by Steven David Horwich
The following is an excerpt from Mr. Horwich’s new book, Not Alternative Education – Universal Private Education. This is part two of his article, Common Bad Sense Says Run The Other Way. It deals with why homeschooling makes good sense.
What is this thing that we call “good sense”? It is the ability to make decisions which assist in our survival and the survival of those people and things that we care about, in as opposed to decisions which in some way damage our own lives and others. That’s all common sense really is.
It is not common sense to take the “easy way”, such as public schooling, when that will result ultimately in the destruction of not only your child’s future and your peace of mind. But when we’re talking about tens of millions of students, the tearing down and diminishing of civilization? What sort of common sense is that? Public schooling is doing nothing less than as described above.
Common sense has to do with survival and doing well. It is a clear-eyed sense of the world that allows one to take not just the short view of a problem, but the long view as well. Let me provide a gruesome analogy so you can see the lack of common sense in public schooling. Public schooling is a very old, very tattered, diseased, infected band aid. It is being used to cover the fact that civilization has just lost its left leg. But it is a very expensive band aid. It requires attention all the time. It does not cover the wound which is now poisoning the entire body. So here’s my question to you – is it really common sense to avail one’s self of such a band aid? Or shouldn’t one try something else, even something requiring some effort – before dying? Is it enough to say; “Well, that band aid is what we have. Can we stretch it a little farther?”
It is a display of actual common sense to take the longer view. It is survival. The short view is “public school is free and freedom”, both a lie just like the promise of that tattered band aid. Public schooling, in the long term, will provide neither “free” nor “freedom”. The cost to our country is staggering. A lack of any real education and the crushing of the dreams of a young person imprison him in ignorance and hopelessness for life, and leave him in a condition where he often remains the responsibility of the parents far longer than should rightly be the case.
It is also bad sense to ignore the difficulties of private education, particularly homeschooling. What follows is a series of chapters tackling the objections the world seems to have to homeschooling. I’ll take them on one at a time and try to answer them thoroughly enough that you will see the common sense of homeschooling, alone or in a group. In the process, I’ll provide information you may need to either start, or to improve your homeschooling.
If you are already homeschooling, you might want to skip to chapter 30, which is a complete course I’ve authored for homeschool teachers and parents, preparing them to improve their homeschool skills as a teacher.
If you are doing well at homeschooling and really do not need assistance as a teacher but want to form a homeschool group to spread the responsibility and open up educational options, you may wish to skip to chapter 31, which provides a full course on how to form a homeschool group.
Steven Horwich is an Emmy and Dramalogue award-winning writer/director, who has split his life between the arts and education. A teacher with over 35 years and over 20,000 hours of experience from elementary school through university-level teaching, he started homeschooling his own children in 2002. This led him to author over 300 courses since 2002, a complete curricula (excluding math) for ages 5-adult, called Connect The Thoughts. Over 20,000 people have used CTT since making it available via the Internet in 2007. His curricula is presented at www.connectthethoughts.com. There is over 5 hours of film explaining his courses and approach. He has authored a book about education today, Poor Cheated Little Johnny, and a teacher training program to go with it. He currently presents a free webinar about education and homeschooling every third Tuesday.
The following is an excerpt from Mr. Horwich’s new book, Not Alternative Education – Universal Private Education. This is part two of his article, Common Bad Sense Says Run The Other Way. It deals with why homeschooling makes good sense.
What is this thing that we call “good sense”? It is the ability to make decisions which assist in our survival and the survival of those people and things that we care about, in as opposed to decisions which in some way damage our own lives and others. That’s all common sense really is.
It is not common sense to take the “easy way”, such as public schooling, when that will result ultimately in the destruction of not only your child’s future and your peace of mind. But when we’re talking about tens of millions of students, the tearing down and diminishing of civilization? What sort of common sense is that? Public schooling is doing nothing less than as described above.
Common sense has to do with survival and doing well. It is a clear-eyed sense of the world that allows one to take not just the short view of a problem, but the long view as well. Let me provide a gruesome analogy so you can see the lack of common sense in public schooling. Public schooling is a very old, very tattered, diseased, infected band aid. It is being used to cover the fact that civilization has just lost its left leg. But it is a very expensive band aid. It requires attention all the time. It does not cover the wound which is now poisoning the entire body. So here’s my question to you – is it really common sense to avail one’s self of such a band aid? Or shouldn’t one try something else, even something requiring some effort – before dying? Is it enough to say; “Well, that band aid is what we have. Can we stretch it a little farther?”
It is a display of actual common sense to take the longer view. It is survival. The short view is “public school is free and freedom”, both a lie just like the promise of that tattered band aid. Public schooling, in the long term, will provide neither “free” nor “freedom”. The cost to our country is staggering. A lack of any real education and the crushing of the dreams of a young person imprison him in ignorance and hopelessness for life, and leave him in a condition where he often remains the responsibility of the parents far longer than should rightly be the case.
It is also bad sense to ignore the difficulties of private education, particularly homeschooling. What follows is a series of chapters tackling the objections the world seems to have to homeschooling. I’ll take them on one at a time and try to answer them thoroughly enough that you will see the common sense of homeschooling, alone or in a group. In the process, I’ll provide information you may need to either start, or to improve your homeschooling.
If you are already homeschooling, you might want to skip to chapter 30, which is a complete course I’ve authored for homeschool teachers and parents, preparing them to improve their homeschool skills as a teacher.
If you are doing well at homeschooling and really do not need assistance as a teacher but want to form a homeschool group to spread the responsibility and open up educational options, you may wish to skip to chapter 31, which provides a full course on how to form a homeschool group.
Steven Horwich is an Emmy and Dramalogue award-winning writer/director, who has split his life between the arts and education. A teacher with over 35 years and over 20,000 hours of experience from elementary school through university-level teaching, he started homeschooling his own children in 2002. This led him to author over 300 courses since 2002, a complete curricula (excluding math) for ages 5-adult, called Connect The Thoughts. Over 20,000 people have used CTT since making it available via the Internet in 2007. His curricula is presented at www.connectthethoughts.com. There is over 5 hours of film explaining his courses and approach. He has authored a book about education today, Poor Cheated Little Johnny, and a teacher training program to go with it. He currently presents a free webinar about education and homeschooling every third Tuesday.
