Pros And Cons Of Homeschooling Essay

Homeschooling is a good alternative to traditional public schooling for some families. Homeschooling was the way many people were educated in America up until the early 1900’s when compulsory attendance laws were enacted in all fifty states (Jones & Gloeckner, 2004, p. 13). At least four presidents and a number of other prominent people received some or all of their education at home. (Jones & Gloeckner, 2004, p. 13). Once the compulsory laws were enacted, many states ruled that homeschooling was illegal (Jones & Gloeckner, 2004, p. 13). In the 1960’s and 1970’s, a movement was begun by families to educate their children at home by people concerned about the direction public education was going. Authors such as John Holt played a big role in this by calling into question the way public schools teach (Jones & Gloeckner, 2004, p. 13).
In the 1970’s there were perhaps 13,000 homeschooled students (Cogan, 2010 p. 19) Thirty plus years later estimates are that there were about 1,508,000 homeschooled students in 2007 (Cogan, 2010, p. 19). Homeschooling which was once a fringe
It offers smaller class sizes and the ability to tailor the curriculum to the individual student. For students who are either above or below grade level this is a great advantage, because it allows them to work at their own pace. For students with ADHD and other learning disabilities, homeschooling can offer more one on one instruction with less distractions than there are in a larger classroom setting. Homeschooling generally takes less time per day than attending a public school as the student does not need to ride the bus to school, wait to use the bathroom and line up to go to lunch. Also, since students can work at their own pace (instead of everybody having the exact same amount of time for math and other subjects), students can spend less time on the subjects that they do well and more time on the subjects they struggle