EDUCATION REPORT - Home Schooling

EDUCATION REPORT - Home Schooling¹

By Jerilyn Watson
Home schooling in
Pennsylvania, 1936
(Library of Congress)
Broadcast: May 16, 2002

This is the VOA Special English Education Report.

More than one -million children in the United States do not go to school. Instead, they learn at home. Most often,
their parents are their teachers. Educational companies, libraries and the Internet provide many families with
teaching² material. Other parents create teaching methods to meet the needs of individual children.

Parents choose home schooling for several reasons. Some choose it because of their religious beliefs. Others say
it provides more time for the family to be together. They say the home offers a better place for learning³. Some
parents believe home schooling avoids problems of traditional schools. These include classes that have too many
students. Critics, however, say children need to attend school with other children. They also say that some home-
schooled children do not get a good education.

All fifty American states and the District of Columbia permit home schooling. Some
states do not require much preparation by parents or testing of children. Other states
have more requirements for home schooling. Home-schooling in the United States
began when the country was established. In farm areas, people often lived far from a
school. Widespread home schooling took place until about the middle of the
nineteenth century. Then, in eighteen-fifty-two, the state of Massachusetts passed
the first law requiring children to attend school.

Over the years, the American public education system strengthened and grew. By
the nineteen-sixties and nineteen-seventies, however, some Americans believed that
traditional education was not helping⁴ their children. So a number of parents began home-schooling.

Home-school expert Linda Dobson says many people have helped the movement grow. She says some parents
began teaching their children at home after changes in tax laws forced some private religious schools to close.
That happened in the nineteen-eighties.

And, most recently, she says many kinds of people have joined the movement. She says these include rich people
and poor people. They represent many races, religions and political beliefs. Mizz Dobson says the number of
home-schooled children has increased an estimated⁵ fifteen to twenty percent each year during the last fifteen
years.

This VOA Special English Education Report was written by Jerilyn Watson.

Email this article to a friend

Printer Friendly Version

1 schooling   

n.教育；正规学校教育

参考例句：

• A child's access to schooling varies greatly from area to area.孩子获得学校教育的机会因地区不同而大相径庭。
• Backward children need a special kind of schooling.天赋差的孩子需要特殊的教育。

2 teaching   

n.教学，执教，任教，讲授；(复数)教诲

参考例句：

• We all agree in adopting the new teaching method. 我们一致同意采取新的教学方法。
• He created a new system of teaching foreign languages.他创造了一种新的外语教学体系。

3 learning   

n.学问，学识，学习；动词learn的现在分词

参考例句：

• When you are learning to ride a bicycle,you often fall off.初学骑自行车时，常会从车上掉下来。
• Learning languages isn't just a matter of remembering words.学习语言不仅仅是记些单词的事。

4 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

5 estimated   

adj．根据估计的

参考例句：

• She estimated the breadth of the lake to be 500 metres. 她估计湖面大约有500米宽。
• The man estimated for the repair of the car. 那人估算了修理汽车的费用。