Pros and Cons Of Public High Schools

The trend of parents choosing to home school their children grows each and every year. There are many reasons why families choose to do this, and some of them are not the right reasons. There are many good reasons to do it, but make sure your reasons are sound. If you are not sure how you feel, or you are feeling guilty for not doing it, think about the good and the bad of public high schools in your area before you make your final choice.

Some families pull there children out of public high schools to home school them because of violence and drugs. These are two very good reasons to do it. If your children only have access to a school that is plagued with both, and you can not afford private school tuition, home schooling may be the answer for your family, as long as you understand the scope of what you are taking on. If your child is being bullied, this is also a good reason, but don't pull them out because of small adjustment problems. They need to learn to deal with peers. Without this, they are going to flounder in college and in the work force.

Another good reasons to pull your children out of public high schools is when they are having huge problems keeping their grades up when they did well in middle and elementary school. It could be that the classes are too big and they can not get the attention they need. Make sure this is the problem though, as some students have learning disabilities that show up in high school that have nothing to do with the level of education they are presented with at school. If you feel your attention will help them learn, perhaps home schooling is a good idea for your family.

There are also some bad reasons to pull your children out of public high schools. Your child may be doing just fine there, and perhaps they are excelling. If you have a very smart child, there are things they can get through the high school that you can not offer them at home. You do not want to pull them out if they are doing well just because you feel like it, which happens quite often. If they have dreams of college, and you can not teach them trig or calculus, you may want to rethink what you are about to do and why you really want to do it. Remember, even though your child may have some issue with peers and may struggle on occasion with some grades, there is more to public high schools than you may realize, especially for higher education.

There are life lessons that students learn in any high school that they will not get from home schooling. These include being on time, following a schedule, dealing with tricky person to person relationships, answering to authority, making the right choices, and learning how to say no to things that may harm them. They can learn these things through home schooling, but so many parents take a lax approach because they can, and their children miss out on these valuable life skills. Home schooling can work, but make sure you are really up to the challenge before you dive in. Education is about more than what shows up in the classroom.