by Ignoranceisbliss 21 Replies latest jw friends
From the standpoint of what a Jehovah's Witness CLAIMS to be . . .
An example
A Christian who gives a witness
Homeschooling deprives the regularly attending non-JW's of the company of "true" Christians who will model proper conduct.
Homeschooling removes the opportunities to give a witness to the student body in matters of holidays, flag salute, birthdays, etc.
ISN'T IT IRONIC?
Ignoranceisbliss: It is a program designed by a witness. She incorporates a lot of the jw.org content into the curriculum.
Not all home schooling is bad. To say it is, is just wrong. Many students that are home schooled are able to become quiet successful.
According to Brian D. Ray, Ph.D. of the National Home Education Research Institute:
The quality of the schooling depends in the education, experience and personal atttributes of the person doing the teaching. Extremely few JWs have the appropriate background.
But the "school" you describe in the OP sounds like a joke. One could not possibly create a well-rounded, academically rigorous curriculum from "jw.org content." That is just ridiculous.
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They have a much better chance at keeping their kids in the Borg if they homeschool.
Maybe it's unique, but almost everyone that I know that was home schooled by their J-dub parents are no longer J-dubs...most followed this pattern:
Baptized by 13 years old >>> Regular Aux Pioneering from 14-16 (and interviewed at the Circuit Assembly) >>> Started part-time work at 16 >>> inactive/DF'd/pregnant/smoking weed and in a band by 19.
Some of my peers were recently considering homeschooling their young children. I asked "think about everyone we knew that home schooled. Where are they today?" Needless to say, they decided not to home school.
Statistics show that home schoolers do as well or sometimes better than others in college testing, and so forth. I myself am not for home schooling, I think it puts kids at a social disadvantage, but that can have an upside too. What I didn't realize, well in this area anyway, is that if a child is home schooled, he can participate in some activities in his school district. When my daughter was in high school, there was a home schooled JW (I knew the family from back in the day when I was in) and he was in the high school band with my daughter. They were really good friends, although his mother didn't like it when she found out I was an inactive JW! Anyway, when he turned 18, he moved out and came out as gay. He is still good Facebook friends with my daughter, he has moved away, I think to get away from his mother, HA!( By the way, I never did understand how a JW could be in the school band, playing the alma mater, national athem, and holiday programs. Dont know why I never asked him that.)
I think the big problem with JW home schooling is that they would not get as rounded and as an inclusive education of all theories, science, etc, that "normal" home schooled kids would get. I am sure JW parents would exclude a lot from the curriculum, as well as promote some things that are just not correct. Can you imagine, for some JW kids, contact with school mates is the only normal interaction they have, and if that is taken away, imagine how unprepared for anything they will be.
Is there vocational programs for this JW Home School? You know, Window Washing 101 and Advanced Janitorial Services.
They should have standards for the parents. School made the big difference in my life and it was a notoriously bad school. It is now ranked fourth from the bottom in the entire state of New Jersey. The state took over the school district. When I saw the headlines in the New York Times, I did a victory dance. Also, the movers and shakers for my generation could all be visited in the federal penn. My parents were very bright but the Witnesses left them with an elementary school education. I am strong in the Humanities b/c I could self teach. Math and science were different. Parents can only know one or two subject areas.
The academics may be the easiest part. I could enter the Foreign Service with what I learned navigating between classes. There were several distinct cultures in the school. If my mom would work at a commutation schedule, I could have attended Brearly on scholarship. Maybe I would have hated the rich girls but the education would be first rate. Home schooling is incestuous. There may be occasional instances where it is wise. A lawsuit works better for bullies than home schooling.
I noticed on the infographic that most of the sources they quote are not exactly independent.
Look, other home schoolers say that homeschooling is the best and here are some right wingers who don't like public schooling.
I doubt that the real data is anything like that one sided.
If you live where the public schools are good, the kid does well. If responsible parents can provide education at home, the kid does well. The problems crop up when the lazy, hypocritical jw parents are homeschooling for the wrong reasons - for example, a family we know has a mom who only wants to procreate, not actually do everything children need. She constantly ridicules public schooling and encourages her children to make fun of my granddaughter, who enjoys going to public school and is continuing to earn good grades. She doesn't want to have to get up early and go through everything that it takes to have kids in school. But her children have BEGGED to be allowed to go. My granddaughter was told she would only be allowed to go to public school through the 8th grade, and after that, mandatory homeschool like her step-sibs.
Thankfully her mother was able to regain custody and grandkid is doing wonderfully well in 9th grade. She's in jazz band playing upright bass. She's in French language class which she is enjoying. Also taking drama and art, making props and learning stage makeup and lots more stage craft. She has made lots of friends, and they are all ambitious, studious kids who enjoy school so much and they have tons of fun together.
She often remarks that she can't believe the contrast between her present life and the dark misery she left behind in her father's jw cult household. She has told us many instances over the years of the stepmother printing off workpages and handing them out to the kids and that's supposed to be their schooling for the day. They were never up out of bed when my granddaughter left the house to meet the bus. Sometimes she'd come home and they were all still in pj's with their bed hair sticking up, all sitting at the table having their family bible study. Her father would order her to join the study, and homework due the next day didn't matter. She would stay up all hours doing homework, because it wasn't allowed to intrude upon the family activities! Grandkid said "It's so great not to have to half-ass my homework!"
The state allows homeschool parents to do testing at home and send in the results. A joke. Published statistics may insist that homeschoolers can assimilate in the workplace with no problem, but the jw homeschoolers we have met personally are awkward, unsure, tentative, dependent on their parents on after their teen years, without a clue which direction to turn to support themselves. They try this, they try that - a career or permanent type of business that they can sustain never shows up. They live in their parents' basements, often with spouses they've acquired and the offspring that result. It is a horrible mess.
My granddaughter met a family who made the decision to withdraw their elementary age kids and switch to homeschool. They confided in her that they absolutely HATED homeschooling and missed going to public school very much.
I'm one who was not allowed to go to school, i never even got to finish the 6th grade. I have always had difficulties trying to fit in with people my age - they always think i'm weird. I see the old people in my area who went to school together and have been friends since high school or elementary school, lifelong friends. They recognize the traits of their generation, they see themselves in each other. Homeschool for the most part can't provide that, in my opinion and personal experience.
