(Editor’s note: This is one of a series of questions about homeschooling that will all be posted with answers. Eventually.)
Question 2. Teaching one world view usually Christianity. Home schooling like private schooling is often designed to have a Christian-based curriculum. For home schoolers or private schoolers, basic subjects such as science and history have a Christian slant. In science, evolution is absolutely wrong, and creationism is absolutely right. In history, more emphasis is placed on religious groups such as the Puritans than on atheists. I’m a Christian myself, and I find nothing wrong with Christian teachings. But children should be given a wide world view of different cultures and different religions. Not everybody is white and Protestant, and an educational curriculum should reflect that. Teaching children a wide world view also gives them the chance to decide for themselves if they want to believe in evolution or creationism or become an atheist or a Christian. Parents shouldn’t home school to brainwash their children into little versions of them.
This paragraph treats at least three completely separate arguments as a single topic: history (Puritans v. atheists), social studies (cultures, religions, worldview), and science (evolution v. creationism). Let’s look at them separately.
SOCIAL STUDIES
>> Children should be given a wide world view of different cultures and different religions. Not everybody is white and Protestant.
Who said they were? Not all homeschoolers are white and Protestant, either, so you are guilty here of the same sort of pigeonholing you are accusing others of. The Christian segment of homeschooling may be the most vocal, but it is not actually much larger than the non-Christian segment.
Most homeschooled children meet with a much wider variety of people in their everyday lives than do their school peers, who are cooped up with twenty-nine other children every day, all day; children who are exactly the same age, who live in the same neighborhood, and who belong to roughly the same socio-economic group. Homeschoolers, on the other hand, are generally out on field trips, doing public service projects, and just living life in their communities; all of which give them access to a much broader range of acquaintance in age, race, experience, and socio-economic range than is possible in a schoolroom. I think most people would agree that living life in the real world and meeting real people from all walks of life is a more valuable cultural experience than doing a worksheet on “My Colorful World.”
DARWINIAN EVOLUTION v. CREATIONISM
>> In science, evolution is absolutely wrong, and creationism is absolutely right.
Christian homeschools, atheist homeschools, homeschools of other faiths, private schools, and public schools all promote a single point of view, pro or con, regarding evolution. In other words, teachers teach what they believe, or at least what they are paid to believe in the classroom. Most Christian homeschools and some private schools will teach creationism and will choose to do any of three things with Darwinian evolution: (1) ignore it completely, (2) touch on it in order to give arguments against it, or (3) study it in-depth to give their children a thorough grounding in why they believe creationism to be a better argument. Atheistic homeschools, most public schools, and some private schools teach evolution exclusively and if creationism gets any mention, it is merely to ridicule. So if your argument is that children need to be taught the wide spectrum of views on the beginning of the universe so that they can decide for themselves, well, then they need to drop out of public school for sure. Almost without exception, no homeschool of any faith and no private or public school actually teaches a nonjudgmental multiplicity of views on Darwinian evolution, creationism, and other theories on the beginning of the universe so that their students can make an informed choice. Almost without exception, every homeschool of any faith and every private and public school promotes a single viewpoint on this issue. Many homeschools at least give a blow-by-blow of why they think the opposing viewpoint is incorrect, whereas public schools merely assume it is not worth airtime at all; so as a whole homeschools touch on more diversity in this area than public schools.
HISTORY
>> In history, more emphasis is placed on religious groups such as the Puritans than on atheists.
And public schools teach a balanced point of view? When were you in school? The truth about the Puritans is that they had strong religious motivations. In order to understand why they did what they did, we need to learn the truth about their motives. In US history, the biggest motivating factor in the settlement of the colonies was the Christian faith. And yet, that Christian faith is written completely out of most public school textbooks these days! What about the textbook that teaches that at the first Thanksgiving, the Pilgrims were thanking the Indians … where is the truth in that? Where is the objectivity?
It is true, some Christian homeschools may focus on Christian history to the exclusion of other parts of history, but how is that worse than teaching a deliberately skewed version of history? Let’s be honest, whoever is teaching history is picking and choosing what to teach - there is simply not enough time to teach every interesting or important point of history. So, guess what? Everyone has gaps. Why are some gaps better or worse than other gaps? Gaps are not a problem; gaps are inevitable. Deliberately falsified history, on the other hand, is a problem.
>> Teaching children a wide world view also gives them the chance to decide for themselves if they want to believe in evolution or creationism or become an atheist or a Christian.
