Homeschool-to-college brag and college entry myths debunked

My oldest child, Margaret, received word last week that she has been accepted into the University of Illinois electrical engineering program, which is one of the top engineering schools in the country. She'll be transferring directly into her junior year since she already completed her associate's degree at a junior college.

Of course, I'm proud of her because she's my daughter, and I did have a bit to do with her education. However, the news could not have come at a better time, since I was speaking at the InHome Conference this past weekend. Three of my four sessions focused on college, and there were an absurd number of questions about the negative stigma of attending a community college. I've done talks on this before, and there might be a question or two about that, but they're kind of vague and weak. This weekend's questions were off the charts in specificity and negativity. One woman asked, "I've heard that you are less likely to get into a university if you have an associate's degree, and that you should stop at like 59 credits so you don't get that associates." Okay, that's just wrong. You are actually more likely to get accepted if you have completed an associate's degree -- unless you have a 2.3 GPA or something that makes you look like a less-than-serious student. It is absurd to imply that a community college degree is the kiss of death.

Five years ago, as a 16-year-old with an associate's degree, Margaret was accepted at Illinois College, Simpson College, University of St. Frances, Bradley University, and Northern Illinois University. She ultimately decided not to go at that time because she wasn't sure that she really wanted to get a degree in English. And since she was only 16, I suggested that she take a few more classes at the community college to see if she was more passionate about another subject. She found that passion in her physics classes and realized that most of her classmates were planning to go on to universities and major in engineering. She began exploring engineering careers and realized she'd found an exciting career path.

My daughter's physics professor told her that students with at least a 3.5 have a pretty good chance of getting into U of I's engineering program. I know from my experience at ISU that students with at least a 3.0 have a good chance of getting into ISU's communication program, which is fairly competitive, since they only accept about 50% of the applicants. It varies from school to school and from one program to another within a college, but generally anyone with at least a 3.0 from a junior college should be able to get into a university somewhere. Although U of I might not accept someone into their engineering program with a 3.2, there are other universities with engineering programs where that GPA would be competitive. And it is entirely possible that a student who is not accepted as a freshman would be accepted later as a transfer when he or she has proven his or her ability to do college-level work at a community college.

It's no surprise that many parents this past weekend seemed afraid of making some terrible mistake that would doom their child for life. That's part of the parental job description, and I used to have that same fear. However, sending your child to a community college would rarely turn out to be a mistake. (I never say never.) Every child is an individual, and parents should help their child choose a college based upon many things, so many that I can't address them all in this post. In fact, that's a post for another day entirely. For today, I'm proud that Margaret will be going to U of I to get an engineering degree since it is one of the top schools in the country (some say the top), but I'm thrilled that she finally found something that she's passionate about!

Individualized instruction

Seems like I say this a lot, but it is true that as homeschoolers we can do all the things that professional educators know are best practices. A few months ago, I mentioned the science teacher who likes to take his kids out into the woods to experience nature for 20 minutes! As homeschoolers, we can do that for hours -- and we can do it every day if we want. One of the other big strengths of homeschooling is that we are able to provide individualized instruction for our children. This is something that the pros know they need to do, and they are continually trying to figure out how to deliver individual instruction to 20 or 30 kids in a classroom.

Jim Bower, a neurobiologist at the University of Texas and the CEO of the virtual world Whyville, recently explained at an educator's conference:

We tend to learn best through hands-on experiences, he explained--by trying things ourselves and taking ownership of our own learning, rather than passively receiving information from another source. But until the internet came along, we haven't had a scalable way to deliver this kind of experience to every student.

Before the internet, Bower said, the two most important developments from an educational perspective were the invention of the printing press and the creation of a university system. But both of these developments were "push" operations, he said--meaning they pushed information out to students, rather than letting students experience learning for themselves.

I agree with Bower, but after spending time teaching in three different public high schools over the past few months, I can tell you that most schools are not even close to giving kids the kind of education that is necessary and possible in the World Wide Web. Almost zero students have heard of a blog, Twitter, Squidoo, or any other Web 2.0 tools and programs. This semester I surveyed my high school seniors and learned that most of them spend very little time online, and almost 100% of that time is spent on either Facebook or MySpace.

