiness.
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@scottalanmiller said:
in the adult world you can't act like kids in school.
You should tell that to the people I work with
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@s.hackleman said:
Is there a major downside to homeschooling? I know everyone always goes on about the social aspect, and it is clear that that can be solved. Do you find there is anything else missing in the homeschool environment?
Sure, many downsides. Homeschooling is a massive commitment. One or both parents need to treat it like a full time job. You don't get free daycare most days, you have to actually be with your kids full time. You can't be dual income. For a lot of people, that is very hard.
You need to be able to teach all subjects to a high school level (or better.) Lots of people struggle to do that (but then again, few teachers can so you run into issues with this in the public school system too, my high school physics teacher didn't know science or math and no one learned a thing from her class, for example.) IT folks tend to do well, IT tends to engender highly intelligent, well rounded people who enjoy learning making them relatively ideal for home schooling.
Homeschooling is very costly. You need to provide all of the resources that a school normally provides. Books are obvious. But don't forget all of the science stuff, wood shop, computers, etc. It's very doable, but there are a lot of resources that you will want that normal households do not have.
It takes a crazy amount of planning. Insane. You are becoming not just a teacher but an entire school at home. You have to make curriculum decisions, actually do the teaching, provide the structure, etc.
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