A colleague made the point that a lot of home schooling parents’ primary objective may not be a better education, but sheltering their children from the outside world. I am inclined to agree with him, but I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing.
I learned the "F" word in kindergarten in 1981; the twelve years after that I learned very little. I probably fit into the category of smart kids bored with being taught to the mean, although laziness also played a big part in my graduating high school with a 2.4.
With a six month-old son, my wife and I are considering our options for educating him. The plan right now is public school through whatever age kids start using drugs and having sex (I think it’s currently about 11 or 12?), then Catholic school until he graduates. But we are also considering homeschooling.
I’d be interested to hear what Mikeforbes’ and Catherine’s (and any other homeschooling veterans) experiences were as they left the homeschooling environment and discovered some not-so-nice things about the world.