Most schools have a single computer lab, but little time is spent in there. This is where homeschooling parents can easily give their children a better education than the public schools can. If you're reading this blog, you are already more Internet literate than a lot of public school teachers. So, don't be shy about searching the net and looking for learning opportunities for your children, and let your children look for information on subjects that interest them. If you're new to this blog, read some of the older posts about how blogging can improve kids' writing or how you can learn critical thinking skills through the Internet.

As I said, I totally agree with Bower's ideas that the Internet can be used to deliver individualized content to students, but it will not happen if kids are getting half an hour per week on a computer. Sadly, most districts don't have enough money to allow students more time online. And Bower even admits in the article, "'We haven't figured out how to leverage Web 2.0 yet' in schools." Well, while the school districts are still trying to figure that out, homeschooling parents can continue delivering the best possible education to their children.

Educate your kids and save the world with worms

Okay, I'm exaggerating about saving the world -- but maybe not too much. After nearly ten years of thinking about it, I am finally a worm farmer. We've had a compost bin for seven years, and we have compost piles all over our farm, but vermicompost is even richer than what you can make in a regular compost bin, so I finally took the plunge. Monday I attended a composting seminar, and at the end of the day I attended a session where we made our own bin and got our worms. I wrote about it on my farm blog.

I've always thought this would make a great homeschool project, and even apartment dwellers can do it. In fact, they should do it, because not only is it educational, but it will use up all of their kitchen scraps and keep them out of landfills. Worms will even eat things that you shouldn't put in a regular compost bin, like gravy and potato salad, which have too much fat in them for traditional composting. Then the vermicompost can be used to fertilize container plants, such as tomatoes and peppers grown organically in front of a sunny window or on a patio.

Now, what about saving the world? Garbage is one of the biggest problems we have facing our society -- really. When I was a reporter in the Chicago burbs, it was one of those topics that cities were always talking about. Landfills fill up, and no one wants a stinky landfill in their backyard, so municipalities are paying more for having their garbage hauled farther away. Solutions like worm bins can help our society.

But who wants a stinky worm bin in their apartment? Worms need oxygen, and as long as your bin has plenty of oxygen, it won't stink. It's an aerobic process, and if your worm bin or traditional compost bin starts to stink, it means you're heading into an anaerobic situation.

And, about saving the world -- it really isn't an exageration to say that educating your kids could save the world someday. It is entirely possible that some homeschooled kid with a worm bin could grow up to figure out a permanent and earth-friendly solution to all of our garbage problems.

InHome Conference 2009

The annual InHome Conference will be held March 5 to 7, at Pheasant Run Resort in St. Charles, IL. Registration is available on-line now.

Katherine and I will be presenting two sessions together. In Bringing Science to Life, we'll talk about many of the things we do that make life science practical. This will be geared to parents with kids of all ages, and we'll have lots of examples of how kids can learn science in the real world, whether you live in an apartment in Chicago or the middle of nowhere.

In Next Step: Community College, Katherine will talk about her first year at a community college, and I'll talk about the experiences of my other children as students at a community college, as well as my experience teaching at a community college.

Katherine and I will each be part of a panel discussion on college and homeschoolers. I'll be on the parent panel, and Katherine will be on a panel for teens. The point of these sessions is mostly to give the audience members an opportunity to ask whatever burning questions they might have about college.

I'll be presenting Preparing for College, where I talk about what your children need to know to succeed in college, from my dual-perspective as a college instuctor and a homeschool mom. I'll talk about the things that my college students are most lacking, as well as what presented challenges when my own homeschooled children started college.

If you're able to attend, please be sure to introduce yourself to us!

What homeschooling is not

Homeschooling is not simply school at home. It is the term for when parents take control of their children's education, from choosing curriculum (or not) to grading (or not). When we started homeschooling in the 80s or 90s or whenever our children started learning, the definition of homeschooling seemed obvious. However, more public schools are offering virtual schools, and some private schools and private companies are starting to offer "school at home" via computers and the Internet. Some people are mistakenly calling this homeschooling, and this topic just keeps getting hotter and hotter.

Home Education Magazine Editor Helen Hegener has a very thorough discussion of the difference -- and why it's important -- on her latest blog entry.

For the public school view on the growth of virtual schooling, you can check out this article. And for more on the benefits of virtual schools, check out this article. The funny thing about that last one is that people are actually listing some of the same benefits for virtual school as we've been listing for homeschools for decades. Even the socialization issue is addressed -- and it's not a problem. Interesting double standard!

