Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Home Schooling

Need a reason for home schooling? Check this out and tell me we shouldn't be Home Schooling our kids.<BR> <A HREF="http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/fr/550029/posts" TARGET=_blank>http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/fr/550029/posts</A> <P><BR>Our Children are our greatist resource. I know it's an old cliche, but it's true. Why do people allow their kids to be brain-washed into socialist thinking in public schools?<BR>7mm

Hey,what did you expect. Haven`t you heard we were the bad, bad guys in WW2. Mommy at work so two SUV`s can be in the driveway is good. And a woman stupid enough to stay home and raise the kids is beneath contempt. Johnnie has two daddies and they are in the bedroom is great. I could go on but my doctor won`t let me.

Home schooling is a great way to go, IF the job gets done. I have personally seen too many cases of children being kept out of public schools and languishing at home. If it is being done to protect them from Satan, I worry about the attitude they will develop to different thoughts, as a result.<P>Over-protection is risky business, IMO.<P>There is a home-schooling poster here, who is doing a fantastic job, but of the large number of them I know, they are the exception.<P>As for the probability that 4th graders wrote the piece... NOT!<BR>art

Home schooling - now here is a topic which will lead to verbal "fights"...<P>My sister was a school teacher and ended up getting fed up with the system as a whole. She has three young children and will be homeschooling them. With her education and background I see no problem with this. As far as her kids being unable to integrate into society she has over come this by placing them in activities (ie arboretums, zoo, karate classes etc type programs) and she integrates them with other parents who have opted for home schooling. <P>If I did not have to work and had all the abilities (ie education degree) to home school I am not sure whether I would or not. For me public and private school is where I got my first reality checks on other people walking the planet with me. It is amazing what you learn and see. And how fast you yourself learn the differences in how/what your parents have been teaching you versus what the school attempts to teach you. <P>Parents who are "scared" of public schools should only be "scared" if they are not tending to their children and guiding them enough so that when they do go to school they know in their hearts and minds that the rubbish others are spewing at them is exactly that rubbish. I remind my daughter on a daily basis that they are only Teachers, nothing more than anyone else. THat she is just as faliable if not more faliable then the next person. <P>I encourage her to question her teacher when she is wrong, and that if the teacher gets off topic and starts in on personal views which have nothing to do with her learning her "3 R's" then to speak with me and we would go and confront her teacher, which I have done and will do tonight at a conference. <P>I honestly believe if I stay involved in my daughters life and give her the abilities necessary to go thru school she will come thru with a decent education and the power she needs to distinguish between fact and fiction. Does the does the school know me? Absolutely! They sigh a collective sigh of relief when they know I am not there to see them over a comment or two said by a teacher or situation which was handled poorly.<P>With regard to the web site posted about the 4th graders saying all that crap I have to agree with Art they did not write that. My daughter has never been curious about rifles, guns etc because we did not make them hidden and curiosity to her. Early on Mark took her to the range and showed her the dangers and the good uses of weapons. She also knows if she goes to someone's home if there is a weapon found she is to leave the area immediately and tell an adult. Not because the gun is dangerous but the person she is there with is. I remind her unless she has been to a gun range with them or knows that they are aware of safety procedures she has to consider them the dangerous situation, not the weapon. <P>The only way to keep children safe and teach them right from wrong etc starts at home, not at school. When people quit allowing their children to be raised by school districts and step up to the plate and do their jobs as parents should our schools and society as a whole will be much better off.<P>But I am hopping off the soap box...<P>Toons

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><HR>The only way to keep children safe and teach them right from wrong etc starts at home, not at school. When people quit allowing their children to be raised by school districts and step up to the plate and do their jobs as parents should our schools and society as a whole will be much better off.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P>Ditto!

Toons,<BR> Amen, I couldn't have said it better my self. <BR> I just received the Eddie Eagle starter package in the mail and I was wondering if anyone else here has tried to get this program started up in his or her local school. Would it be better to talk to the local sheriff's department to see if they would help teach the curriculum or just talk to the principal at the school?

