There is a lot of confusion about what homeschooling is. This confusion is compounded by the fact that every country has a specific definition of what is meant by homeschooling and different countries have different definitions.
Add multiple organizations with their definitions, institution definitions, and a number of educators and you have a number of definitions. Let's see if we can resolve this confusion. You can also choose Homeschool for Kids & Schools & Activities at 4Kids.com.
The most important function
While there are many home learning options in San Jose, we will limit our discussion to the most basic of situations, or what we may call the home learning paradigm. Once we understand the case, we can extract the main features from the definition of homeschooling.
First, in homeschooling, parents make a conscious choice to shape their child's education on a much larger scale than any other learning opportunity. Basically, in homeschooling, parents have chosen to control their children's education down to the smallest detail.
Homeschool parents decide what materials to study, what books to use, how much time to spend in class, and many other details. Homeschooling parents do not pass this decision on to others, such as principals, individual educators, or even government officials.
Second, children who study at home will do their homework at home. This seems obvious enough, but let's take a look back at the most basic features of homeschooling.
A child raised at home does not go elsewhere for education, school, church, or even someone else's house. While a home-schooled child may attend certain classes elsewhere, the primary location of home-schooling is at home.