Blogging for kids

I recently rediscovered a blog that I started when I was in graduate school. It was this particular blog entry that caused me to encourage my youngest to start her own blog, Science on the Farm. Although she doesn't post as much now as she did originally, it provided her with a great opportunity to write for publication -- in other words, she was writing for an audience, rather than just her mom or her teacher. One of my frustrations as a college instructor is conveying to students that they have to think about their audience when they are writing or speaking. They have spent their entire lives writing papers for a single person -- the teacher -- so the concept of an audience is foreign to them.

Blogs are a great way for kids to get experience writing, of course, but they also provide a way for kids to show off their photography, which is part of a well-rounded fine arts curriculum.

Starting a blog is simple, and it's free! Another benefit is that it provides something that the relatives can peruse for reassurance that your child is not illiterate. The irony is that most people over 30 are so web-illiterate that they will likely think your child is a computer genius for being able to publish a blog on the web. So, if you have particularly pushy in-laws, a blog could have multiple benefits.

Thinking vs. testing

Like most people, I love it when I find kindred spirits -- you know, those people with whom you agree. Finding this article came at a good time for me. I am down about some of my college students, so it's especially nice to find a person -- a Harvard person, no less -- who voiced many of my opinions about what schools need to be teaching and doing.

In Seven skills students desperately need, author Meris Stansbury talks about a keynote address delivered by Harvard's Tony Wagner in which he says that while schools may be successfully teaching to the test, kids are leaving schools without the survival skills that they need for the real world. Bravo! My sentiments, exactly! Wagner relates how he has visited schools where students just wait for the teacher or a star student to give them the answers -- even if a Bunsen burner is smoking!

In my student evaluations, it is not uncommon for someone to write something along these lines ... "When we ask you a question, you should just answer it. Don't ask us a question." And a few weeks ago, when I passed out an exam to my students, I told them not to get caught up in whether to say yes, no, or maybe in response to an essay question, because I would be grading them on the "why" behind the yes, no, or maybe. Several students groaned in agony. Ever since I started teaching college more than two years ago, I have noticed that students do not like to think. "Just tell us the answer!" is written all over their faces. I am constantly telling them that to succeed in college and in life, they have to think! They can't just memorize all the right answers, because usually there is not a single right answer.

One of the reasons that schools fail is because they are trying to get students to memorize a bunch of stuff that they will forget as soon as they take the test. The emphasis is on "knowing" the right answer, rather than critically thinking to figure out what one answer might be. Whether I am at home or in a classroom, I rarely give a straightforward answer to a child's or student's query, because no one should look at me as the expert on everything. Students should realize that they can figure out the answer on their own. One of the my favorite things as an unschooling mom was to hear my young children talk about how they taught themselves to do something.

When people ask me if I think that the state should have oversite of homeschooled students, I quickly respond no. Why? Because no doubt that would include testing, and then homeschooling parents would start making the same mistake that public school teachers are forced to make -- teaching to the test. Educators know that teaching to the test ultimately fails students, because it doesn't teach them to think. But it is legislators, not educators, who make the laws. They want quantitative proof that students know something. And I suppose they get proof that students know something -- but standardized tests do not prove that students can think.

Math at Christmas

Three years ago, I got this brilliant idea to make lots of cookies in November, so that in December we'd have plenty for guests. It became Katherine's job (then 12 years old) to double all of the cookie recipes (multiply fractions) and make them. When they're made, we eat half, and we put the other half in the freezer. Today, I started our Christmas baking for this year. I started with a favorite of mine -- Scottish shortbread.

To see my recipe, check my other blog.

Math field trips

My 15-year-old daughter wants to go clothes shopping, and there are a couple things she wants from a catalog. So, here's the deal ... she can only get things on sale, and she has to figure out what each one will cost:

• a jean jacket is normally $39.99, but it's 40% off
• a corduroy jacket is normally $44.99, but it's 30% off
• a pair of boots are $79.99, but they're 25% off

I've been doing this for years in the grocery store. I have my children figure out which product is cheaper, so they have to do the math to figure out the per-ounce cost. Now, you might say that many stores have this information on the shelf tag, but my children didn't know that when they were younger. :) Also, some stores complicate things by putting the per-ounce price on one item and the per-pound price on a competing product.

