Homeschool outperforms public school system

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Homeschool; Research; schooling on 22 Mar 2012.

While traditional schooling shows signs of decline, more and more families are homeschooling, ie, educating their kids at home themselves. This new infographic shows how homeschooling is succeeding and how parents of homeschoolers are doing well even though they may not be certified teachers. Yay for homeschool!

(Hat tip: Thanks Peter Kim for those great infographics developed by your team)

Created by: College At Home

Are students benefiting from Facebook?

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: College/University on 21 Mar 2012.

Who would have thought that social media is helping to enrich the college experience? Then again with close to 800,000 users on Facebook, not realising its huge potential for learning and education would be a mistake in this day and age. Take a look at the infographics below. Tell me what do you think.

Created by: Online PhD

ELI 360: Tertiary education opportunities in USA

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Announcement on 20 Mar 2012.

Study in the USA

Are you exploring tertiary education abroad?

If you are, come and meet Eli 360′s Vice-President of Marketing, Mr. Steven Gist. ELI 360 is an international education consulting company that represents a number of U.S universities and high schools. The company works to connect non-U.S. students with educational opportunities in the U.S and has helped to place a number of Malaysian students in reputable institutions there. Among them are homeschoolers (my son Ethan was one) and students from learning centers in the country.

Come listen to Steven Gist as he shares on preparing and applying for studies in the U.S.

Date: Wed 21 March
Time: 2.30 – 4 pm
Venue:
Frontier Learning Centre,
Eaglepoint Puchong
No. 2, Jalan Rajawali 3,
Bandar Puchong Jaya
47100 Puchong

(Click here for location map)

About Steven Gist
Steven has worked in various areas of international education including study abroad, foreign language education, international student recruiting and cross-cultural training in both the public and private sectors for more than ten years. He holds an MA in International Education from the School for International Training in Brattleboro, Vermont where much of his research focused on the process that families go through in choosing an educational institution outside of their home country. Steven has lived and worked in several countries around the world including China, Belgium, Japan, Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore.

Homeschool: An experience I would never trade

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Homeschooling Achievers on 15 Mar 2012.

Homeschooler Petrina Phua was 17 years old when she stepped into a learning centre to prepare for her IGCSE O Level examinations. Last year this talented ex-homeschooler and concert pianist scored straight As in all 8 subjects (Physics, Chemistry, Biology, Math, Ad Math, Accounts, English (1st language) and Bahasa Malaysia (A-Star). Petrina writes about her homeschooling experience and what it was like to transition to an examination year student.

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VERY OFTEN, I WOULD HAVE PEOPLE COMING UP TO ME and ask “What’s homeschooling like? Do you feel as if you’ve been deprived of a normal schooling life?” Looking back at my 8 years of homeschooling experience, I can confidently say that I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Homeschooling really broke down the walls of structure that schools have. It gave me the liberty and time to explore and learn many different things at my own pace.

For instance, I was able to pick up many instruments, go for art classes, play different kinds of sports and study at the same time. Through homeschooling, I was able to explore all these things and pick up the skills that I had interest in. And so, I felt that as a child I was given a vast exposure to discover myself.

MY CLASSROOM FOLLOWED ME

I remember that there were days when I would do nothing but music. There were times when I would draw a lot and also, times when my brothers and I played a lot. I don’t remember my homeschooling being wholly academic. In fact, there were instances when my mom would take us to the KL Library and we would spend the day poring over books. We had excursions to the zoo and to bread-making factories with other homeschooling families. There was no physical classroom for me. I felt that everywhere I went, my classroom followed me! I would never ever trade my homeschooling experience for anything else.

Having said all these, I was really excited when I discovered that I was going to be enrolled in an O-Levels center. I’ve always wondered what it would be like to have a group of friends I could call my classmates, a group I could identify with and see every day, not just once a month. I felt that after being homeschooled for so long, it was time to move on to something different. I felt really thrilled to be able to enter a classroom setting.

A DIFFERENT PHASE

In Frontier Learning Centre, I met many new friends and finally had a physical classroom! I even had different teachers who taught me and the opportunity to learn new subjects that were very alien to me. Among these subjects were Physics, Economics, Accounts, Additional Mathematics and Chemistry. And for the first time in my life, I had a chance to see where I stood when my work was graded by teachers in an actual classroom setting. It was quite intimidating at first as learning in a group was definitely a different experience for me.

My 18 months in FLC was equally as enjoyable as my years of homeschooling. FLC has given me friends and great memories. It opened up new doors for me which took learning to a new level. I felt that studying in the center has helped me get accustomed to what it would be like when I moved on to college. I was able to do projects with my classmates and even science experiments in a lab. These were things that I couldn’t do while I was homeschooling and so, it was very fulfilling.

