Perhaps I have been unfair. Could you lay out in a few simple sentences what you think the status of homeschooling should be?

With specifics, please.

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"Have you no decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"
-Joseph Welch

Here is ONE type of "standardized test" for home schoolers. It's a joke. Not only is it UNTIMED, it's taken AT HOME and administered by parents to "avoid stresses." They call this an "achievement test" similar to ones taken in public school. Parents also give a placement test before the real test to place them in the "proper area" so they are more likely to succeed by avoiding questions that are "way too easy" or "way to hard." You give the test, send it to the company, they score and analyze it, and then give you 'results" for a fee that are forwarded to the government.

Other problems with the home school tests as measures of achievement is that they often only cover certain subjects. So they can be teaching virtually anything in the other ones and only giving the bare minimum to the test for everything else.

I bet.

I laugh out loud.

Hewitt Homeschooling Resources

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Wikimedia Error

You can't ignore SAT and ACT results.

Well, you can, but it kind of weakens your argument.

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"Have you no decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"
-Joseph Welch

SAT's are basically worthless anyway. They don't even capture anything other than reading and math, which means that you can learn basically anything in the other subjects the parents want to brainwash their kids into learning.

As the article critiques, they only cover "factual" information, and many home school curricula miss important content and techniques in sciences not measured on the standardized tests.

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From "wikipedia." Snicker,

My articles basically addressed these problems. Thank you for providing an article that essentially reiterated several of my points thusfar. Your own article substantiates what I have already said is a problem. I appreciate your efforts, but you see, in a debate, you're not supposed to prove your opponents argument regarding standards and testing. You can if you want to.

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I would say that it is even worse for a parent to brainwash a child.

And note that no one I know has been brainwashed by the public education system, at least at my school. I know it's convenient for you to just say that the reason everyone is not some far-off libertarian like you is just brainwashed by public schooling, but it isn't logical in any way.

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"Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states...Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds."



~Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

It should be legal, but with very specific regulations as to the curriculum they must teach and parental qualifications.

Any science programme taught must use approved materials for the study of evolution. They must teach that evolution is both fact and theory and demonstrate and understand of all the sciences. Not just rote factual knowledge.

They should not be allowed to get "texts" and "materials" from organizations known to be fronts for religious fundamentalists as the primary texts. They would be forced to buy approved texts and state curriculum materials approved by a science committee.

All home schoolers must be "taught" by someone with at least a high school degree. For the teaching of science, you must pass a certification content-knowledge exam for all sciences taught at home. Any other subject would also require it.

All standardized tests would be held in a public institution, timed (like public ones are), and administered by trained proctors that are normed properly.

All parents must notify the school board and department of education of their home schooling.

All must (not voluntary, as it often is now), administer standardized tests on a variety of subjects other than math and reading designed by approved organizations that are not fronts, these reports being submitted to the State.

Ideally, random segments of a given population will be selected for review with government or school officials, such as counselors and science panels to discuss student progress and the curriculum at set times. These would be periodic investigations of quality and materials. A sample of the student's work will be required to be submitted to the State Committee in a portfolio.

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So what? They're not your damned kids! It is none of your damned business what parents choose to teach or not teach their children! Go screw up your own children!

Again, so what? Who the hell do you think you are to dictate to someone else how they must educate their children (or even that they must educate their children).

If you think these damned government indoctrination centers are so wonderful, you really need to get your head examined! But I'd settle for you checking out information from someone who taught in those centers:

John Taylor Gatto - Challenging the Myths of Modern Schooling

Bianca, You Animal, Shut Up! - John Taylor Gatto

Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden ... - Google Book Search

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A panda walks into a cafe. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air.

"Why?" asks the confused waiter, as the panda makes toward the exit. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder.

"I'm a panda," he says at the door. "Look it up."

The waiter turns to the relevant entry and, sure enough, finds an explanation.

"Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves."

You are the one complaining about the lack of standardized testing, and then dismiss the most widely accepted standardized test out of hand?


God I love Irony in the morning... smells like... irony.
Standardized testing is very limited value. Indeed, standardized testing is often considered part of the problem of a public school, with teachers "teaching to the test" instead of teaching.

So basically they should have to meet your standards.
State brainwashing?
Why is "taught" in parenthesis? Are you purposely being offensive, or are you just a tool?

Again, your assumption that when someone is homeschooled they are only taught by their parents is completely ignorant, and you are only demonstrating further that you don't know anything about how homeschooling actually works, only what you've read about how bad it is.

I don't think that kids should have to take standardized tests.
Agreed. That's how it works in Ohio, where I (usually, not at the moment) live.
I disagree. In Ohio you have the option of submitting to a standardized test (I don't actually know who proctors it), or making a portfolio of your year's work and presenting it to a certified teacher (who can not be related to you) for approval.

Sounds a bit fascist to me.

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"Have you no decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"
-Joseph Welch

Your recommendations sound very totalitarian to me:

Who decides these regulations, some bureaucrats?

Approved by whom?

Although I share your disgust at the fundamentalist mindset that brainwashes people into believing fairy tales, telling them they cannot is an infringement on their religious freedom.

I agree that someone should have completed their education before being able to competently teach others, yet certification is a joke which I have heard teachers admit.

Totalitarianism in education. I don't think so!

I homeschooled my son in a state that had the most stringent homeschool requirements at the time yet I had the freedom to teach what I felt was necessary. I used college textbooks and designed his tests and worksheets myself. My son aced his GED before his peers graduated high school. I didn't have to submit any of this to the state although I had to keep records in case the state asked. I also had to show one of the local education bureaucrats my college transcript to prove I had a Bachelor's Degree,required by the state of Tennessee for anyone to homeschool at the high school level.

I am a staunch advocate of homeschooling. It is unfortunate that many homeschool parents are ignorant religionists who don't want their children to be exposed to anything outside their narrow world view, but that is their right.

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Walter Mondale: "George Bush doesn't have the manhood to apologize." George Bush: "Well, on the manhood thing, I'll put mine up against his any time."