Grocery shopping is also a good time to teach rounding. If I'm in a store that accepts cash only, I still have my children keep track of my total. I'm not going to ask them to do the exact math for every single item, so I have them round the prices to the nearest dollar, so they can easily keep track in their heads.

The point is that math in the real world is way more interesting than worksheets. What ideas have worked for your families?

Is college worth it?

In Reconsidering the Value of College, Cathy Arnst quotes several recent studies and articles about students who are not prepared and not intelligent enough to succeed in college. The news isn't much better for the students who do succeed. After acquiring tens of thousands of dollars in student loans, they wind up in jobs that do not even require a college degree. We probably all know someone who is overqualified for a job. I know someone with a geology degree who works at Wal-Mart. I know another person with a public relations degree who tends bar and another with a journalism degree who works in a women's clothing store. The list goes on and on.

Arnst quotes a Chronicle of Higher Education article by Marty Nemko. He starts with this story:

Among my saddest moments as a career counselor is when I hear a story like this: "I wasn't a good student in high school, but I wanted to prove that I can get a college diploma. I'd be the first one in my family to do it. But it's been five years and $80,000, and I still have 45 credits to go."

Colleges are businesses, and like most businesses, they have done a great job of "selling" their product. Americans believe that a college degree is required for success as much as they believe the sun will rise tomorrow. Even parents who make six figures a year without a college degree insist that their children go to college. Nemko goes on to say:

Among high-school students who graduated in the bottom 40 percent of their classes, and whose first institutions were four-year colleges, two-thirds had not earned diplomas eight and a half years later.

These students sit in my classes every semester, and I try to tell some of them that they should not be there. They don't want to be there, and I try to let them know that it's okay to leave. They didn't enjoy high school, and they couldn't wait to graduate, and now they find themselves stuck in a world that they have never liked.

As a homeschooler, most parents hear the question, "But how will your child be able to go to college without a high school diploma?" Although many, many homeschooled kids do get accepted at top universities across the country, it's a shame that so many people measure success by whether or not a person can be accepted into a college. And if you read farther into the Nemko article, you'll see that it really is not that difficult to get accepted into a college somewhere. Nemko said that only 23% of the students who took the ACT in 2007 were ready for college-level work -- yet colleges accept them.

For almost two decades I've been saying, "Homeschooled kids have no problem getting accepted by colleges," but I should have been saying, "College is not synonymous with success." Bill Gates (Microsoft) is a college drop-out, as well as Michael Dell (Dell) and Steve Jobs (Apple). When I was a reporter in Kane County, IL, I interviewed the Man of the Year about ten years ago, and he had been kicked out of high school about 20 years earlier. He went on to start working in construction and to start his own construction company, and before he was 40, he was successful both financially and socially. He was a well-respected member of the community because he was a fair and honest business owner, and he had completed many construction projects in the county that were well done and less expensive than his competitors. Such stories are not all that unusual.

If people sat down and started making a list of people they know with college degrees and those without, they'd see that the college degree does not equate success. I used to know a mortgage lender who complained to me one day that she couldn't get a loan approved for a physician because he handled his money so badly -- $350,000 a year. But most people don't think. They just follow the script: go to school, get good grades, go to college, become a success. There just isn't a recipe for success that is so simple.

Since my children are all in college now, I probably won't be hearing the "what about college" question very often, but if I do, I think I'll be less defensive about their ability to get into college and simply tell them that my goal in homeschooling my children was not necessarily to get them into college. My goal was for them to find a passion for learning and to follow their passion, regardless of whether that led them to a college or a cosmetology school or a job in retail.

Time for recess!

If the state of Illinois is to be taken seriously, physical development and health are a required part of our curriculum, so here's my two cents on that subject this fall. A friend sent me a link to this article about the importance of Vitamin D. I first read about Vitamin D about four years ago when I thought I might have fibromyalgia. At that time, I learned that many people who are deficient in Vitamin D will exhibit many of the symptoms of fibromyalgia. It was winter, which meant not enough sun in Illinois to get enough sunshine for proper Vitamin D synthesis, so I started taking a D supplement, and most of my symptoms disappeared. Since then, I've been spending more time outside in the summer and not using sunscreen unless I know I'll be out long enough to get burned.

