My attitude is pretty much parents need to do what they wish to do. As a teacher, I would hope that I could successfully school your child and you could successfully unschool your child. I see the benefits of both. I did both with my own kids over the years.My own kids did homeschooling, public and private schooling. Each child had a different arrangement (4 kids) and all turned out pretty similar as measured by traditional measures of success. Research tends to show that most homeschooled kids do well reentering school/college. Think about swimming lessons.In group lessons, each kid get a few minutes. In private lessons, kids get undivided attention.Pretty true of home schooling,too. If the parent knows content or locates tutors etc., how can it not be good? I do believe that there is a lot of not so desirable behavior that I would love to have my kids avoid in school. But sooner or later, we all join the real world. I think this topic has been debated for years. Read Holt's(?) Teach Your Own;a classic read. I think the Taliban comparison is extreme for the average homeschooling family.Over the years, I hsve taught many returning to school homeschoolers and have found them well prepared and socially delightful.

The education system of today is producing people who are dependent on earning money from one specialized skill to pay for all the other things they need. Education should encourage self-reliance. The basic skills people need to live without dependence on others should be at the heart of this. How to grow food, cook, build a house, repair and maintain a home and its contents and the other skills necessary to be independent. This gives young people choices throughout their lives. Currently we are teaching our children the opposite of independence. Parents should take responsibility for these essential skills (and all other skills and knowledge) of independence, but they are too caught up in the hamster wheel that they inherited from their parents and so on. It is time for the parents and the teaching professionals to rebel and refuse to serve this system of indoctrination any longer. http://mikedurland-reallife.blogspot.com/

My sister in law home-schools. And I'm pretty convinced that her kids are behind. Vacations last long, days are cut short by other obligations like hair cuts and the grocery store, etc. She doesn't have the depth of background. She doesn't have the resources either. I think the kids are short-changed when mom gets bored and says-- "okay, you've worked hard, now you can watch TV."

NO WAY , NO HOW it is just to isolate the child from the world that the parents want to hide from

I am a substitute teacher in Carroll County. Teaching a child is a committment. Their future is in your hands. I have known some people who have successfully home schooled their children, and as the children's progress was supervised by the school system, it was successful for them. I have however also known two mothers who did a very poor job of home of home schooling theirs, and I even know one mother now with a third grade education herself, who is trying to homeschool hers... and is doing very poorly with them....her children are behavioral problems when visiting our church, and this was her reason for taking them out of school....constant calls to school because of their behavior, but these boys aren't even going to know anything beyond the third grade level thanks to their mom.

I am a substitute teacher in Carroll County. Teaching a child is a committment. Their future is in your hands. I have known some people who have successfully home schooled their children, and as the children's progress was supervised by the school system, it was successful for them. I have however also known two mothers who did a very poor job of home of home schooling theirs, and I even know one mother now with a third grade education herself, who is trying to homeschool hers... and is doing very poorly with them....her children are behavioral problems when visiting our church, and this was her reason for taking them out of school....constant calls to school because of their behavior, but these boys aren't even going to know anything beyond the third grade level thanks to their mom.