HomeSchooling, Germany and US

HomeSchooling, Germany and US · Other Thread Under Same Video (excursus : Continuing first separate Thread) · When bullies and bullied are both stuck in the same school ... · There are Other Debates Too

Homeschooling: BANNED in Germany, POPULAR in America?
The Black Forest Family, 13 Nov. 2022
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZ5hBKAGbdM

I

1:09 Since 1919? I thought it was since Reichsschulgesetz 1938.

One thing less to blame Hitler for ... would you mind telling me what exact German politician did this horrid move (which Hitler didn't alleviate, to his great discredit)?

I actually looked it up. No specific text specifically banning homeschooling, just general requirements to have schooling and the provision that schools can be run by the state or by private confessional actors. Here is article 146.

"Das öffentliche Schulwesen ist organisch auszugestalten. Auf einer für alle gemeinsamen Grundschule baut sich das mittlere und höhere Schulwesen auf. Für diesen Aufbau ist die Mannigfaltigkeit der Lebensberufe, für die Aufnahme eines Kindes in eine bestimmte Schule sind seine Anlage und Neigung, nicht die wirtschaftliche und gesellschaftliche Stellung oder das Religionsbekenntnis seiner Eltern maßgebend. Innerhalb der Gemeinden sind indes auf Antrag von Erziehungsberechtigten Volksschulen ihres Bekenntnisses oder ihrer Weltanschauung einzurichten, soweit hierdurch ein geordneter Schulbetrieb, auch im Sinne des Abs. 1, nicht beeinträchtigt wird. Der Wille der Erziehungsberechtigten ist möglichst zu berücksichtigen. Das Nähere bestimmt die Landesgesetzgebung nach den Grundsätzen eines Reichsgesetzes. Für den Zugang Minderbemittelter zu den mittleren und höheren Schulen sind durch Reich, Länder und Gemeinden öffentliche Mittel bereitzustellen, insbesondere Erziehungsbeihilfen für die Eltern von Kindern, die zur Ausbildung auf mittleren und höheren Schulen für geeignet erachtet werden, bis zur Beendigung ihrer Ausbildung."

Note the "Der Wille der Erziehungsberechtigten ist möglichst zu berücksichtigen." - This theoretically could let in homeschooling through the backdoor, especially if there is no specific ban in the Land.

Compare this, which is much more explicit:

Gesetz über die Schulpflicht im Deutschen Reich vom 6. Juli 1938* (Reichsschulpflichtgesetz)

§ 5. Erfüllung der Volksschulpflicht.
(1) Zum Besuch der Volksschule sind alle Kinder verpflichtet, soweit nicht für ihre Erziehung und Unterweisung in anderer Weise ausreichend gesorgt ist.
(2) Während der vier ersten Jahrgänge der Volksschule darf anderweitiger Unterricht an Stelle des Besuchs der Volksschule nur ausnahmsweise in besonderen Fällen gestattet werden. Der Übergang zu einer mittleren oder höheren Schule richtet sich nach den hierfür erlassenen besonderen Bestimmungen.

* note

The law was by Minister of Education Martin Bohrmann and Führer Adolf Hitler.

II

1:12 Enshrined in some state constitutions as well?

Could the ban of 1919 have concerned sth like Freistaat Preußen or sth? In that case, Hitler's and Bohrmann's Reichsshulgesetz would still be to blame for extending it to other states.

III

9:14 Dealing with bullying is supposed to give you what appropriate "soft skill" later on in life?

The "soft skill" of identfying yourself as a bully victim and "not provoke" bullying later on?

Stepping down a bit is one response to bullying. I actually did that in 11th and 12th grade, and I think that, as opposed to homeschooling, handicapped me. It pushed me out of the assertiveness which would have been useful. It pushed me out of relying on my rights as being inalienable. It invited later persons to do some soft bullying which is still going on. And those who are doing it now, arguably imagine they are providing "appropriate soft skills" for my future. I am 54, if this doesn't stop, there is no future, or the future is a dystopia which I don't want to think about.

IV

dialogue

Hans-Georg Lundahl

9:18 Team work.

Peace. I recall group works. In any theoretic subject, without experimentation, I was likely to do more than my share of the work. And no, the repeated experience didn't give me the skill to get the other team mates working for the project.

The Black Forest Family

Respectfully, that outlook distills team projects down to issues of perceived 'fairness' - which will never be found in a work environment. Depriving students of the ability to work in groups robs them of the preparation needed to handle unequal share of work, conflict resolution, and performance under pressure.

I taught for years in a school of architecture.... and while we had our share of gifted students who would prefer to work alone than share the work with students who didn't pull their weight - that would not appropriately prepare them to work in a firm where group projects are the standard. Even in professional practice we have colleagues who struggle with time management, colleagues who force others to do more than their fair share of the work.... but yet, the client deserves to have their project completed on time and to the standard which their industry expects.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family Thank you.

