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High School Home School,some questions??
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Question:
How do parents and others handle secondary-level (high school) education at
home? I can see where some subjects can be rather easily accommodated in
the home environment (math, some of the social sciences, humanities), but
how do home-schoolers undertake to purchase the expensive equipment needed
to appropriate instruction in the 'hard sciences' (chemistry, biology,
physics, organic chem)? Do the public schools make their labs available to
home schoolers?
Answer:
- Depends on where you are. There are video programs for most upper level
courses. In our area, community colleges have programs for home schoolers. In
some cases, co-ops are formed, where parents with expertise will agree to teach
each other's kids in small groups. For the most part, public schools do not
allow home schoolers to participate part time. But many private schools will,
so that is another option.
Where there's a will, there's a way...
- This answer is somewhat theoretical, since my
kid is only 4, but... Do you have a community
college nearby? Colleges have the labs and
the equipment. You'd have to pay, but then,
you'd have to pay either way (equipment, or
class).
- Public Schools assist home educators? I will not paint with a large
brush, but if they do, it is a rare PS district.
Check with your local Private and Parochial High Schools and see what
they do for the 'hard sciences' as you put it. You might be surprised to
find that they don't have the expensive equipment "needed" either (does
that make their teaching inappropriate?). Labs are not a requirement
to teach the 'hard sciences' but they can demonstrate the principles taught.
Here are some of the things we did:
Edmund Scientific (among others) has lots of reasonably priced teaching
aids for all the sciences (and some that not even the PS districts could
afford ), and there is always the used bargains if you search for
them.
Know a scientist or engineer? Usually they have a room or garage area
full of their "hobby" equipment. Would they like to impart their
knowledge to a bright, respectful young person? You never know until
you ask!
Most Community Colleges will accept a bright 15 or 16 yo in their
science classes (ours does), and their labs are usually better equipped.
- I am teaching my 14 yo from the American School. They did Joyce Swann's 10
(all or most, I am not sure) of Practical Homeschooling's fame. They are
wonderful, offer an inexpensive curriculum (980 for 4 years, 930 if you pay
up front) and a diploma. Their curriculum is no-frills, 1940ish with 16
credits for graduation. comes with guarantees. Look up this write-up:
http://www.homeschoolteenscollege.net/american.htm Call this number for
catalogue and packet of info-1 (708) 418-2800. Not alot of fluff and
nonsense to this program.
- We just did high school chemistry, and I'll admit that the lab portion
of the instruction was lacking. Yet there are experiments that don't
require that much instruction.
1. There's the vinegar and baking soda mixing to produce a gas, and a
stinky gas at that.
2. To demonstrate heat of dissolution, just dissolve baking soda in
water (it gets colder) or calcium chloride (it gets pretty hot).
3. There's the burning of a marshmellow to show how fats store and/or
can release energy.
4. One can put honey into a freezer to cause it to solidify and then
heat it to melt it, kinda like water.
5. Another good use of baking soda is to show how, after being
dissolved, it can serve as a buffer solution (Le Chatlier's
principle). We live in FL, and own a pool, which makes for an ongoing
chemistry experiment, and using baking soda as a buffer is a big part
of it.
6. What might be surprising is the degree to which car ownership and
maintenance can be used as object lessons for chemistry. We spent some
time going over every chemistry principle we could, which included
combustion, the lead acid battery (which included redox reactions,
electrolisis, specific gravity measurement), corrosion, surface
tension (after a good wax job), gas laws (the tires), boiling point
elevation and freezing point depression (the water/ethelene glycol mix
in the radiator), and probably more things that I just cannot remember
offhand.
We'll concede that there are we probably missed out on having access
to titration experiments and such, nor did we keep 12 Molar HCl around
the house. But I think we held our own, at least I hope so.
- In my state, dual enrollment is legal (1/2 time in pubilc school, 1/2
time elsewhere). This would make available the public school's science
courses. Of course, how well or poorly an individual dual-enroll-er is
treated is up to the individual teacher. (I've heard nasty stories of
teachers stating in front of their whole class unkind/untrue/nasty
things about homeschoolers -- while the teacher had the full knowledge
that one of the students present was previously or concurrently
homeschooled.) I'm wary of any involvement with the public schools, and
would not be likely to choose this route.
I'd like to also point out that there are a couple of companies that are
capitalizing on this 'felt need.' You can actually *rent* the lab
equipment needed for a set of experiments, then send it back. I've
received their advertisements in the mail, but as my children are not
high school age yet, I haven't kept the ads.
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