Advice for 16 year old homeschooler

Theoretically, a parent could home school thier child until they were 16 up to senior level of high school, then spend 16 to 18 just preparing them to pass each and every clep and dantes.

Do you think that would be as good of an idea as sending them off to community college at 16?

It sounds like i probably would have enjoyed that when I had gotten out of highschool. Well, now that I think about it I probably would have not had the attention span or patience to do that at 18.

Could a parent just use cleps and dantes as the final exam for the highschool home school classes? I mean, why not just have them start learning and earning college credit at freshman high school level studies?

I bet they would thank you later!

 

Consider Simon's Rock College

There is a very fine liberal arts college in southwestern MA. (Great Barrington). Simon's Rock is unique in that most students start after 10th grade (i.e. the age of students is 16-20)

http://www.simons-rock.edu/

They DON'T do distance education to the best of my knowledge.

 

ttt

 

To me, homeschooling is all about parents determining what is best for their children when they are younger, and bringing older children into the decision-making process when they are old enough. How old "old enough" differs from one child to another. For many children, your idea about finishing their school with CLEP and DANTES exams may work well, but as you pointed out, some may not be ready by that age, others may have more interest in going to college.

My wife and I have been homeschoolers since our oldest child (now 17) was about six or seven years old. He is now a homeschool "senior" and has been taking one college class per term at the local community college for the past several months. He will probably take the GED soon, and then to to school full time.

As to the socialization issue, I've seen what the "socialization" at public school does to many kids. I'm glad we chose to avoid that for ours. We have five children, and are often complimented on how well behaved, and well mannered (in other words, how well socialized) they are.

 

I agree. I think letting other kids the same age as your kid raise your child and develop his interests can be a bad thing. that is essentially what HS does in many cases.

If you homeschool you kid you can join a homeshcool group and also have your kid go to church youth groups.

Most larger churches have activities for pre-teen, teens, and college age people almost every day of the week. There is plenty of healthy socialization to be found there.

If you let your kid complete Cleps and dantes as part of their homeschool program you can cut down the time they spend in college on their FIRST degree. They can still go off to college, but they would be able to double major or work on 2 degrees if they have all of the freshman and softmore years of those degrees completed, then they should be out of college with their friends having completed 2 bachelors, ready to make good money and move onto a masters program later in life.

 

At the present time my daughter is not very interested in taking CLEP test. She prefers to attend the local community college taking a combination of live and DL courses. This works for us--we live less than three miles from the college. Perhaps in the future she may consider credit by examination. Since she is 16, she is ahead of the game and has plenty of time to decide.

She has stated the the diversity of ages of her college peers is a much more enriching and satisfying social experience for her than the artificial same age/peer dependent social structure of the K-12 public school system.

 

Steve,

Thank you for making this valid point. My wife and I homeschooled all five of our children and socialized them in many environments. We merely tried to avoid what we refer to as negative socialization.

My 16 year old recently graduated from Ashworths RA high school program and is enrolling this Fall in APU's BA program in Military History - a subject he is extremely passionate about. I believe his passion for history is at least partially due to his homeschooling background.

 

My reply to Steve and to Lance is simply to point out that while many kids are appropriately (and maybe exceptionally) educated at home, frequently homeschooling is the last refuge of kids who are failing miserably due to behavioral problems. They are on the verge of expulsion and so parents, who are not at all equipted to teach, elect to "homeschool" their child. In these situations this typically means the child's education stops. On a dime. They muddle through whatever amount of time required before dropping out is allowed and then the educational system just lets them go as a matter of law.

We all know that there are smart, dedicated parents who will teach their children well but my friends in the education field tell me that most kids who are being homeschooled are not really being schooled at all. I'm happy that your situations conflict with this scenario.

 

It sure does, Steve. I think I've been lurking here as far back as that comment! lol

 

Unfortunately, the scenario that you describe is all too common in all states. It also gives parents who seek homeschooling as a superior alternative to public school education a bad name. Frankly, I believe the parent who chooses to homeschool and fails to fulfill their obligations should be charged with neglect.