So, other than educating our children about Vitamin D, what does this have to do with homeschooling? Quite simply, we need to make sure our kids get enough sunshine. As I read several years ago, the RDA for D supplementation was established more than half a century ago when people spent lots of time outside, and it was only established at a level to avoid rickets. As this new article points out, D-deficiency has now been linked to many diseases including several types of cancer. D is not present in any great amount in foods, which is why milk is fortified with D, although it is fortified at a level that scientists now know is not nearly enough. Vitamin D deficiency is becoming a real problem. Here are a few reasons why:

“The tendencies of people to live in cities where tall buildings block adequate sunlight from reaching the ground, to spend most of their time indoors, to use synthetic sunscreens that block ultraviolet rays, and to live in geographical regions of the world that do not receive adequate sunlight all contribute to the inability of the skin to biosynthesize sufficient amounts of vitamin D.”

To get enough Vitamin D, we need to spend time outside with our skin exposed to the sun, or take supplements -- 2,000 IU, according to the UC researcher, which is 10 times what the US government still says we need. Of course, when it comes to the sun, we need balance. With the current awareness of skin cancer risks, many people avoid the sun at all costs. I understand this, since my husband is a skin cancer survivor, but moderation is the key. I've read quotes from some dermatologists who get very angry about people "baking" in the sun. In another article, I read that you only need about 15 minutes of daily exposure on your face and arms to get enough D, so that's a far cry from baking or broiling or burning.

So, not only is physical education an important part of your child's overall education, but getting exercise outside in the sun is important for good health as well.

Making gifts

Just found this great blog post by another homeschooler who talked about making gifts for the holidays. We had already decided to do this, mostly knitting socks and hats for family members, but this post has a long list of gifts you can make this holiday season.

Of course, art is an important part of any education, and the thing I loved about homeschooling is that I was never overrun with toilet-paper-tube Christmas trees and other garbage-art from public school art classes. When homeschooling, you can provide the one-on-one attention needed to teach your children useful arts, such as knitting, crocheting, quilting, spinning, sewing, painting, photography, etc. Art is not gluing the teacher's cut-out Christmas tree onto a toilet-paper tube that you have painted green. It is about creating your own beautiful work. In fact, my daughters have both gone far beyond me in their spinning and needlework skills. I only know how to knit fairly simple designs, but both of my daughters have taught themselves to crochet, and they even create their own designs, including mittens, socks, and hats, which are all items I've never created.

Are any of you going to make holiday gifts this year?

The TV choice

Television is one of those things that causes a great debate among unschoolers. While some don't even own a television, others believe that there is no such thing as too much television. They completely trust that their children will watch whatever they need and that restricting television causes children to binge-watch whenever they get a chance. I've sometimes found myself to be the only moderate in the midst of such a debate, but today I found this blog, and the author sounds a lot like myself. He grew up a total addict but now tries to foster a more moderate viewing philosophy.

I've heard some parents say that they tried unschooling, but it didn't work for them because all their children did was watch cartoons all day. While some unschoolers would give an unqualified thumbs up to that practice, I would ask a few questions and suggest that they not throw out the baby (unschooling) with the bathwater (TV).

First, exactly how many hours are we talking about? Some parents might mean all afternoon when they say "all the time," while others might mean every waking hour. All afternoon is less troubling than every waking hour.

Second, what type of activities does the child have available other than television? Many kids today do not have a lot of options if they live in the city if their parents believe that unschooling means a total hands-off approach. They need parents to take them places, such as the library, museums, and parks. One woman asked if it was okay that her four-year-old son watched the same violent video game over and over again. After a bit of discussion, I learned that the family only owned that one video game. The child had no other options for video games. Still, I would not want a child that age to play any video game for an extended period of time, because they should be outside running around, getting exercise, and breathing fresh air.

There is all kinds of research available on the problems with watching too much television, such as obesity and lower academic performance. Television, like many things, is okay in moderation, but a steady diet of TV, like a steady diet of potato chips and candy, is not good for you. On the blog mentioned earlier, the author talks about his family's viewing habits. I personally don't watch any television, but I do watch a movie on DVD once a week. We don't have cable or a dish, but we subscribe to Netflix, which means the family doesn't watch more than three or four movies a week. Some members of my family do watch a couple of TV shows every week through the Internet.

