Rethinking 5

"Home schooling has been burgeoning in America over the last 25 years.   Children who are schooled at home score significantly better on standardized tests in every subject area.  Page 67

So, home schooling is the way to go because the public schools are failing.  Everybody wants to blame the teachers, and teachers want to blame the parents.  I blame the judges who won't allow me to smack the kids who should be smacked.  I think it would help a lot if schools worked with police and judges regarding discipline in schools.  I think that innovations are needed to help teachers keep order in schools.  On the other hand, maybe kids who refuse to respect others should just stay home.  Won't the average student perform better if a certain few are left at home?  I think so.  It just isn't fair to make teachers be police without authority and to make average students suffer from lack of excellent instruction.  The authors explain on page 101 of the next chapter that parents are trying to protect their kids from learning the wrong things from peers in schools.

"In about 10% of families that do home schooling the mother works outside the home." Page 69

So, some adult who cares about the kids stays home in most home schooling families to maintain discipline. Is this evidence we should pay attention to?  I think so.  Maybe there will be more home schooling as the job market gets increasingly worse.  Parents and sudents might really start to value education again.  Public schools will become places to house the bad kids and all of the good kids will stay at home.  When I was a child few mothers worked outside of home.  Discipline was higher in schools generally and punishment was both swift and harsh.  We still had bad kids in schools but there was less tolerance of disruptive behaviors.  However, some teachers literally pounded on kids with behavioral disabilities.  We did not understand these then.  And, as I remember, corporal punishnment did not work for the 22 year old students who were still in junior high.

"Workplace learning has been rapidly expanding over the last 25 years........."  Page 71

As schools dropped a lot of the applied disciplines like shop classes, junior colleges and technical schools started to fill some of these roles.  My brother has a header and dye shop in Rockford, Il.  He complains that it is hard to find trained workers and that training a person to really be competent takes 3 years.  So, I suspect that he trains people to do individual functions.  He gives very limited benfits and blows lots of money in Casinos that he could use for employee incentives.  This would not be my way.  I have told him.  He has a lake cottage about a mile from my home that he uses on week ends.  I saw him once 2 years ago. he still owes me $100 from when O'bama got elected.  That's what family is all about, right?