IT’S THE JOURNEY, NOT THE RESULTS

Preparing for the O-Levels exam was another different experience. I wouldn’t say it was a good experience, but neither will I call it bad – it was altogether a whole new phase! Mainly it was because it would be the first major exam my classmates and I had ever prepared for. The reality of it all was quite daunting because it appeared that our future literally depended on how well we performed in the forthcoming exams. Well, at least that was what went on at the back of my mind.

However, after sitting for my O-Levels I learnt that the end results didn’t really matter that much. Once the moment was over, and as time passed, my results didn’t really play as sweetly in my ears as they did the first time I obtained them. The thing that really left a great impact on me was the process. The journey that I took to get there was more meaningful to me than the exam results themselves. Indeed, I really owe everything that I’ve gained to FLC and I thank my dedicated and loving teachers for all they have done.

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Pix: Petrina who is presently sitting for her A Levels, poses with her parents Alan and Katherine Phua. Not in the picture are her 2 brothers – Philip (19), & Phileon (14). The Phua Family worships at Full Gospel Assembly in KL.

Related posts on homeschoolers who have moved on to O Levels and beyond:
Brian
Cherish
Ethan
Rachel
Jian Eu
Jianwen
Balakrishna
From homeschool to O Levels
Yao-ban

9 Essential Skills Kids Should Learn

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Wordpress on 17 Feb 2012.

[A friend shared this link with me and I am sure it's a piece that will have you wondering why more parents aren't homeschooling their children.  You may not agree with everything the author says,  but there's a lot that strikes home. ]

9 Essential Skills Kids Should Learn
Post written by Leo Babauta.

Kids in today’s school system are not being prepared well for tomorrow’s world.

As someone who went from the corporate world and then the government world to the ever-changing online world, I know how the world of yesterday is rapidly becoming irrelevant. I was trained in the newspaper industry, where we all believed we would be relevant forever — and I now believe will go the way of the horse and buggy.

Unfortunately, I was educated in a school system that believed the world in which it existed would remain essentially the same, with minor changes in fashion. We were trained with a skill set that was based on what jobs were most in demand in the 1980s, not what might happen in the 2000s.

And that kinda makes sense, given that no one could really know what life would be like 20 years from now. Imagine the 1980s, when personal computers were still fairly young, when faxes were the cutting-edge communication technology, when the Internet as we now know it was only the dream of sci-fi writers like William Gibson.

We had no idea what the world had in store for us.

And here’s the thing: we still don’t. We never do. We have never been good at predicting the future, and so raising and educating our kids as if we have any idea what the future will hold is not the smartest notion.

How then to prepare our kids for a world that is unpredictable, unknown? By teaching them to adapt, to deal with change, to be prepared for anything by not preparing them for anything specific.

This requires an entirely different approach to child-rearing and education. It means leaving our old ideas at the door, and reinventing everything.

My drop-dead gorgeous wife Eva (yes, I’m a very lucky man) and I are among those already doing this. We homeschool our kids — more accurately, we unschool them. We are teaching them to learn on their own, without us handing knowledge down to them and testing them on that knowledge.

It is, admittedly, a wild frontier, and most of us who are experimenting with unschooling will admit that we don’t have all the answers, that there is no set of “best practices”. But we also know that we are learning along with our kids, and that not knowing can be a good thing — an opportunity to find out, without relying on established methods that might not be optimal.

I won’t go too far into methods here, as I find them to be less important than ideas. Once you have some interesting ideas to test, you can figure out an unlimited amount of methods, and so my dictating methods would be too restrictive.

Instead, let’s look at a good set of essential skills that I believe children should learn, that will best prepare them for any world of the future. I base these on what I have learned in three different industries, especially the world of online entreprenurship, online publishing, online living … and more importantly, what I have learned about learning and working and living in a world that will never stop changing.

(On to the Nine Skills – read the rest of the post here.)

THIRD CULTURE KIDS SEMINAR

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Announcement; Parenting on 4 Nov 2011.

THIRD CULTURE KIDS PARENT SEMINAR
with CHRIS O’SHAUGHNESSY

WHEN: Saturday, November 5
TIME: 7:00-8:30 pm
WHERE: International Church @ Mont Kiara (IC@MK)
B-02-07 Gateway Kiaramas, Mont Kiara
We are located not far from Garden International School
CONTACT: Scott 016 348 2853

A Third Culture Kid himself Chris O travels and speaks internationally to parents, teachers, and friends of Third Culture Kids in an effort to better prepare them for their unique adventures of cross cultural living. There are no fees for this seminar, please come and join us and bring your friends.

What’s your homeschooling model?

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Curriculum on 12 Oct 2011.

IN MY LAST POST, I SUGGESTED THAT PICKING THE RIGHT CURRICULUM should come after the following considerations: worldview, circumstance, and learning goal. Clear these important issues, and you’re in a better place to think about approaches to homeschooling your child and the kind of tools you will require.

