Cathy Barfield, a home school mother and co-founder of Teaching Effective Academics in Christian Homes, answered questions from readers about home schooling. The chat is part of the “Learning Outside the Lines” series by the Lawrence Journal-World, 6News and LJWorld.com. See the entire series.

ChristyLittle

What’s the main concern you hear about from parents who want to home school their children? Is it academics, socialization, any other issue?

clyde_never_barks

Thank you. For Regents Universities in Kansas, I forgot about the 10 percent window under Qualified Admissions.

imastinker

Can you explain the 10% exception rule? I am not familiar with that and have heard it mentioned twice. A link to another site would be fine.

clyde_never_barks

I am trying to figure out how to articulate this thought into a question so that it does not come off as commentary; but I can think of specific personal experiences I have had with homeschooling friends who intend to shelter their children from various infulences only to have those items/issues they wish to shelter their children from become realities either from the pulpit or from some other venue. [This question probably does not apply to those who homeschool without a religious influence.] How do you measure success in protecting a child from an outside influence you seek to exclude?

Moderator

Hi, everybody. Cathy Barfield, one of the co-coordinators of TEACH (Teaching Effective Academics in Christian Homes), is here to answer your questions about home schooling. This is part of our series, “Learning Outside the Lines: Home Schooling in Kansas,” which kicked off in the Journal-World on Sunday and runs through Thursday. You can read all the stories and see the multimedia content at http://www2.ljworld.com/news/education/home_schooling/learning_outside_the_lines.

Moderator

I’m Terry Rombeck, a features reporter here, and I’ll be moderating today’s chat. To read more about Cathy’s background with home schooling, you can read an essay she wrote about her experiences at http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2007/may/13/first_person_cathy_barfield/?home_schooling_feature.

Cathy Barfield

Hi.

Moderator

First off, what are some factors families should consider when they’re trying to decide if they want to home school?

Cathy Barfield

It’s a time commitment. You have to realize it takes time to pick out the books, to actually sit down with the kids, to grade the work. It’s not something to take lightly. When we first started out, we did it one year at a time. It didn’t take long before we realized we were going to do it all the way. It’s a lot easier to start when they’re in the younger grades than when they’re in the older grades. It’s not impossible to start in the older grades. It’ll take more research. When you home school, you’re kind of losing a second income if you’re a two-income family. Some home-schoolers will continue to work, and sometimes they work from home. Most home-schoolers I know are a single-income family, so there is a financial cost to it.

Cathy Barfield

It works the best that you’ve got support from your husband. There are single parents actually home-schooling. Single parents can home-school. It’s more of a challenge. It’s nice to have another person to feed off of and support you. There are good days and bad days. You both have to be for it for it to work well.

Moderator

You mentioned the curriculum, and the time it takes to sort through books and choose them. How does someone go about that?

Cathy Barfield

That is the most overwhelming thing about home schooling, the decision of what to use. There are a few books out there that critique major home school cirriculums. There’s one my Mary Pride and another by Cathy Duffy. They can’t do all the cirruculum, but they take the most popular and critique them. When I think of books to use or curruculum, I look at those first. I like to go to home-school conventions. There’s one in Kansas City and another in Wichita. Those curriculum guides help me narrow it down sowhen I go to those conventions, I can look those curriculum up and look at them.

ChristyLittle

Do you feel there is an age level (such as high school, when curricula might feature chemistry or physics) where children need instructors with a strong academic background in a subject?

Cathy Barfield

When they get up to especially high school, they are self-taught. There’s many curriculums out there that is written to the student. Even if the parent doesn’t have a background in something, there’s more and more curriculum that’s written for the student. The students are more self-taught, so the parent is taking more of a back seat role and a facilitator. There are times I don’t know the answer and look for someone to help — acquaintances I know who have a background in that area. Usually, the kids don’t have trouble doing the material, but it’s nice to have somebody in the community you can bounce things off of and ask.

clyde_never_barks

Cathy – Many Christian homeschoolers I know, use as their basis for homeschooling the observation that the Bible gives primary responsibility to parents to educate their children. Most use [Proverbs 22:6 – Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it]; and [Ephesians 6:4 – Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.] as the biblical example. I am aware that there are other examples that can be extracted from various stories and passages in other areas of the Bible as well.

While I do not support homeschooling for my own situation, I do believe that advances have been made from the aspect of “association membership” which allow for better student social interaction and options for sports, fine arts, etc. I also think that instruction at home is critical to enhance and balance the academic experience kids have in public (or private) school settings.

