Pupils Feel at Home in Alternative Classrooms

An estimated quarter of a million school-age children nationwide won’t be returning to the classroom this month.

Instead, they’ll learn reading, writing and arithmetic at the same table where they eat breakfast, and mom and dad will be the teachers.

A U.S. Department of Education official estimates that more than 260,000 children are being taught at home, primarily for religious reasons. Other motivations for home teaching range from doubt about the abilities of public school teachers to not wanting children exposed to peer pressure.

“I see it as a reaction of one part of the population to the over-institutionalization of the child,” said Patricia Lines, a research analyst at the U.S. Department of Education.

But parents taking such action could face possible problems with authorities. Since some states do not have statutes that specifically address the practice, interpretation of existing laws could lead to legal disputes over who is qualified to teach their children at home.

California Rules Vague

California law requirements for home teaching qualifications are vague, said Fred Fernandez, educational consultant for non-public schools at the state Department of Education. Although there are no statutes that specifically provide guidelines for home teaching, the law mandates that instructors must be “capable of teaching,” he said.

The Los Angeles Unified School District follows state guidelines to make sure that students are learning the appropriate curriculum, but has no strict guidelines regarding qualifications of home teachers, said Donald Martin, the district’s project consultant for independent study.

The district had 27 students registered in private schools with four or fewer students in the 1987-88 academic year, Martin said.

Parents in California who want to teach their children at home are required either to file an affidavit as a private school with their county’s education department or enroll in a county-sponsored program that provides curriculum guidelines and other resources.

Red Balfour, who heads the Orange County Department of Education’s home schooling program, said about 225 students are enrolled in his district’s department. Balfour, who until last winter administered a similar program in San Diego with more than 500 students, said he gets at least five calls a day from parents interested in the growing program.

No Precise Tally

The state of California doesn’t keep an exact tally on the number of children who are taught at home, but Fernandez’s department estimates there are about 2,100 home schools registered in the state.

A national study based on the 1985-86 school year estimated that the number of home schoolers was between 120,000 and 260,000, Lines said. Although data for the 1987-88 school year has not yet been compiled, she said she believes the number exceeds 260,000.

Micki and J. David Colfax of rural Boonville, Calif., have become heroes to many parents who believe children get a better education at home. Their oldest son, 23-year-old Grant, graduated magna cum laude from Harvard in 1987, and his brothers Drew, 20, and Reed, 18, currently attend the same Ivy League university.

“I think public schools, especially high school age children, are mostly a holding operation,” Micki Colfax said. “I think there’s an enormous waste of time.”

The Colfaxes, both former teachers, began teaching their children in 1973 when they moved to their rural ranch about 100 miles north of San Francisco. Micki Colfax said she said wasn’t impressed with the public education in the area, and the couple decided they could do a better job teaching their children.

“I think that all parents have a better notion of what their child needs than public schools,” she said. “I think it’s an option that all parents should consider.”

Families in the area have encouraged the Colfaxes to share their teaching success with the community and participate in public education, Micki Colfax said. Her husband currently is the president of the Mendocino County Board of Education.

Parents who choose to keep their children at home for religious reasons point to the teachings of veteran educator Raymond Moore, who runs the Hewitt Research Foundation in Washougal, Wash.

His foundation supplies lesson plans for more than 5,000 students, and he says that those youngsters average significantly higher on standardized achievement tests than the public school norm.

“Home schoolers enjoy tremendous advantages,” Moore said. “They are positively socialized instead of being peer-dependent, narcissistically socialized.”

Lines said federal data confirms Moore’s claims that students who are taught at home usually score above average on standardized tests.

Moore, who often appears on Christian radio shows, said bad teaching is the enemy, not public schools. Many children are forced into an institutional situation before they are ready and subsequently do not perform up to par, he said.

Sharon Weir, a Seventh-day Adventist from Downey, said she taught her two older daughters at home during their early elementary years and plans to teach her 4-year-old when she reaches school age.

“I wanted to keep my children away from any negative influences,” she said. “When you’re home schooling, it’s just the mother and child one-to-one. You know if your child is getting the material.”

Taught Daughters at Home

Weir said she taught her 18-year-old daughter, Jenny, at home until she was 7 and her 13-year-old daughter, Julie, until she was 9. Both girls now attend private Christian schools.

“I want my children to have a good Christian teacher to copy,” she said.

Many of the parents who teach their children at home for secular reasons credit the teachings of education reformer John Holt, who died in 1985. His views are still being advocated in the Boston-based “Growing Without Schooling” magazine edited by Susannah Sheffer.

The magazine acts as a clearinghouse for information about home schooling as well as publishing letters from parents, Sheffer said.

Meanwhile, support groups have sprung up throughout the country for parents to meet and exchange ideas and for children to have the opportunity to interact with each other.

Gary McIntire, 7, of Yorba Linda, is one of a few dozen children in Rainbow Kids, a group made up of local home-taught youngsters and their parents who meet once a week to work on projects or go on field trips.

His mother, Sue McIntire, said she prefers to teach her son at home because she doesn’t like the socialization process that children face at public schools. And she believes Gary can learn better with the special attention.

“Where he’s strong we can go at the speed he’s ready for, and where he’s not we can slow down,” she said.

The Northern California Home School Assn., California Coalition of People for Alternative Learning Situations and Monterey County Home Schoolers also lend support to parents and provide opportunities for children to get together.

2 Court Cases Dismissed

Aside from support groups, the Home School Legal Defense Assn., a nationwide legal group based in Great Falls, Va., provides legal advice and representation to its more than 9,000 members, said attorney J. Michael Smith, the group’s vice president. It also gives out information about home schooling laws in each state.

Smith said his group intervened in two recent cases, and both were dismissed in court.

Another case in the Covina Valley School District was successfully prosecuted, according to officials.

Jackie Haugen, the supervisor of child welfare and attendance in the district east of Los Angeles, said her office prosecuted a family case last year in which officials contended the child didn’t have structured lessons. The district also complained that the parents’ highest level of education was high school.

Credentials Needed

She said parents must have teaching credentials to gain approval from the district to teach their children at home.

Bill Honig, state superintendent of public instruction, said that although his office leaves guidelines for home teaching up to individual districts, he prefers to see youngsters attending public school.

“Obviously, it can work. That’s what people did 100 years ago,” Honig said. “I think kids lose something by being educated at home because they lose the social atmosphere, but I don’t begrudge parents who want to do it.”