Homeschooling is such an organic lifestyle involving parenting and a way of life, you should assess and review your situation and education needs regularly.

As a quick aside, let me explain that when I use the term “homeschool” I refer to parents educating their own children at home. Some parents prefer ’home education’ to ’homeschool’ because the suffix ’school’ has the sound of – *shudder* – fingernails scratching the chalkboard. Anyway, for better or worse, we’ll stick with homeschool.

Sure, there will be occasions when learning takes place outside the home – through   co-op learning, extra-curricular activities, short-term tuition and courses, the use of community resources, etc. But where parents are their children’s primary educator, that’s homeschooling or home education.

In this second part of 5 Steps to Choosing the Right Homeschool Curriculum,
I’ll be looking at Methodology.

STEP 4

METHODOLOGY: As alternative education, homeschooling is an approach that ranges from radical to conservative, with a number of colourful shades in between. What this means is, your choice of curricula is going to be decided by the method of education that takes place in your home.

As the diagram shows, homeschooling models fall into three main classifications. There are no neat boundaries though. Notice how these 3 circles overlap – as they should – because the principles of learning and education at home transcend methodology, and you can find this in most homeschools.

An unschooler is a homeschooler who subscribes to natural learning – largely unstructured, and always child-led. It’s not curriculum-dictated, but interest-driven. It was John Holt who first coined the word unschooling to mean learning as a natural process. If you are unschooling, you will have no use for packaged curricula, choosing instead to use whatever teaching aid and learning material that matches your child’s readiness and interests.

On the far right of the homeschool spectrum is the family that literally replicates school in the home. It’s a traditional school-at-home method that is generally structured by grade and curriculum, and for some, a daily class timetable is strictly adhered to as well. I’m sure this group of homeschoolers believe in natural learning too, except that many parents also feel strongly that guided learning instills much-needed discipline that is so essential to good learning habits.

In the middle of it all is a broad segment of homeschoolers who appreciate the ideals of child-led education but prefer some academic structure as well. They’re eclectic by inclination and therefore are not bogged down by packaged curricula, and use a bit of everything the family deems appropriate. Eclectic homeschoolers do not see curricula as an end in itself, but a tool to provide functional learning.

By now it should be evident how your curriculum choice follows your homeschooling model.  Pat Montgomery of Clonlara used to say that a child’s education is about the child and not the trappings of institutional schools. If you hold on to that thought, you will avoid the kiasu search for the World’s Best Homeschooling Curriculum  (as if there were one) and the anxiety attacks of Not Learning Enough (as if one could cover ALL subjects equally).

Next: we conclude with a look at Curriculum.

Study in the US – Eli360 & Calvin College

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Announcement; College/University on 4 Oct 2011.

THIS IS THE SEASON WHEN REPRESENTATIVES from college admission offices visit to present their campus programmes and talk to prospective students and their parents. If you are exploring education in a reputable christian college in the US, look out for the following visits in Penang, Ipoh, and Kuala Lumpur.

Look out for visits from:

ELI 360
Please check NOTICES for more info regarding visits in Penang and Ipoh
To arrange for a meeting in Kuala Lumpur/Petaling Jaya call Jin Choo 013-4381164

CALVIN COLLEGE
Please contact Teresa 012-2782341

Information on the visits may be obtained from our NOTICES page.

5 steps to choosing the right homeschool curriculum

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: College/University; Curriculum on 3 Oct 2011.

I DON’T WANT TO GIVE THE IMPRESSION that purchasing a curriculum is like sitting for the final year exams. Nevertheless, in this follow-up to my previous post on Curriculum, I have devised a chart that outlines 5 steps to choosing the right homeschool curriculum to put things in perspective. Think through the Big Picture basics of Worldview, Circumstances, Learning Goal, Methodology, and Curriculum as far as you are able before whipping out a credit card, and you’re off to a good start!

WORLDVIEW: The first place to start is also the heart of a curriculum choice. A worldview is simply one’s belief system or inner conviction about reality, morality, and the purpose of life. Whether religious or not, well-articulated or fuzzy, everyone has a worldview. It’s what shapes your values and influences the decisions you make.

A lot of popular homeschooling curricula are Christian in worldview – ACE, Alpha & Omega, Abeka, Bob Jones, and Sonlight. Although less common, curricula for other faith communities such as Muslim, Hindu, and Buddhist, are beginning to find their way online and into bookstores. Just Google to find links to suppliers and publishers.

Understandably, you might find these curricula a bad fit if you are not particularly religious. But as homeschool becomes an acceptable education option, more diverse and secular curricula have become available. Among these are Waldorf-inspired Christopherus Homeschool, Calvert School, K12 which combines online and offline tools, and Time4learning.

