You may be wondering what this whole homeschooling thing is all about. A lot more people are homeschooling now than 10 years ago, but there are good reasons to why it has grown so much.
Homeschooling is becoming more popular mainly because of studies and digital technology. Studies have proven that homeschoolers do well in post secondary school, and that regular school puts too much stress on kids. Plus homeschoolers can do so much online including being social and doing classes.
But wait…there are so many more reasons to why homeschooling is becoming more popular, and how much it has grown over the past few decades.
Why is it Becoming Popular?
There are over 2.5 million students who are homeschooled right now in the U.S. which is more than double how many there were in 2003. Homeschooling has noticeably had an increase in population over the past 10 years. There are lots of possible reasons to why.
Digital Age
First off because of the digital age, and there are plenty of resources and websites that teach subjects. For example Khan academy is a very popular online educational website that teaches math and science, and lots of homeschoolers use it. This makes things easier for parents to homeschool their kids because they don’t need to spend the whole day teaching things if the kid is learning online. Now there are plenty of online classes or distributed learning classes that you can take. If you take enough of them homeschoolers who do online classes can even graduate with a diploma. Kids don’t even have to go to high school at all anymore to get a degree with online learning.
Secondly with the digital age say goodbye to the socialization myth of homeschooling because kids can communicate and be social online. Because of this homeschooling communities have started within cities (mainly on Facebook) and homeschool families can meet up and talk with one another. And teens can connect through social media or teen homeschool groups in their area.
Finally parents can work online. This makes homeschooling easier for parents (especially single homeschool parents) because they can work from home. There are so many job opportunities on the internet now, it’s fairly easy to find one that suits you. Because of this parents can work from home while they also teach their kids.
Studies
Studies have proven that homeschoolers are successful. Imagine how families who wanted to homeschool in the 70s felt, there was nothing saying that their kids could even be successful. They just had to take a chance. But thanks to the families that did take that chance we now have studies and proof that homeschoolers are successful and maybe even more successful than regularly schooled kids.
There’s been so many studies of homeschoolers being successful in post secondary school. On average they get better grades and their 4 year graduation rate is higher than it is for public, catholic and public schooled kids. Even after school, adults who were homeschooled tend to participate, vote and help out in community events more.
Because of all these studies universities have noticed that homeschoolers are well educated and have started accepting more homeschoolers. And a lot of universities have special admissions for homeschoolers.
Adding to why homeschooling is becoming more popular, parents are also realizing that public schools have lots of flaws and put a lot of stress on kids. There’s been studies about the stress impact school and homework has on kids, when they should be spending their childhood having fun not worried about grades. Plus kids in regular school do not get enough sleep because of school and stress, which worsens their overall performance.
Better Learning
Homeschoolers have better, improved ways of learning. They have a personalized education that suits them and it can be changed depending on how they do in certain subjects. Every student is different and is good at different things, so this way of learning is more appealing to parents and kids. There is no rule of how you need to learn when it comes to homeschooling.
Homeschoolers also do a lot of hands on learning. This type of learning allows kids to engage on what they are learning about. It is easier to understand subjects when you get to experience them through an experiment.
Parents or homeschool kids teacher can change the kids curriculum to be more in depth about what they’re interested in. If a homeschooler is having a hard time with a certain subject they can take their time with it, and vice versa if they understand it well. But also if they are really into a subject they can spend more time learning about it. Homeschooling really can be the best from of education.
Other Reasons
Homeschoolers grow up being themselves, not changing because of peer pressure and what’s in style. People find that having your own style and being different is cool now. Homeschoolers have their own style and personality. You may have noticed that homeschoolers are also better socializing with adults, which isn’t really something you learn at school. But they spend a lot of time with adults and they might pick up a few things.
Because of all these reasons, homeschooling is becoming more popular. A lot of it has to do with because of modern day technology and studies. Homeschooling myths have been debunked and parents have started realizing that it is a possibility to get their kid to success.
How Much Has Homeschooling Grown?
Homeschooling around the world has been growing at high and fast rates for various different reasons. Here are a few countries where homeschooling is becoming a big thing.
United States
As of Spring 2019 there are 2.5 million homeschoolers in the U.S. In 2007 there were only 1.5 million homeschoolers. The homeschooling population is continuing to grow at a fast rate of 2-8% per year.
Canada
There are 95,000 homeschoolers in Canada at most, as they do not give an exact number. But growth of homeschooling in Canada has also started. In 2012 homeschooling had risen 29 percent in five years!
Australia
There are 20,000 homeschoolers in Australia, which is 0.5% of the population of schooled aged kids. In 2013 there were around 1,100 homeschool students in Queensland, but in 2018 there were 3,232. In Victoria, there were 3,300 homeschoolers in 2013, which increased to 5,300. Homeschooling is also on the rise in Australia.
Russia
Homeschooling has been on the rise ever since it became legal in Russia in 1992 since the fall of the Soviet regime. Now there are 50,000 to 100,000 homeschool students in Russia.
South Africa
There are about 100,000 homeschoolers in South Africa with a growth rate of 20% per year. Homeschooling became legal in the country in 1996, and in 2002 there were only 400 homeschoolers. The education system in South Africa is not improving, so more and more parents choose to home educate their kids.
United Kingdom
There are at most 100,000 homeschoolers in the UK. The Isle of Wight has the highest proportion of homeschoolers which is 1 in 50. In 2014 there were 34,000 home learners, and over 3 years it has gone up 41%.
Short History of Homeschooling
Homeschooling is the oldest type of education dating back centuries. But then in the late 19th century it began to decline when strict school attendance laws were put in place. In other words homeschooling became illegal. If parents did not send their kids to school, they would loose their parental rights.
It wasn’t until 1970s that the homeschooling movement started again. There were many homeschooling advocates, including John Holt, Rousas John Rushdoony and Raymond Moore. The Homeschool Legal Defense Association (HSLDA), a christian homeschool organization, also helped the make homeschooling legal. In the 1980s homeschooling started becoming legal in the States. In these times parents would mainly homeschool their kids for religious reasons.
They found that public school systems did not teach enough religion and they wanted to teach their kids about their religion. In the 1990s most homeschooling groups were explicitly christian and would exclude non christian homeschoolers. But as the years passed, homeschooling has become more popular although it’s changed throughout the decades. Now homeschooling is continuing to grow, and parents have many different reasons to homeschool their kids instead of just for religion.