Tenessee Hunter - I feel foolish but I really am unaware of what the Eddie Eagle program is....I assume it is for teaching children gun safety etc??@@? but would appreicate knowing what it is. I have found that by accessing the school districts web site you can get a background on teh staff at your childs school and based on the info you find is where I would start with on implementing a new program. <P>It is alarming the ignorance Teachers have in spewing out facts. As I told Tiff's teacher who was telling her class that more kids die from gun shots than anything else is that she needs to do her own homework before stating anything she cannot prove and listening to RosieOFatso and OprahLardButt does count as research. As I told her more children are killed from not being properly restrained in a moving vehicle than gun shot wounds...<P>Toons

I used the Eddie Eagle program several years ago when I was a cub scout leader. The boys and parents were extremely receptive to this NRA program on firearms safety. I also couldn't believe how excited some of the kids of non-hunting parents became when I brought pictures and stories of deer and pronghorn hunts I'd just completed. <P>As to home schooling -- I would agree that there are cases where children are being fed garbage by liberal teachers but if the parent is involved enough in their childrens lives they should figure out that their child is being fed this garbage and do something about it. Maybe my wife and I are lucky but most of the teachers in our small school district are gun owners and of a conservative bent themselves, between my wife ( who is a teacher in this district ) and myself we have no qualms sending our 2 kids to school everyday.

Tennessee Hunter,<P>I took the Eddie Eagle starter pack to my daughters school and presented it to the principal. I now realize it was the wrong thing to do in this case. I failed to investigate how open to it she might be <I>before</I> presenting it.<P>Know who you are dealing with. If you don't, investigate it first. Some people will absolutely and flatly refuse when they find out that the NRA sponsors the program. If the principal of your school is a "Brady" type, it would be better to present it at a PTA meeting, the whole schhol board, or the district superintendent.<P>Be prepared to answer any and all possible objections before you go. Good luck, and let us know how it goes!

Sitka, my experience with home schooling is this. Wifey and I teach a junior high Sunday school. Two of our kids were home schooled. Both very bright and well adjusted. Our Pastors wife home schools their brood, all 8 of them, and they're all very smart and socialy well adjusted. We have several others in our church, and not a mis-fit in the bunch.<P>Toons, Big Hunter just started a cyber-run home school curriculum last month. Wifey and I are both pleased so far. He was in the gifted program at our local school, and it was boring the sox off him. His grades were starting to slip, so we jumped. This is a go at your own pace deal, and so far he is enthusiasticly keeping at it.<P>4pwr and Jarhead are right. Parents should be calling the teachers and schools to acount for the crap that is substituted for an education these days. I read an article not long ago that our public schools are being deliberatly "dumbed down". The authour claimed they were trying to create a compliant working class. I don't know about that, but I do know that kids are very seldom taught to think for themselves And that, my friends, scares me way more than anthrax and hi-jacked jets. [img]images/icons/frown.gif" border="0[/img] <BR>7mm

Well guys I for one hated home-schooling but this was many years ago and is alot different now that then.. <P> I went and read that article and was it me or was there a bit of contradiction?<P>------------------------------------------<BR> <BR>.......Children need to be educated about the harm that guns can cause. If we teach this at a young age, we believe that children will be less likely to touch and play with these deadly weapons. <P><BR>Guns are way too powerful and loud. They can blow out your ear drums. People should not have guns for personal pleasure or hunting. These days we have plenty of food. There is no reason people have to hunt with guns. It is cruel to animals and it should not be a sport. Many accidents could happen with hunters and guns. <BR>------------------------------------------<P>Well the way that I see it is that if they are taught at a young age the dangers that a gun can have then it contradicts the next paragraph and says that the people don't need guns for personal pleasure or hunting.<P>Did I misss something?<BR> [img]images/icons/crazy.gif" border="0[/img]

You didn't miss anything squirrel.<P>This is a typical emotional response to the gun issue. As such it is based on emotion, not fact. That it makes no sense is a given.<P>I looks to me as if the teacher has simply taken the ideas he or she has heard time and again from the Chucky Schoomers and Diane Fienstiens of this world and filtered it through the 4th graders. Some of the ideas in the letter seem a bit advanced for the 4th grade mind. "mandatory sentencing" for one and educating gun owners in the "proper handling and storing of firearms" for another.<P>What ever happened to My Little Ponies and the stickers my girls used to collect. Have 4th graders suddenly started watching The 5 o'clock news? <P>No, this is a set-up pure and simple. This is something I would expect ex-president Clinton would read at a State Of The Union show.

