Homeschooling on the rise in the US, thanks to adundance of online resources
April 7, 2008
Homeschooling Innovations and Networks
The continued growth of the number of homeschooling families has led to a proliferation of resources and networks that facilitate homeschooling. Twenty-five years ago, a family that wanted to homeschool would likely have had limited curriculum and instructional options. Today, the options are nearly boundless. A Google search on “home schooling” produces more than 13 million hits.[21] This demonstrates the wide range of instruction options and homeschooling networks that parents can access when they choose to homeschool their children.
Parents can find and purchase curriculum materials through online exchanges and other networks.[22] Hundreds of Web sites, blogs, and books are devoted to supporting parents who homeschool. In some cases, parents can access free or low-cost instructional products to teach their children. Other options include online learning services such as K12.com, which offers professionally developed courses online for relatively low monthly fees.[23] Across the United States, a growing number of for-profit tutoring providers are in operation, such as Kumon and Sylvan Learning Centers, which offer parents opportunities to provide supplementary instruction to their children.
Author: Dan Lips and Evan Feinberg, The Heritage Foundation, 3rd April 2008
Full article available here.
Entry Filed under: ICT, Learning, Pedagogy, Social Impact, Trends. Tags: Education, Homeschooling, ICT, Learning, Online Resources, Pedagogy, Social Impact, Technology, Trends.
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am2springer | April 7, 2008 at 3:20 pm
It is very interesting to learn that so many parents are opting to homeschool their child rather than send them to the local public or private school. Although I am also a parents dissatisfied with my local public school’s academic instruction, with the environment of the local school and I too have a preference to provide religious and moral instruction to my children, I have opted for private school and find it interesting that I had not considered my option of homeschooling.
The growing rate of those parents who opt to homeschool their child should be an eyeopener to the Board of Education and the National Education Association. The growth of 7%-12% per year of homeschoolers should show the “powers that be” that parents are dissatisfied with the condition of our public schools and that something should be done to fix the numerous problems - the #1 being funding to the schools and #2 teacher salaries!