STEP 2

CIRCUMSTANCES: What’s your family situation and needs? Are you parenting a gifted child, or one with learning differences such as dyslexia or autism? Is your child diagnosed with developmental delays? If you’re in any of these situations it is imperative that an appropriate curriculum is used.

Consider also the number of children at home. What are their ages? Will you be teaching one or more children at the same time? What’s their learning style? Preschoolers and very young children require a different learning experience from an early teen or high schooler who needs more sit-down time.

Remember, you left traditional schooling to get away from cookie-cutter learning, so don’t tie yourself in knots comparing your circumstances with others. We’re all different. The wonderful thing about homeschooling is you get to make your own rules, determine your own learning material. And why not? After all, who knows your child better than yourself?

STEP 3

LEARNING GOAL: There are two aspects to a child’s learning goal, heart and head. Of course, I use these words broadly to encompass character (heart) and academic (head) development.

A child’s education should include social skills towards adult maturity and growth of character. These are values drawn from your worldview, faith-based or secular. Although more will be caught than taught, responsible parents will make it their aim to nurture ethical and moral integrity through modeling and teaching.

An academic goal looks at the end of a child’s typical homeschooling journey through Grade 10. Is it college? Is your son a likely candidate for Pimp My Ride or is he a botanist in the making? You will agree that not everyone is academically inclined, so wise parents will not insist their child aim for Oxford and Harvard when she has a thing for dance and fashion designing, for instance.

Meanwhile, young children would do well to focus on reading, spelling, phonics, writing, vocabulary, and numeracy as their learning goal in the early years. Give some thought to your child’s learning readiness too, as the brain’s ability to master and apply different concepts do not all appear at the same time!

If the US is your goal, two college admissions tests are SAT and ACT, with SAT the more popular. Practically all homeschooling curricula originating in US claim to prepare students for these admissions tests, although requirements will vary from college to college.

Admission into private colleges in Malaysia and in Commonwealth countries is better served by IGCSE O-Levels, however. Note that popular US curricula AOP, ACE or Sonlight DO NOT adequately prepare you for the IGCSE O-Levels exams which qualify you for local private colleges (and those in Commonwealth nations).

Although they may equip a student intellectually and provide some foundation in grade appropriate subjects, they are not O-Level exam-specific in scope. You could simply opt out of US-based curricula for one that is O-Levels based, or aim at a minimum of 18-month prep in O-level exam subjects after Grade 8. (More here in the Resources page)

A note of caution: It’s fine if academic goals are not too clear when a family begins homeschooling. In our family, we did not talk about college until our boys were past 15 or 16. We simply felt sure that the environment they grew up in and their love for learning would equip them intellectually and sufficiently for whatever course they would finally pursue - when they were ready. In any case, it’s okay if a child isn’t cut out for college and indeed, not everyone needs a college degree! (Read this)

NEXT POST: Methodology and Curriculum Choice

What curriculum?

Posted by DAVID BC TAN under: Curriculum; Reading on 26 Sep 2011.

USUALLY AFTER A FAMILY HAS DECIDED TO HOMESCHOOL, the first question that comes up is, “What curriculum should we use?”  As I have said elsewhere, we did not invest in any formal curriculum until our two boys were 10 and 8 years old. In the early years of homeschooling, reading was practically the primary learning activity in our home.

Getting kids hooked on reading is the road to learning success, and countless studies attest to this. We read widely and voraciously. We borrowed books from the library, we did read-alouds that developed active listening skills, which led to conversation and promoted critical thinking. Eventually we settled on Sonlight because we were all readers to begin with, and you should see our boys’ faces when the package arrived!

Certainly we were overwhelmed as any new homeschooler would be when faced with the staggering amount of curriculum available, so polished and glossy, all screaming at us, “Buy me! Buy me!” Everything seemed more colourful and so much more interesting, you almost felt cleverer just looking at the titles.

Some caveats are in order, however:

Please note that you don’t have to buy everything all at once. And neither is everything necessary. Besides you can always try to source some material locally to save costs.

Second, you don’t have to stick to ONE curriculum or publisher all the way from Grade 1 to Grade 10. Yes, you are allowed to experiment, supplement, and even ditch the whole curriculum in favour of something more eclectic or tailored to a specific need of the student.

Third, it is possible to minimize expenses by using resources available in your local library. You can even homeschool using FREE stuff online – something pioneering homeschoolers knew nothing about in pre-internet days. For example, see Khan Academy, Charlotte Mason Curriculum Guide, or Homeschooling 4 Free.

With that out of the way, we’re back to the question: “What curriculum should we use?”

The short answer is, “Anything.” You can use anything and everything that you can lay your hands on. Literally.

The long answer is, well, considerably lengthier and it begins with the Big Picture. I’ll say more in the next post.