I know a few people who are home schooled, it seems to be mostly the hippy type how do it "my kids will die form the cemicals in the public schools"(well there not exactly like that but not far form it). I think it is good in some situations, the teacher should have to be qualified and they rilly have to have "class" every day at home. Some people let there kids sleep till 11 and don't rilly expect their kid to have to do much. The biggest problem is letting the kids get helthy socal contact with other kids.<P>& now the topic of guns,<BR>I think that parents should teach there kids on this topic, and the schools should stay the hell out of it. This in my mine is allmost like brain washing. 4th graders are not old enuff to make there own disision on the topic (most 4th graders), I think this bcaus most havent been exposed to the Bill of Rights and why it was all writen.<P>I don't think that public schools are all anti traning camps, but they have the potenchal to be. I would have some consern if I had kids in school and would have some "beef" with any teacher who did this kind of stuff. (i don't have kids a good thing me being 16)

My boys are grown and out. Every day I give thanks that they grew up in a rural school system. The kind where the Ag teacher bumms a dip off one of the students. [img]images/icons/laugh.gif" border="0[/img] <BR>It has been said before and to echo parents just have to keep a check on what the kids are being taught.<BR>I don't have any thing either for or against home schooling as I understand there are good programs to follow out there. It is hard for one person to be good in math and english and history all at the same time and easier with several different teachers.<BR>The one thing I see missing in home schooling is team sports. Kids learn a lot that way. You could do ok while they are small with little league or Pop Warner but when they get high school age opportunities sort of fall off.<BR>BCR

We are currently working at getting Eddie Eagle into my son's school. We are going through the PTA route. One of the things that amazes me about the PTA meetings is the incredibly poor turn-out for them. Just a little effort from a small number of people can really unbalance the whole show.<P>I remember, as a kid, being stuck going to PTA meetings and the whole auditorium would be full. Same town, a long generation later and there are about 10 per meeting. <P>The school psychologist (parent of the worst behaved kid in the school) is a serious anti. She was upset the NRA would be making money off the program, unaware they make no profit from the program. The next point of resistance was the NRA itself, but was unable to come up with any other program.<P>We aren't there yet, but we are working it.<P>7mm<BR>I'm about to open a jar of worms here, so please hear me out [img]images/icons/shocked.gif" border="0[/img] <P>A friend is the business manager of a huge school district in Michigan, and he is intimately aware of the number of failures in home-schooling there. Their remediation program a couple years ago caught up to all of their other special ed classes combined in cost.<P>I have 2 formerly home-schooled nieces, both shining examples of what can be. But, I also know a number of smart, well-adjusted (superficially at least) home-schooled kids who are at least a grade behind the public school.<BR>art

Friends the answer is not in home schooling but rather than being involved in your childrens education. There are groups in all schools that have parent involvement. Join or attend these. The opposition is always there spouting off their political correct Clintonesqe bull. GET INVOLVED BE HEARD,NOT A PART OF THE HERD. If we remain silent the Clintons and Bradys will have all our kids dancing to the PETA music. Our way of life is important to this nation we need role models for our kids that not only teach truth and justice but also restraint and compassion. We need our kids to learn of our nations heros not just the new crop of robber barrons (Bill Gates and the like.) Our kids need to learn a work ethic that shows them the value of their labor, I earned my Porsche it's paid for and my kids can't touch it. But at the same time never refuse them a helping hand when one is warranted. Our schools have been hijacked by the liberals of the sixties and seventies (my generation) and it is time to take them back. Vote pro education when you can, not pro political correctness. We are after all a nation of individuals not sheep.<P>Bullwnkl.

Art and Bullwnkl, you won't get an argument from me. As stated, I've only seen good examples of home schooling, but I know there are bad too. This, as well as public schools, needs parents to be serious about their childrens education. If you're not up to teaching, than keep them in school. But if you do, pay attention to what the school is teaching. There is no substitute for parental involment.<P>As far as social skills and team sports, that's not a problem. Big Hunter is still part of the schools Cross Country Track Team, and is planing to go out for regular track in the spring. I don't know abut other places, but here, home schoolers living in the district are eligable for all scholastic sports. He and most other home schoolers are also involved with the teen and childrens programs in our church. The only problem I have is this. My senior year was the most fun year of my life, and I hate to see kids missing out. Just the same, I'll sleep better knowing he's not doing the same things I did as a senior. [img]images/icons/laugh.gif" border="0[/img] <P>Like I said, YOU THE PARENT, are responsable for your childs education. Not the school board or the teachers. If you are going to take this responabilty serious, home school. If not that, than for for the childs sake, get involved with the teachers and school board.<BR>7mm