Homeschooling and Early Cognitive Development
John Dewey once said, “education is not preparation for life; education is life itself”.[1] In other words, the human experience is defined by our curiosity, to grow and create and innovate, to be intelligent converters of energy; we as humans will continue to learn until the day we die, for there isn’t a moment that we stop learning. Therefore, it could be said that, indeed, life isn’t about the destination, but the journey — and there are many unique paths that one can take on that journey of enlightenment. One of those paths can be homeschooling, which has historically been the primary method of education, and in some cultures, a popular, alternative option to public education.
The subject of early cognitive development is vast, however recent research has begun to explore the differences in how various educational methods effect the development of children. From socialization to academic achievement, the environment that children are nurtured in can result in drastic differences in how they later interact with the world. So how do homeschooled children differ from publicly educated children? The short answer: it’s complicated.
History of Homeschooling in the United States
Homeschooling is defined as the education of children at home by their parents; it “is a progressive movement around the country and the world, in which parents choose to educate their children at home instead of sending them to a traditional public or private school.” [2]
So where did homeschooling come from? How did it begin here in the United States? “Homeschooling has existed as one of the oldest forms of education. Early Judeo-Christian records established it as a focus within the family, and its prevalence parallels the spread of Christianity in Western society (Power, 1970). Both the Native Americans and the Puritan immigrants had utilized home education, and Rakestraw and Rakestraw (1990) noted that the earliest American education was a family-based religious effort. As the colonies grew, the Founding Fathers recognized the need for educating the masses in political and religious tenets, and the common schools were born in the 1820s (Gorder, 1990; Gutherson, 1992).[3]
Many parents objected to the transfer of educational power from family to state, and the enactment of the last compulsory attendance law in 1918 took their homeschooling efforts underground.[4] For the next 50 years, homeschooling became a heated topic of legality.
Arguably, it wasn’t until the 1970s that the homeschooling movement truly began. Authors and researchers, such as John Holt, popularized this “reformation movement” with their exposés on educational reform. “They suggested homeschooling as an alternative educational option. According to the National Home Education Research Institute, there are now more than two million children being homeschooled in the U.S., with the percentage rapidly increasing by 7 percent to 15 percent each year.” [2] In 1989, homeschooling was finally made legal in all 50 states; many foreign countries followed suit thereafter.
Types of Homeschooling
Within homeschooling itself, there are many different types of homeschooling methods to chose from. Many of these educational methods arose not long after the institution of formal education itself. Included below (although not limited to) are several options that one may chose for their child’s method of learning at home:
Charlotte Mason Method
Charlotte Mason (1842–1923) was an innovative, British educator who developed a unique approach to education. Her revolutionary methods led to a shift from utilitarian education to the education of a child upon living ideas.
Books Classical Education Method
Dorothy Sayers’ well-known essay, “The Lost Tools of Learning”, is the basis of the new classical Christian education movement.
Eclectic Homeschooling Method
An eclectic homeschooler is one who looks at the different approaches and methods of homeschooling and takes from each, forming one’s own unique philosophy.
Montessori Method
According to Dr. Maria Montessori (1870–1952), learning is a natural, self-directed process which follows certain fundamental laws of nature.
Traditional or School-at-Home Method
Traditional homeschools are conducted in a “public school style” setting with a complete curriculum, traditional grading system, and record keeping.
Unit Studies Approach
The Unit Studies Approach integrates all school subjects together into one theme or topic.
Unschooling or Natural Learning Method
Unschooling or Natural Learning is a philosophy of child-led learning.
Waldorf Education Method
Waldorf education is based on the spiritual-scientific research of the Austrian scientist and thinker Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925). According to his philosophy, man is a threefold being of spirit, soul, and body whose capacities unfold in three developmental stages.[5]
Reasons For Choosing to Homeschool
Choosing whether to homeschool one’s child or not can be a very important decision. After all, one is setting the course for the entirety of a child’s developmental future.
