Homeschooling: A Parents Guide to Teaching Children

by Samuel L. Blumenfeld

Explains the advantages and disadvantages of homeschooling, and provides advice on setting up a curriculum, getting the child involved with the community, and dealing with the special learning needs of some children

Genres: Education, Nonfiction

215 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 1999

Reviews

[CybercrrEDU · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was going to try to read this based on some of the chapters names, thought it might be a good read. Until... I saw one in particular and had to read it first out of order... I Dnf'd this shit. It is awful... It's hot ableist garbage... Who the f### labels a chapter can homeschooling cure ADD? And the "everyone can be a little ADD" yikes ... this didn't age well at all. And school wasn't THAT bad in the 90's. That sounded like hot propaganda garbage to me... Biased.
Garbage...
People back then were morons. I'm sure people will say that about us in 10 years time too. To be fair. But... The rise in ADD diagnosis's was due to our better understanding of psychology and physiology, it feels like the modern day equivalent of "everyone is a little autistic" or the over diagnosis claims. I'm so tired of those. I've heard them my whole life... As science progresses we gain better understanding, it's only reasonable to find misdiagnosing or to be able to achieve better diagnostics.
Hot garbage. I doubt this is worth reading for any of the other chapters.
If I sound harsh it's because we deserved to be treated better then we did. Old mindsets... I can't chastise this too much because that would be applying presentism on something... But it's certainly eye opening...

[Martha · Rating 1 out of 5]

I didn't even finish reading it (although I did flip through it) because I got so disgusted with it. As far as I could tell, these are its themes: 1. The public school system is completely incapable of teaching your children correctly (partly true); 2. My books can teach you the right way
(maybe & maybe not, but isn't it a little egotistical to write a book to advertise your other books?); 3. The public school system will ruin your child in every way possible (possible, growing more likely, but not yet a surety. The book ranted on & on about all the terrible things public schools have done to children. I don't think that's
necessary.); 4. The only way to save your child is to take them out of public school (and society, and immunizations, and dating life, and . . .) and keep them at home until they get married (I'm only exaggerating slightly here, from what was said in the book, but I think people who want their children in public school can do it, if they are concerned AND involved). On the other hand, it didn't give any real advice on how to: 1. Start homeschooling; 2. Comply with
state & local laws; 3. Find a good curriculum (it said it did, but it didn't); 4. Combat problems (other than becoming a political activist); 5. Work WITH the public school system; 6. Make your children happy.

[SoulSurvivor · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good, if somewhat dated, guidance for those wishing to break the mediocrity of government schools for their children.

[Diane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Parts of this book were informational and very interesting, and there was a lot about the positive reasons to choose homeschooling, i.e., being able to provide a high-quality, tailor made education. But there were also some radical sections where the author apparently would try to scare parents away from public schools with horror stories that are true & tragic, but in my view, NOT a good way to promote homeschooling! He also made one comment which definitely rubbed me the wrong way about homeschooling & housework: something to the effect that if there wasn't enough time to homeschool and clean the house well, it was ok, as long as the house wasn't *too* messy. Ugh! I was debating between 2 and 3 stars - but there is a very thorough, useful resource section at the end, so I'll go with 3 stars.