- For people who do read this forum, my first concern is that homeschooling can hinder emotional development. I'll touch on it next, but interacting with lots of different kinds of other children and adults is, to me, a critical part of emotional development. Being able to handle interpersonal situations such as bullying (which, of course, I oppose), feeling like someone's being unfair, not understanding what the teacher is trying to tell you and having to get clarification; these are important and transferable to anything that you do in life. I'm concerned that if a child is raised and schooled like they're the center of the world (which to their parents, they are- and rightfully so!), they'll grow up thinking that they're the center of the world and that everything's hunky-dory, not realizing that many people struggle with many things. Not experiencing some degree of struggle on their own would seem to me like hindering their emotional development.
- Second is socialization. I (seriously) could be wrong here, but going to public school with black kids, brown kids, Muslim kids, Christian kids, and Jewish kids exposed me to a wide array of different cultures that you simply cannot get in a homeschool environment. Sure you can join sports teams or interest clubs, and those are great and I fully support them. But I think it's important to grow up around a lot of different kinds of people to get an appreciation that life is different depending on your point of view. Also, I think it's important for kids to interact with adults who aren't their parents and learn that adults can be wrong too.
- Third is expertise, especially at older levels. Elementary school I could definitely see, since (where I grew up) elementary classes were taught by 1 teacher who covered all the major subjects. Given the pretty high education level on these forums, most posters would probably be covered for that. But are you an expert in biology, chemistry, physics, comparative politics, history, economics, literature, music, and art? Because as the child gets older, he/she will need at least a fundamental base of knowledge in each of these subjects, and while you may be an awesome engineer, you owe it to your child to teach him/her about classic literature and world history too.
TL:DR- my issues with homeschooling are emotional development, socialization, and subject matter expertise. Please clarify/confirm my thoughts, as they are not meant to be inflammatory.
So, I was homeschooled pre-K through 12th.
1. Bullying, feeling like someone's being unfair, needing clarification on instructions-- these things all happened in my homeschool experience, too. The bullying didn't come from classmates but one of my parents (which is probably actually worse), kids always think their parents are being unfair at some point or another, and textbooks can be confusing. ;)
Re. the child being treated as the center of the universe-- You mentioned that you think of homeschooling as a conservative religious activity. This is often true. However, don't forget that conservative religious people ALSO often go out of their way to prove to their children that they are *not* the center of the universe. Infants get ignored while crying because their cries are considered manipulation. Young children get spanked for irritating their parents. My experience and observation has been that conservatively homeschooled children get the idea that they are not special and are indeed sinful and selfish and nothing without God beaten into them from a young age. Personally I feel this is even more damaging than growing up thinking the world revolves around you and then learning otherwise as an adult. But that's my bias, I freely grant.
2. Still on the conservative religious vein (which is not reflective of all homeschoolers, mind), you DO learn that there are people that are different than you, even if you only are allowed to socialize with those that are the same. You learn that through the process of deciding who is the same and who must be avoided. It's the wrong answer (avoid vs. celebrate differences), but the same lesson (people have different backgrounds and beliefs and cultures). Fortunately, when you grow up from this and go to college and start being taught to learn from differences instead of shun them, most children evolve to this kinder position (to the chagrin of their parents, and sparking "studies" about how often Christians "fall away" by going to college and books about how to not lose your faith in college, etc. lol). Some children don't change as they grow up, remaining extremists, but if the family culture at home is so strong as to hold against college and post-adolescent attempts to discover one's "true self", then I'd theorize that public school wouldn't have been a strong enough counter balance either.
Personally, as someone who plans on homeschooling her own children, my socialization concerns are less about creating diversity as they are about getting out of the house and doing real life stuff. Academics are hugely important to me, but so is being out and doing stuff alongside adults (not just kid's clubs and co-ops and whatnot). Unfortunately I was stuck at a desk in a dark room for most of my highschool years and the few social outlets I had (which were occasionally taken away as punishment for taking too long to do bookwork) were not the sort that prepared me for adult life. I experienced diversity when I was in college, but not until recently (five years after college) have I finally sort of felt like I can actually interact with others as an adult living an adult life.
3. This varies HUGELY from family to family. There are a lot of options these days, moreso than there have been in the past, with free classes/tutelage and higher education opportunities specifically targeted to homeschoolers. And then there are the families who think that higher education isn't important at best, and dangerous at worst. My own highschool education was spotty in some areas, but more due to my complete lack of interest than any possible academic lacksadaisical-ness from my parents. My mom was strong in the humanities and my dad was strong in the math and sciences, so their collective expertise was relatively well-rounded and they wanted us to go to college and prepared us for that (academically, we were better prepared than most other freshmen, I noticed, despite my spottiness in some subjects). My brother was interested and did extra math and science courses for fun. I, however, stopped doing science after 10th grade biology and barely squeaked through Algebra 2 by the time I graduated. (This was all that was required by the school district/state.) It wasn't that they were hard, I just thought they were boring, couldn't focus (I have ADD in all likelihood, but was never tested) and therefore got bad grades. Fast forward to college, and I still avoided science like the plague, grudgingly took the one math course I had to for my AAS (two year technical degree), but I didn't want to publicly fail, so I got decent to excellent grades depending on how much I liked the subject. Now, as an adult, I'm more interested in science and even read those textbooks for fun and may even go back to school in pursuit of a science degree. In some ways I feel like my homeschool experience was too regimented, too much mimicking of public school, and that didn't suit my learning style. For all those who get pulled out of public school because they're losing their curiosity and love of learning, for me, that happened at home anyway.
I am in favour of homeschooling being regulated more consistently state to state as I have witnessed some really egregious failure to educate amongst my childhood homeschool community even in a state that has decent regulations already. But there needs to be space for children whose learning style calls for looser structure, and more hands-on experiences, or whatever it is they need that the district can't or won't provide. I want to homeschool my own children partly because it's what I'm familiar with and know how to do, and partly because of lifestyle (we travel frequently). I am not afraid of jumping through hoops and regulations to make it happen, knowing that they're protecting other children's right to learn that would otherwise be at risk. Having seen the dark side of homeschooling myself, I have my own informed concerns, but feel like I know how to make a plan to account for and avoid the common pitfalls.