There are many reasons why (or why not) a parent may choose to homeschool. Of those reasons in favor of homeschooling, some circumstances may include the need for more time together as a family, religious obligations/freedoms, and/or the ability to tailor their child’s education specifically to them. For example, “that was the case for Laura Clark, a Baltimore mother who currently homeschools her two elementary school-aged sons (a third son was homeschooled until he reached high school). Clark’s oldest son started out in a traditional kindergarten, but she decided to try homeschooling when he entered first grade. Homeschooling allowed her son to move forward in math at his natural pace — which tended to be speedier than the pace he would have found in a traditional classroom. But Clark says that the pacing of education was only part of her decision to homeschool. She also liked the ‘flexibility of it; having more family time, the flexibility of choosing the direction of education.’”[6]
Pros and Cons of Homeschooling
With standardized schooling, there is a relatively standardized result one may have some measure of assurance in. However, with homeschooling, a child’s experience is heavily dependent upon one’s family: if one has a healthy home life, one will generally have a great homeschooling experience; if one has a unhealthy home life, one will generally have a bad homeschooling experience. Homeschooling itself can neither be “bad” nor “good”. It is simply a method that is completely dependent upon the nature of the situation it’s being applied to; then, and only then, can it be determined whether the decision to homeschool is within the boundaries of good reason or not. However, there are many valid concerns with homeschooling that are often raised in its discussion: Would the child be lacking in his/her socialization with their peers, as well as their physical education/team playing skills? How much education does the parent(s) need to have to effectively homeschool a child? What are the legal requirements that pertain to homeschooling?
Socialization
“Hegener says that socialization [as well as physical education], though ‘such a common concern’ for those outside the homeschool community, is largely a non-issue for most homeschoolers, many of whom refer to it in jest as the ‘S-word.’ For homeschoolers, church meetings, athletic teams, book clubs, volunteer activities — even trips to the grocery store — can provide children with natural opportunities to interact with other kids and adults. ‘The world is a pretty social place. … It’s hard to be antisocial these days,’ says Hegener.” [6] In fact, “…Children who spend almost all their time in groups of other people their own age, shut out of society’s serious work and concerns, with almost no contact with any adults except child-watchers, are going to feel that what “all the other kids” are doing is the right, the best, the only thing to do.”[7] In other words, the more time a child spends around adults, rather than fellow children their age, the better it is for their social and intellectual development.
Rogoff et al. (1993) proposed that differences in the nature of guided participation, a process where an experienced person helps a less experienced person become competent in a particular practice, occur in different cultures. They made contrasts between two general types of cultures: Cultures where, beginning in the preschool years, children are often segregated from adults and receive much of their culturally important information and instruction outside of the context of skilled activity (that is, in school), and cultures where children are in close contact most of the day with adults and both observe and interact with adults while they perform culturally important activities. Because children are around adults most of the day, they can observe competent adult behavior and interact with adults while they perform the important tasks of their society. Rogoff and her colleagues reported that observation skills are more important and better developed in the traditional communities than in the middle-class communities, with children in traditional communities being better at attending to relevant adult behavior. In many ways the experiences of a (Western) home-schooler sit in between these two cultural dichotomies, where depending upon the methodology of home-schooling used, may receive the benefits of both methods of guided participation. [10]
Parental Qualification
“As for the concern that parents aren’t equipped to teach their children, Ray says that this too tends to be overblown. ‘Many adults believe they are incapable of anything other than something they were specially trained to do,’ he says. ‘[But] you don’t have to get a bachelor’s degree in homeschooling to get involved.’”[6] Elaborating upon that, “according to Holt, author of the best-selling book Teach Your Own, the most important thing parents need to homeschool their children is ‘to like them, enjoy their company, their physical presence, their energy, foolishness, and passion. They have to enjoy all their talk and questions, and enjoy equally trying to answer those questions.’ For the majority of parents who homeschool, the only prerequisite is the desire to do so, along with a dedication to the educational process.”[2]
