HOME SCHOOLING VS PUBLIC SCHOOLS

Do home schooled children have higher GPAs than children in the public school system?

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this research paper wae to analyzed whether homeschooled children have higher GPAs than children in the public school system.Comparatively little educational research has focused on home schooling. Since most students are educated in public schools, parents' choice of other educational alternatives is often perceived as a deviation from the societal norm. Friends and neighbors of parents who home school rarely understand their motivation for doing so. Using qualitative case study methodology, the researcher confined the study to a specific concentrated population of home schooling families. Phenomenological data analysis procedures were used to refine the volume of data and to construct a narrative containing the essence of parents' lived experience concerning the decision to home school their children. A total of 31 parents from 20 home schooling families participated in semi-structured face-to-face interviews with the researcher. Six public school administrators and 12 teachers from schools directly impacted by home schooling were also interviewed. Parents explained their motives for initiating home school programs and elaborated by telling their stories. Educators described their experiences with children being removed from their schools and with home school children returning to the classroom. They shared their experiences and perceptions of the value of home school and issues relating to student learning. Educators were included in order to determine how well they understand parents' reasons for choosing to home school a child. Data analysis revealed eight primary factors that initially motivated parents in this study to choose home schooling for their children: (1) negative effects of peer socialization; (2) religion; (3) a child's special learning needs and disabilities; (4) negative personal experiences of a parent as a student in school; (5) lack of administrative support; (6) an incident at school involving the child; (7) unique environmental needs of the family; and (8) recruitment. Data analysis also revealed that educators' understanding of these motivations was limited. Although educators' views of home schooling were primarily negative, they are clearly keenly interested in and concerned about the learning of all children, in and out of school.

Table Of Content

ABSTRACT2

Table Of Content4

CHAPTER 14

Introduction4

Background5

Statement of the Problem7

Significance8

Research Questions9

CHAPTER 210

REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE10

Compulsory Education11

Home Schooling Defined12

Home Education in the United States15

Homeschooled Children Have Higher Gpas17

Home school trend in today's society19

Homeschool Students Graduate Early And With Better Grades21

Parental Motivation to Home School23

Factors25

The Home Schooling Controversy27

Implications from Glasser's Developmental Model30

CHAPTER 3:31

METHODOLOGY32

Research Design34

Data Collection36

Participants in the Study37

Interview Protocol39

Data Analysis Procedures39

CHAPTER 443

Results And Discussion43

CHAPTER 553

CONCLUSION53

References55

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

Background

According to American Home School Legal Defense Association Counsel Scott W. Somerville (2007), although home schooling, at the turn of the 21st century, should never have been a successful movement, it has. At the onset of the modern home schooling movement in the mid-1960s, “there were no support groups or newsletters for parents who taught their children at home...many parents who taught their children at home never knew there were any other people doing the same thing” ...