Home schooling is one of those terms, like responsible drinking or marital fidelity, which doesn’t necessarily mean exactly the same thing to all people. If you just look at the literal meaning, I can see circumstances where it might be warranted. If the parents are some sort of experts in
The Santorums
child psychology and pedagogy, if the child has special needs or if the family’s residence is north of the arctic circle or on a desert island, for instance. Or, I suppose, if the parents are rich and can afford private tutors and don’t trust the public schools which, admittedly, can be pretty dicey at times. Filled with riff-raff, you know.
I’m not saying it should be illegal. But, I do question the judgement of parents who opt for it. It’s not just the classroom education that they are opting out of. It’s the interactions in the hallways and on the playgrounds, the lessons you learn about how to get along in society (when Robert Fulghum wrote “All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten” he was not talking about the day they learned the alphabet song or how to cut with scissors.)
Home schooled children may grow up well educated, in a book sense. But they run a strong risk of being socially retarded.
This is especially true today in the USA, where it seems the majority of home schooled children are home schooled because their parents are conservative/religious fanatics who don’t want their children exposed to liberal ideas, i.e. the real world. Michele Bachmann’s kids. Rick Santorum’s kids. Santorum has pledged that he will continue home schooling his kids in the White House, as if that’s a selling point.
But, there’s a particularly interesting twist to the Santorum home schooling story. He got $73,000 from the state of Pennsylvania for home schooling his kids. So, it’s not like he’s reducing the tax burden or anything like that.
Anyway, I’d like to hear from Santorum’s kids. At least any of them who are over 18. To see how educated they sound.
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