I don't think that television is inherently bad. Indeed, I think there are great ways it can be used. Three years ago, my youngest child and I spent autumn watching all of the PBS House shows -- Frontier House, 1900 House, Colonial House, Manor House, etc. They're reality shows where people go back in time to live like people in a particular era, and it was the most fun history lesson imaginable. We learned so much and were very entertained in the process. It caused us to talk about how we would respond to living in such conditions, and ultimately we decided that although the clothing was pretty cool, we really like having toilet paper and indoor plumbing!

Learning to write; Preparing for college

This little statistic came as no surprise to me. In Colleges spend billions to prep freshman, the author states,

... one-third of American college students have to enroll in remedial classes. The bill to colleges and taxpayers for trying to bring them up to speed on material they were supposed to learn in high school comes to between $2.3 billion and $2.9 billion annually.

If you doubt this statistic, just check the schedule of available classes at community colleges. There are dozens of remedial classes taught every semester in math and English. I know high schools are not preparing students for college because I have students in my college classes every semester who cannot write a complete sentence. This article tells the unfortunate -- but not uncommon -- story of one young lady:

Christina Jeronimo was an "A" student in high school English, but was placed in a remedial course when she arrived at Long Beach Community College in California. The course was valuable in some ways but frustrating and time-consuming. Now in her third year of community college, she'd hoped to transfer to UCLA by now.

Like many college students, she wishes she'd been worked a little harder in high school.

"There's a gap," said Jeronimo, who hopes to study psychology. "The demands of the high school teachers aren't as great as the demands for college. Sometimes they just baby us."

I have had students who were shocked to receive an F on their first paper, because they were A students in high school. Sometimes, they were even in the honors program. These are smart kids, but they were stuck in a system that had unqualified teachers working in an archaic system. When it comes to writing, no one is going to learn to write unless they read and write a lot! They do not learn to write by diagramming sentences or labeling nouns and verbs -- but it is so much easier to grade worksheets instead of essays.

A teacher in a class of 30-40 students (times five classes a day) does not have the time to provide feedback on the amount of writing that most kids need to do in order to become proficient writers. It really does not matter what kind of writing they do -- they can write movie reviews, letters to Grandma, or short stories about their favorite subject. (My youngest has written dozens of stories about horses.) The point is that kids have to write!

And they have to read, so they can see good writing. If they want to read Harry Potter 15 times, that's great! So-called "reading books" are one of the things I blame for so many kids hating reading. As every agent and editor in NYC will tell you -- publishing is a very subjective business. Most best sellers are rejected dozens of times before an agent agrees to represent a book, and then it is usually rejected even more before a publisher buys it. That's because not everyone loves even the most popular books. Between my three children, the only thing that all of them like is Harry Potter. Otherwise, they can't even agree on a genre. My oldest loves fiction; my middle child likes non-fiction books about movies; my youngest reads fiction and non-fiction, as long as the subject is animals.

All of them became competent writers with almost no help from me. They wrote things that interested them and excited them. I never told them to write anything, and yet they wrote prolifically. They wrote fan fiction, forum posts, short stories, and novels. They wrote because they loved the subjects, and they wanted to share their thoughts with other people. Just like playing the piano or shooting hoops, the more you do it, the better you get!

Need for science education

As I've written before, homeschoolers are in a perfect position to provide the best science education for their children, because we can take our kids out into the field and do things with them that make science fun and interesting! My daughter who blogs at Science on the Farm is taking her first college science class this semester, and she already said that she can see why most students say they "hate" science. There is a lot of memorization, and without the practical background, it seems pointless and boring. Here's a quote that pretty much sums up a great article on the need for better science education. (STEM is an achronym for science, technology, engineering, and math.)

"What is most dramatic about this survey is the extent to which the Fortune [1000] executives speak with one unequivocal voice on these issues," said Attila Molnar, president and CEO of Bayer Corp. "Almost without exception, they overwhelmingly recognize this country's great need to tap the potential of the entire STEM talent pool, and the importance of doing so at every point on the development continuum--beginning in elementary school with high-quality, hands-on, inquiry-based science education, through college where STEM talent is refined and recruited, and then into the workplace where it must be further nurtured and encouraged."

Yes -- hands-on, inquiry-based science education -- not memorizing anatomy charts and periodic table of the elements. The people in education know what we need, and the executives in businesses know what they need, but the current educational system is not equipped to provide it.