Martin-Chang et al. (2011) sought to compare the differences in academic achievement between homeschooled children and publicly educated children. The researchers found that homeschooled children performed better than publicly educated children — even when family income and the mother’s level of educational attainment were controlled for (although, it should be noted that most participants in this study came from two-parent households). However, there was a caveat to these results. Homeschooled children were divided into two subgroups: structured and unstructured. Structured home-schoolers were defined as those who followed an instructional plan designed by the mother, where unstructured home-schoolers were defined as those that didn’t follow any instructional plan at all. Out of three groups that differed in schooling methods, structured home-schoolers where the highest of academic achievers, then those that were traditionally public-schooled, and lastly, those that had unstructured home-schooling performed the worst. [9]
Legalities of Homeschooling
Regarding the legalities and reception/criticism of homeschooling, and the freedom of individuality in one’s own education that it offers, as beneficial as that is, is its own drawback, because “children whose families are not adhering to these prescribed legal requirements are routinely ushered back into their local public school. This is not the case in many states where a single phone call to the local school district secures permission for homeschooling. These inconsistencies have caused many to decry the concept of homeschooling and its poorly regulated status in many states. For this reason many critics of homeschooling are well founded in their objections to programs that are not properly supervised by state agencies and local school districts. Situations exist where parents lack the proper education, maintain unacceptable programs, fail to provide adequate instruction, and have limited or no accountability (Hanna, 1996). In contrast, there are serious questions being raised about the child’s rights and power within the program itself and the rights of parents in crafting a curriculum that may or may not be in the child’s best interests (Waddell, 2010).”[3] However, what better expert of the child is his/her own parent(s), as opposed to the state? How much power should the state have in determining if the child’s parent(s) are fit to “be that expert”? These are all questions that have been, and continue to be, controversial issues. Because despite the findings of the aforementioned research, the purpose and strength of home-schooling is that it’s not meant to be uniform.
To summarize education as a whole, and the freedom that homeschooling may offer for one to pursue it beyond the classroom walls, John Holt said, “living is learning. It is impossible to be alive and conscious (and some would say unconscious) without constantly learning things.” [8] So if life is about learning, what better way to learn than to have the freedom to choose how one will?
[1] John Dewey, My Pedagogic Creed. (University of Chicago, 1897).
[2] Jamie Martin, “Homeschooling 101: What is Homeschooling?,” Parents. 2012. www.parents.com/kids/education/home-schooling/what-is-homeschooling/
[3] Linda G. Hanna, “Homeschooling Education: Longitudinal Study of Methods, Materials, and Curricula,” Education and Urban Society 44, no. 5 (2012): 610–631. https://doi.org/10.1177/0013124511404886.
[4] Michael S. Katz, “A History of Compulsory Education Laws,” Fastback Series, №75. Bicentennial Series, The Phi Delta Kappa Educational Foundation, (1976): 2–39. files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED119389.pdf
[5] Beverly Hernandez, “Homeschooling and its Many Faces: An Overview of Different Homeschooling Methods,” about education. Accessed 1 Oct. 2021. homeschooling.about.com/cs/homeschoolmethods/a/methods.htm.
[6] Bridget B. Sizer,“Homeschooling: An Overview,” PBS Parents. Accessed 1 Oct. 2021. www.pbs.org/parents/education/homeschooling/homeschooling-an-overview/.
[7] John Holt, “Homeschooling and Unschooling Resources.” John Holt GWS. 2013. www.johnholtgws.com/frequently-asked-questions-abo/.
[8] John C. Holt, Learning All the Time (Harvard University Press, 1989).
[9] Sandra Martin-Chang, Odette N. Gould, Reanna E. Meuse, “The Impact of Schooling on Academic Achievement: Evidence From Homeschooled and Traditionally Schooled Students,” Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science 43, no. 3 (2011): 195–202. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0022697
[10] Rogoff, Barbara, et al. “Guided Participation In Cultural Activity By Toddlers and Caregivers.” Monographs of the Society for Research in Child development, 1993. pp. i-179. https://doi.org/10.2307/1166109
