Quote: What I found during homeschooling is that we could drop conjugating verbs for a few days and chase down multiple avenues of whatever topic fascinated us that day. Was it true that I couldn't pull out of my memory XY & Z? Absolutely. OTOH, I didn't have to say, "sorry sweetie, it's now 9:15 and we have to do our multiplication tables." Instead, I could say, "let's go to the library, find several different books, audios, videos, magazine articles, scientific/historical journals, haul them all home and spend the next 5 days looking into it. And by the way, there is an exhibit at the museum/park/historic/factory/industry/building on just that very topic. We'll head out there tomorrow."
I know that I was extraordinarily blessed when it came to school (I guess God was making up to me that I chose the wrong parents.) This was not my experience of school. At school I was free, flying, sailing-- I was in a place where I could succeed and where life was predictable. Just from what I see with my bf's daughters, school is different now. (I started first grade in 1954.) There's less exploration and more pressure. Everything is about test scores. (And citing test scores as evidence of effective learning is no more valid when discussing homeschooling than it is when discussing public schooling.)
I was (and still am) one of those kids who could sit still and learn by listening. As an NF (intuitive-introvert), I live in my imagination, I love to read, and to write, so conventional education served me well all the way through graduate school. I realize that conventional classrooms were made for people like me and that not everyone learns this way. Dawna Markova has written some great books on this subject.
When I referred to the teacher pulling info out of his or her own mental data bank, I didn't mean specifically that the teacher has to know everything, or that parents aren't capable of looking something up. I meant that a teacher who has functioned within a particular field for years (biology, American literature) is just going to have more of an overview of the subject and know patterns (gee, what it is about me and patterns?) and linkages with other subjects than a parent who studied it once upon a time and is now researching the subject along with the students.
I would rather learn American literature from someone who really knows American literature-- and can cite influences, cultural, historical, religious, philosophical, psychological on the authors and their works-- than from someone who is one chapter ahead of me in the book. I used to hate it in graduate school when we would have to break up into groups and "teach each other" some aspect of the curriculum. I felt that I was paying tuition to be exposed to the expert, presumably my professor... not to listen to other ignorant students like myself expound on hastily done research. (And I realize I'm now talking about college, not elem school.)
Obviously homeschoolers do not consider this much of an issue, and I'm just wondering how they would address this? I know it is a different world today.