And I especially liked one of the comments posted by a reader:

Teaching "what" to think (STEM content) is insufficient; they also need to learn "how" to think. Too many of our best minds are crammed full of content but don't know how to make the most of the knowledge. We need to push critical thinking, creative thinking, and systems thinking in the curricula even before the STEM (or any other technical field, for that matter) content. It's like having a huge database but no program.

Again, kids need to be out in the field, getting dirty, doing stuff, rather than sitting in a classroom memorizing a bunch of stuff. Even if you live in an apartment without a yard, you can grow plants, keep an aquarium, or have a couple of pet mice. And you can head out to nature preserves, the zoo, and museums. Most good science teachers would do this if only they could, because they know this is how kids learn science. But alas the schools can't afford field trips every week for their students.

Research on learning

Here is a bit of interesting research.

ScienceDaily (2008-09-27) -- Eight-year-old children have a radically different learning strategy from twelve-year-olds. Eight-year-olds learn primarily from positive feedback, whereas negative feedback scarcely causes any alarm bells to ring. Twelve-year-olds are better able to process negative feedback, and use it to learn from their mistakes. The switch in learning strategy can be seen in the brain areas responsible for cognitive control.

For the whole story, click here.

What do teachers know that parents don't know?

Here is a blog written by a first-year teacher in New York City with 42 fifth graders in a single class!

In 1985, I started grad school at Brown University to earn a master of arts in teaching high school English. I quit at the end of the fall semester. Although I loved everything I learned in the classes at Brown, my time in a Rhode Island public high school was less than positive. In fact, it was my first step towards homeschooling, even though I was not even married at the time. When people tell me they can't homeschool because they don't know how to teach their child, I tell them that a degree in education doesn't teach you to teach -- it teaches you crowd control. It was the hardest thing I had to do in student teaching, and it remains the most challenging part of teaching for most teachers. It is probably the biggest reason that children need to spend an hour on a topic that they could easily learn in five or ten minutes.

And if you think this teacher's experience is unusual, just read the comments. Most of them are from teachers who tell her that they've had similar experiences.

Elementary math

I'm in the mood for Monopoly. You know the game ... Park Place and Boardwalk, pass go and collect $200. We're big Monopoly fans here. It's one of the many ways my children learned math when they were little: counting money, adding, subtracting, buying, selling, and budgeting. Although my children grew up with the traditional Monopoly, today we own four different Monopoly sets: the original, the Lord of the Rings Trilogy Edition, the Star Wars edition, and Gardenopoly, where you go to "weeding" instead of jail, and you get to grow all sorts of plants and build greenhouses. There is also a Farmopoly, which I am tempted to buy, but seriously, how many different Monopoly games does one family need?

My point today is brief ... if you have an elementary aged child, skip the math worksheets and buy a few Monopoly games. It will be way more fun for you and your child, and he or she will learn math in the "real" world.

The real thing

My college students are in the midst of a critical thinking exercise. They are supposed to visit three Web sites and decide whether or not they are credible.

• DHMO.org
• Male Pregnancy
• Skunk Law

Being the eternal optimist, in every class and in every semester, I eagerly await their posts on the discussion board online. And every year I am frustrated and disappointed. I've been sitting at my computer this morning, reading their responses and thinking about how I'm going to respond. And in so many cases, I find myself saying, "You're not in high school anymore." For so many of them, the goal is not learning -- the goal is a grade. Some have a goal of A, and some have a goal of C or even D. In this critical thinking exercise, most of them are just throwing an answer against the Cyberwall to see what sticks.

I've told them that obviously, we know men can't get pregnant, but I want them to look at the site like an alien. If you don't know men can't get pregnant, how would you determine that this site is a fake? I do this because when they choose a speech topic, they will be entering a foreign world where they don't know what is or is not possible. There will be thousands of sources out there from which to choose. Some will be good; some will be biased; some will be wrong. They need to have critical thinking skills to determine whether a site is credible or not. Every semester I have students lose points on their speeches because they use sites that are not credible. So many of them scoff at my warning and saying, "Well, it's just common sense." Here are a couple of the responses:

I just can't bring myself to believe this. Although it does have newspaper articles and other credible sources, I just can't believe it.

The site is not credible because the live vital signs only show results and no proof that a man is actually hooked up to the machines.

Students #1 is a perfect example of someone who will probably use sources that are not credible. She's in a hurry and didn't take the time to actually click on those links to see if they really do lead to the "credible" sources that she trusts.

