Homeschool and Test Taking

Did you know that homework was once banned in certain cities years ago? One city even prohibited homework as late as 1961.

My teenage daughter is amazed at the heavy homework load given to her public schooled friends and this is on a daily basis!

What is the purpose of homework? Is it so a child will develop effective study habits? If that’s the case, why do some children fail a test? If the only essential information a child should know is contained on the test, then what’s the use in learning the rest of the material?

Homework is considered to be a reinforcement of the work taught in the classroom so the information can later be given on a test. Testing teaches a child to memorize specific facts that odds are, he or she will never use again in his or her lifetime.

Since graduating high school, I’ve never diagrammed a single sentence-not even when I went off to college. I can’t remember all the rules I was once forced to study and that’s not age speaking, I couldn’t remember the rules from one test to the next!

The problem with group testing is that it doesn’t embrace individuality. Kids are lumped together by age and tested on what they ‘should’ know. The graded results then determine if a child is learning well or if he or she is ‘failing’ that subject.

I caved under pressure when I was fairly new to homeschooling and did have my children take a two day long test administered by a teacher from a local school to silence family members who were very vocally opposed to homeschool. Once the results were in showing that my children tested as much as three grade levels above their peers, I never heard another peep out of family opponents. But if you decide to test your child make sure you’re doing it for the benefit of your child rather than allowing yourself to be pressured into doing so.

Education is one thing and learning is quite another altogether. Homeschool is not meant to be an extension of the way public schools handle education and therefore shouldn’t be tested as such.