You imply that children taught at public school will be given a chance to decide for themselves if they want to believe evolution or creationism, atheism or Christianity, while those taught at home will not have such a choice. First off, this is a baseless argument since there are plenty of children raised in Christian homes (homeschoolers or not) who later become atheists or followers of other religions, just as there are children raised in atheistic or other religious homes who later convert to Christianity, so that’s a count against your argument right there. But more important, your implication is that home education proffers a single point of view while public education gives a multiplicity. Since when do public educators teach anything about Christianity or any other religion, other than secular humanism? As we have already seen, they see nothing wrong with twisting history to actually remove factual, historically verifiable religious motives from the picture. Since when do public school science classes teach anything about creationism? They teach a single view: Darwinian evolution. How is that equipping children to choose between the two?
Public school teachers are in the business of teaching a single worldview, just as you accuse homeschoolers of doing. So how does being taught a single, atheistic viewpoint better qualify children to choose between atheism and Christianity (or any other religion) than being taught a single, religious viewpoint? The happy outcome you envision, of children being free to choose between equal options, requires that the children actually be taught the basics of each viewpoint in an unbiased manner. Hmm, what about it? Put a religion course in the public schools, in which the basic tenets of atheism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, etc, are taught in a comparative and non-judgmental fashion. But wait … that would first necessitate that history be left intact so that children can understand why our ancestors – such as the Puritans – did what they did. Then the children would indeed have a good basis for making an informed choice. But, just leaving religious teaching out and teaching an anti-religious viewpoint does not equip them for making such a choice.
So, it is possible to teach the pros and cons of both creationism and Darwinian evolution, and atheism v. Christianity; and it is possible to teach children how to think through the evidence and decide for themselves; but that is emphatically not what public schools do. Admittedly it is not what most homeschools do either, but we have already discussed the fact that most teachers teach with bias toward their own belief system (or bias toward the demands of their paycheck), whether homeschoolers or public school teachers. Which brings us to your final point:
>> Parents shouldn’t home school to brainwash their children into little versions of them.
Since when is it brainwashing for parents to pass their own values on to their children? It is what has been done by every people, in every era, throughout history. It is natural. Every parent is familiar with the oft-repeated questions, “Mommy, do we do this?” and “Daddy, what do we do?” Children want to know what their parents believe as much as parents want to pass their beliefs on, whatever those beliefs may be. Only in modern times, with modern schools, has this prerogative of parenting been preempted. If parents are not to “brainwash their children into little versions of them” then on whom shall children model themselves? The Hitler Youth are one shining example that comes to mind of public schools taking over the parental job of teaching values to children. That is an example (admittedly extreme) of what can happen when loving parents abdicate their responsibilities to the state and let their values be shunted aside.
Your implication is that teaching children a single point of view without giving them other options is brainwashing. But we have already established that schools teach a single viewpoint on science, history, and social studies, just as you have accused homeschoolers of doing. All teachers pass on a set of beliefs and values to their students. So who is it really doing the brainwashing? Is it the parents, who love their children and have their best interests at heart, or is it the person who sits with the children for eight hours a day and may violate her own belief system in order to teach a children the prescribed curriculum in order to receive a paycheck?
To sum up: there will always be gaps in every child’s education. There are simply not enough hours in the day to teach all about everything, and even if there were, every teacher – homeschool, private, and public – teaches with bias either toward personal or paid beliefs. But living life in the real world and receiving a loving education in family values and mores seems like a much safer bet for actually learning a diversity of perspectives on a variety of subjects than sitting in a desk doing coloring pages and worksheets on the politically correct viewpoint du jour.
“the pros and cons of both creationism and Darwinian evolution”
It’s called biological evolution, not Darwinian evolution.
Do you think there’s pros and cons for the idea that the earth circles the sun? Probably not, because (almost) everyone knows the earth’s orbit around the sun is a fact. It’s called a fact because there’s massive evidence for it. Biological evolution is also a fact, because it also has massive evidence. Every competent biologist in the world agrees all life evolved from common ancestors because the molecular evidence is too powerful to deny.
The only people who have a problem with biological evolution are uneducated people who have religious beliefs that conflict with the scientific facts of evolution. If they homeschool their children, and teach their children evolution has problems, even though they don’t know what they’re talking about, they are abusing their children. Biological evolution is one of the most important ideas of science. It’s important for scientific reasons, and it’s important because people have the right to know how their species developed.
Americans who deny the facts of evolution should educate themselves, because it’s immoral to spread lies about science. Ignorance is no excuse for lying. Even more immoral is lying to children. I can’t imagine anything more wrong than a person who doesn’t know what he’s talking about, teaching a student that supernatural magic is a valid explanation for the diversity of life. This is how stupidity is transferred from one generation to the next generation. There’s no excuse for this dishonesty and the people who are abusing children with this idiotic magical creation nonsense should be ashamed of themselves.
Wow, Bob, this is a pretty huge assertion. Teaching science wrong is … child abuse? That’s kind of a leap, isn’t it?