 

Time certainly does fly! When I made the posts in 2005, I was in a completely different administrative position at a public university (and having less fun than I am now). The 16 year-old in my post has since amassed a nice resume of work experience, served a 1 1/2 year mission for our church, earned a college degree and is getting married this month. Oh, those poor unsocialized homeschoolers!

 

Unfortunately, your friends in the education business are sadly ignorant of a significant body of research, which does not support the conclusions that your draw above. There are no studies to support the idea that children who are educated at home are any less "socialized," are academically disadvantaged or are unable to be accepted (or to perfrom well) in higher education. As someone who has been in the "education business" for over 25 years, has seen homeschool and non-homeschool performance at several colleges and unviersities, have presented at a number of homeschooling conferences and who has read the literature, I can state that, given the fact that there are over 2 million homeschoolers in the country, it may very well be that your friends' limited "situations" conflict with the data collected thus far.

By the way, there is a form of education called "unschooling," where students work on projects and problems, rather than a structured curriculum of 40 minutes of math, 40 minutes of English and other factory-inspired strategies.

Are there some homeschooled children who receive a substandard education? Certainly. Are there public-schooled children who receive a substandard education? Well, when I made the original posts, I worked in Chicago. Recent data indicates that only 7.9% of Chicago Public School 11 graders have tested ready for college and that the CPS graduation rate is 57%. When I worked for a community college in California, only 24% of incoming freshman could be placed into freshman English and only 9% into college algebra.

 

What would consitute failure to "fulfill their obligations"? Who would detemine that? Child neglect laws already exist. What should be done with public schools that spend millions in taxpayer funds and "fail to fulfill their obligations"?

 

Dr. Pina, as always, makes excellent points, and far more eloquently than I will- nice job!

Our family is nearing 2 decades in homeschooling our children. Guess what? You get a spectrum; a spectrum of parents, of teachers, of kids, and of results.

Without sounding too harsh, who cares? What's the real difference between a child who scores in the 49th and another in the 51st percentile? Nothing, except that we've normed them and can quantify their learning of specific things with a number that lines them up with other kids. Big whoop. That's a reflection of what? And you get an outlier now and again. That's a reflection of what? Nothing, but it makes a good story.

Arguments, like many being made in this thread about parent responsibility and obligation, are not based in law. There is no law that dictates academic outcome. This goes for group schools as well as home schools. IF IT WERE POSSIBLE to control academic outcome, public school graduates would all be at a minimum standard. I would also like to point out, that in a school, variability among test scores changes nothing. There is no curriculum revision based on test scores. In my home, a score of 50% would be DEVASTATING. In public school, a score of 50% means a sigh of relief and continued funding.

One final point, if I "school" my child 1 hour a day, 1 day a week, and they can score in the 50th percentile.....then is that neglect? The law (differs in each state) says your child must attend a school from age x to age x. They must do school x number of days per year, and in certain subjects. That's it. I imagine you'd never get a law passed that measures outcome, for fear that PUBLIC schools would also be accountable. And, unless I'm a mathematical idiot, there is no way to make 100% of a population measure at or above the 50th percentile!

 

Whoa, hang Anthony. You're jumping on someone who is a homeschooling advocate who has homeschooled all five of his children. A failure to fulfill obligations is taking a child out of school and failing to homeschool. Sadly, this is a situation that indeed exists as I have seen it. I do not judge a parent's choice of curriculum, but I do judge no curriculum at all.

 

Thankfully, at least one person has understood my comment.

 

Not to pile on...but when you state that most kids who are being homeschooled are not really being schooled at all...the aggregate data does not support that conclusion. Here's a link to a great infographic pointing out the aggregate success of homeschooling:

Homeschool World - News - Some Fascinating Facts About Homeschool vs Public School