Can you offer comment on your thoughts about what you think the Bible says regarding the removal of Christians out of the classroom – be it teachers or students? What happens when there is no more (or far less) salt and light in the public school?

Cathy Barfield

I don’t think that happens until the child is older. The child needs time to develop their self-esteem and time to mature before they can be a “light,” to know what they believe and why they believe. I know interaction with others can help with that, but for a really young child it can be devastating to be in a situation you don’t know. It’s different with different kids — some mature faster than others. Even the kids are limited for what they can say in a public school classroom.

imastinker

What ramifications might there be as far as a potential college is concerned with home schooling? There would be no grades for them to look at. Does this place the child at a disadvantage to other students or are there other things that colleges look at?

Cathy Barfield

The two primary things colleges look at are the transcript and the ACT or SAT. Most home-schoolers do well on the ACT and SAT, and I think colleges really look at the ACTs and SATs more than the transcript. The transcripts just validate the SAT or ACT. There are times when you may have a student who is not a good test-taker. They don’t do as well on the ACT or SAT; they will look at the transcripts. Of course, they need to get the same number as public school kids to enter in, but sometimes they will allow you in as an exception. They allow you in based on the 10 percent exception law. We haven’t had any problem entering our girls into college, and we’ve had two actually graduating, and my last one is entering this fall. There might be a college not familiar with home-schoolers, and then you might need to address the director of admissions and sit down and talk with them.

Che_Guevara

Have the recent allegations (6-10% of students abused according to a recent federal study) about sexual abuse in public schools resulted in an increase in homeschooling?

Cathy Barfield

I haven’t run into that, talking with other moms and people who talk to me about home schooling.

SWGlassPit

Especially at the junior high and high school levels, science courses become dependent on laboratory exercises to illustrate and demonstrate the material. Without access to labs, how do you combat the disadvantage the child will face in the chemistry, biology, and physics fields?

Cathy Barfield

There are curriculum out there that do a good job with labs. They’ll have video, they’ll have equipment you can easily purchase that you can do at home. Some of the curriculum, you can talk to the author if you have a question and you’re doing a lab at home. That intimidates a lot of people, and that’s why at TEACH, we’ve had sciences offered for a group. This year we have biology and advanced biology, and next year we’ll have eighth-grade physical science, biology, chemistry and physics, all taught by home school parents.

SWGlassPit

A followup to the previous question as well:

When an advanced child surpasses the parent in knowledge of a particular field, say, calculus, who does he or she turn to for questions? For that matter, how can a parent select a textbook and resource materials for a field in which he or she is not well-versed?

Cathy Barfield

There are online classes students can take. They can enroll in a community college. With the K-10 connector now, they can take the bus from Lawrence to Johnson County to take the class easily. KU itself does offer classes for high school students.

clyde_never_barks

Don’t forget that for most college admissions, the homeschooled student must complete the GED. Have any of your homeschool associations thought about trying to change that statute regarding recognized high school graduation?

Cathy Barfield

Home-schoolers are entered in through the 10 percent exception rule for Regents schools, so they don’t have to take the GED. It might be if they’re a poor-test-taker with the ACT or SAT, they might want them to take the GED, but I haven’t heard of that.

SWGlassPit

In humanities, political science, and philosophy courses in public and private schools, children are encouraged to engage others, who often share widely differing views, in intellectual debate. Do homeschoolers get this kind of opportunity as well? What opportunities are there for socialization in a structured setting?

Cathy Barfield

The best is to be in a co-op, where you can exchange ideas like that. There was a disadvantage with my third child, where I had to find other children for her to talk with. At least find another family or two that have children that age, so they can sit together and talk. If you take online classes, they have chat rooms for classes.

yourworstnightmare

Do you teach evolution to your students?

Cathy Barfield

I don’t avoid that topic. We do talk about evolution. As a Christian, I do have a biblical world view about that, and I will teach that. We do talk about what an evolutionist’s views are in science. That’s something we do talk about. I think my girls were very comfortable going into a college class, knowing what evolution was. We did both sides in our home school.

Moderator

That’s all the time we have for today’s chat. Thanks, Cathy, for coming in today.

Cathy Barfield

Thanks.

Moderator

Again, our series will continue in the Journal-World with stories Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Or you can read it all online at the above link.