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I kind of thought we lived in a free society where we were not required to teach only the view approved by the state. And that that was a good thing. I’m not going to argue creationism vs. evolution here because that was not even slightly my point in the article above. My point was, everyone has a bias, and everyone teaches their bias, whether it is bias from personal conviction or from personal paycheck. My point was that children are very, very rarely taught all sides of an issue in an unbiased manner, no matter who is doing the teaching. My point had nothing to do with the subject matter being taught.
Teaching wrong science is child abuse. Wow, that’s a tough one to wrap my head around. Maybe because I’ve seen instances of REAL child abuse and find your hubris in making this comparison to be unconscionably trivializing to the real thing. Strange as it may seem to you, a lot of people have disbelieved Darwinian evolution and gone on to live happy, productive lives.
“It’s called a fact because there’s massive evidence for it. Biological evolution is also a fact, because it also has massive evidence.”
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And that’s why it is called, “The Theory of Evolution”.
You seem to be assuming (as many do) that all homeschoolers teach a Christian world view and creationism as truth. I teach neither, at least not exclusively. I will cover evolution in science and seek out non-Christian based history curriculum to use with my children. I will also teach them that others believe differently and it’s not cool to mock them or call them abusive.
I will admit it’s hard to find materials geared specifically toward homeschooling that aren’t Christian based and I often have to modify curriculum or make my own. when I see a bias I don’t agree with I can chose not to use it.
I do get though, that no matter who teaches these subjects their own personal bias will be subtly (or not so subtly) passed along. The idea that schools teach unbiased truth is laughable! At least the biases homeschooled kids are getting are based around the values of their parents, not the government’s agenda.
Please pardon the typos, I cilicked prematurely!
Down the Lane, the original question that sparked this post did assume that, but in my response I was careful to point out several times that there are Christian homeschools, atheist homeschools, and homeschools where other faith prevails. I even pointed out that homeschools are far more likely than public schools to teach a diversity of views on various subjects, as you teach in your homeschool (and I in mine, btw). Where I spoke of parental bias in teaching, I didn’t state which way that bias ran and even stated that atheist homeschools will most likely teach evolution as truth.
Picking and choosing among materials (and modifying them) to find the one that works best for your own family is, as you say, the way to go; and I absolutely agree that the bias of a loving caregiver – WHICHEVER way it runs – is always better for the child than the supposed objectivity of a government body that is more concerned with advancing state objectives than with the child as a whole person. Parents who choose to homeschool are going to teach their children their own belief system, whether Christian or Hindu or atheist, and they should be free from government intervention to do so.
I keep returning to leave a comment, but it isn’t all that simple. I appreciate your strong arguments in favor of homeschooling (especially about teaching history: my experience with the current public school system is that they choose an era of history to teach about (e.g. Oregon trail) and teach it to death, to the exclusion of all other eras.
But then I get to the comments, and there’s this glaring first comment left by someone named Bob who apparently thinks that teaching Creationism is child abuse because it is “lying about science.” Wow. Isn’t teaching that biological evolution is a fact also a form of “child abuse” then, because it is also lying about science. Last time I looked, biological evolution was still classified under “The Theory of Evolution” which is an educated guess as to what happened.
My favorite line is:
So if we were not Americans, it would be OK to deny the “facts” of evolution (which is still a theory because it hasn’t been proven to the exclusion of other theories).
Carma, you handled this very nicely, I love your post. Keep on blogging.
ARGH. Somehow my favorite line from Bob’s comment got lost. He said that “Americans who deny…” You can go up to his comment and see it. I just found it amusing.
I would like to share my view of history education, as it relates to your post: people argue, as you state, that many Christians present too narrow a view of history. I would retort that public schools present too wide a view. By this I do not mean to imply that there are parts of history that children should not learn; on the contrary, the more the merrier. But by attempting to include everything, history education becomes a timeline of dates and names of kings, and the students become bored and lost as the information becomes irrelevant in an overwhelming landslide.
Ideally, history would be presented in a more holistic manner: a few times periods presented in as full a manner as possible, getting in depth in all aspects, social, linguistic, economic, environmental, as well as including the usual battles and ruler drama. I think it is much better for a child to be taught how to study and fully understand segments of the past, even if they end up only learning about a religiously narrow segment, so that they can in the future know how to successfully explore other time periods on their own.
In other words, I completely agree with your point that all education has gaps, by necessity. Our job as homeschoolers (and I believe this should also be the job of school teachers) is to teach them how they can fill in those gaps with self-discipline and good study habits later on.
Thank you Elena, that’s a great point! Studying a small amount in great depth often yields greater results than studying a large amount by skimming the surface. Learning how to learn is the most important thing any student can be taught! I’ve been exploring Thomas Jefferson Education (www.tjed.org) lately and this is their whole thrust.