Student #2 is thinking skeptically, not critically. How could any website prove what he is suggesting? If it were following a woman's pregnancy, how could they prove that it's real?

This is actually an easy site to debunk. If you click on any of the links, you see that they do not go to stories about the pregnant man; the links just go to the home page of those sites. Also, there is no physical address or phone number for the medical center. You can't even figure out what state it's in. If students only took the time to google "pregnant man" or "Dwayne Medical Center," they'd find other sites that say it is not credible. But most students don't think about double-checking their sources.

The DHMO site is a perfect example of how someone can make something look really bad. Everything on that site is absolutely true. But it is a perfect example of bias. So many students think that biased = wrong. Although DHMO does all of those horrible things, it is also absolutely essential for life. As they say in advertising, the truth is irrelevant -- what's imortant is what people believe! Don't be too quick to say that no one would really make something good sound so bad. The government has done exactly that with raw milk. While raw milk has many health benefits, the government has banned it or severely restricted it in many states because big business has convinced them it is just as dangerous as DHMO. By the way, DHMO is water, and as a result of this site, some people have tried to have it banned -- until they learned that it is water.

The skunk site is credible, and a few students pointed out some good things about it, so today I'll be ending that discussion, and I'll add another one: The Lovenstein Institute. That website was created as a result of a hoax email sent out in 2001 saying that Bush had the lowest IQ of any president ever to be elected, according to the Lovenstein Institute. Today, they throw all sorts of interesting stuff up there and mix it with legitimate news, which makes it a little harder to decipher. Since no one has offered any good answers to the DHMO or male pregnancy discussions, I'll leave those up and ask students to continue responding.

This is what I'll be telling my students ... This is the real world. If you're a doctor, you have to diagnose your patients' illness or condition. If you're a lawyer, you have to figure out the best strategy for defending your client. If you're a physical therapist, you have to figure out the best treatment for your patient. If you're a teacher, you have to figure out what works and what doesn't work with your students. If you're an advertising executive, you have to figure out what will sell your products. You can't just throw something out there and wait for someone else to give you the "right" answer. In real life, no one knows the right answer most of the time. You have to use your education and training and critical thinking skills to figure out the best answer. If you choose the wrong answer, your patient might die, your client might go to jail, your students might not learn, your company might go bankrupt. That's the real world. You don't get grades in the real world. You have to think and make decisions, and if you're wrong, the consequences can be much worse than an F.

Science in the real world

When homeschoolers see me speak or first encounter something I've read, they might assume that I'm a science or math professional. Nothing could be further from the truth. However, I write and speak about math and science a lot more than writing -- I am a writer -- because I had such a hard time with math and science in school. Although my science grades were more consistent than math -- math fluctuated from As to Ds, while I almost always had Bs in science -- I struggled to earn those Bs. Teaching science in the classroom is as bad as trying to teach writing through sentence diagramming. Kids can't learn science without living science. My youngest has a blog where she writes about Science on the Farm. While most people don't have a 32-acre classroom in their backyard, they do have plenty of places to study science:

• Even a small backyard has plenty of opportunitites to study science. Get a bird feeder and a bird guide for your state and start checking off your visitors.
• Ask your child to help you decide which plants to put in your flower gardens. Does it need shade or sun? How many hours of sun does each area of your yard get in a typical summer day? How much water does the plant need? What type of soil?
  
• Natural areas, such as parks and recreational areas have lots of plants and animals.
• An aquarium is an ecosystem unto itself and provides great opportunities for kids to learn about aquatic animals and plants.
• Zoos have programs for kids, such as the Junior Zookeeper program at the zoo in Bloomington, IL.

These are just a few ideas. The most important thing for parents to know is that science is one of the easiest things for kids to learn without textbooks. And having a strong foundation of practical science can make it easier for kids when they go into the college science classroom. When they start seeing all of those scientific names, they have a framework to make it all fit, rather than just trying to memorize a bunch of meaningless facts and names.

What surprises a lot of homeschoolers is that most public school teachers would be doing what we do if they were allowed to do it. Here's a post by a public school teacher in Alaska. He talks about what a positive experience it was to take his students into the woods for 20 minutes. We can take our kids into the great outdoors for hours. But it's a big deal for a public school teacher to do something like this for 20 minutes, because it takes away from the time they need to spend teaching kids what they need to know to pass the standardized tests.