You have a point.

School as preparation for certain types of private enterprise. Not quite agriculture, not quite the military, not quite academia, but private sector firms. Also not writing, which is my business (perhaps because I still suck at team work).

Well, it is in a sense the most common one, though obviously, the two biggest employer categories are "the state" (Bund, Länder and perhaps even municipalities) and the main confessions, in Germany, as I learned on the other thread. [under the other video]

V

dialogue

Hans-Georg Lundahl

9:18 bis

Oh, the public school system is doing so much to encourage critical thinking about the flaws of the theory of evolution ...
- Wait? What did you say?
- Critical thinking is supposed to be a one way affair directed only by evolution believers and only against their pet peeves like "religious fanatics"? Sorry I didn't get the memo!

Adaptability?
Like adapting to the ideology of bullies so as not to get their bullying?

The guy who in boarding school bullied me as a homosexual, which I wasn't and still am not, could have ceased bullying me if I had adapted to his will of me making broad jokes like "oh, my butt has this peculiar itch" or things ...

A court which thinks schools teach adaptability is just a pain in the ass!

The Black Forest Family

I completely agree that schools should do more to address bullying. Especially in the current environment where cyber bulling amongst students is not only easier to do, but harder to get "caught" we need to not only teach our students kindness and compassion, but also provide them with the support needed to navigate and remediate bullying situations.

And to your first point.... which flaws exactly on the theory of evolution would you prefer public schools teach? Presuming a discussion of these flaws should be rooted in peer-reviewed, and reputable science and not religion.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family "I completely agree that schools should do more to address bullying."

Like the not very much doing but still acting possibility of allowing homeschooling?

"And to your first point.... which flaws exactly on the theory of evolution would you prefer public schools teach?"

Why should the theory of evolution be on par with "maths" rather than the "Catholic catechesis" or "Lutheran catechesis" or "Calvinist catechesis" and in Berlin even "Muslim catechesis" while "Jewish catechesis" was always marginal but equally possible to the Christian confessions since the system started?

"Presuming a discussion of these flaws should be rooted in peer-reviewed, and reputable science and not religion."

An evolutionist like P. Z. Myers is a reputable scientist to Evolutionists and he gets peer reviewed by Evolutionists. If a Creationist would like to refute a point of his, in Nature Genetics, he would also get peer reviewed by Evolutionists. Would you see a problem if a Calvinist and a Catholic were both reviewed by a Calvinist when publishing theology? I would.

The Black Forest Family

The root of your argument comes down to one, very important flaw: religious "belief" doesn't pass the scientific method. Because you believe something to be true does not make it fact. The theory of evolution is on par with mathematics as a teachable standard, and not creationism (or with any other religious ideology). This is because evolution is observable, measurable, and we are able to test for it.

How would one begin to even measure 'God' and to that note... there are some 3,000 gods discussed throughout human history - which god is worth measuring and teaching? Can we replicate this God's actions under neutral conditions?

A scientist to presents new information on the theory of evolution is not only being peer reviewed by "evolutionists" but other fields of scientific study.

So my question - "which flaws on evolution would you presume be taught?" is my way of asking - can you provide a scenario where a teacher could discuss the flaws of this theory without relying of a belief system that is incongruent with the scientific method?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family "Because you believe something to be true does not make it fact."

Thank you. Goes for the evolution belief as well.

It is for instance not a fact that you find "double articulation" (this doesn't mean two tiers, but three tiers, and articulation means each [of the tiers] subdivided in the [next] lower one) in non-human animals.

"The theory of evolution is on par with mathematics as a teachable standard,"

I think you should take a little look at how you have been influenced by academic and professional peers over the last decades ... how many things have you accepted because everyone says it?

"This is because evolution is observable, measurable, and we are able to test for it."

You don't observe the 111 or more cell types in a human body getting added one by one in our supposed ancestry since the first multicellular eucaryote.

And any test about man evolving language with neither an eternity of human existence or a God with eternal pre-existence providing it has a negative result.

"How would one begin to even measure 'God' and to that note..."

There are confession neutral definitions of Theism. The God of Catholic Christianity and the God of Islam are not the same God, one of them is superfluous, but the philosophical tenet of Theism is studying the "skillset" claimed for both.

"there are some 3,000 gods discussed throughout human history - which god is worth measuring and teaching?"

History can perhaps show miracles clustering around one particular religion?

"Can we replicate this God's actions under neutral conditions?"

That's not the only standard for exact knowledge. Critical math theory says even math isn't studied under neutral conditions, that doesn't give me any qualms about believing Pythagoras' theorem. Or accepting it.

And history is absolutely not studied like that.

"A scientist to presents new information on the theory of evolution is not only being peer reviewed by "evolutionists" but other fields of scientific study."

Evolutionist is not referring to "evolution biologist" (a scientific or pseudo-scientific study), it's referring to someone believing in The Synthetic Theory of Evolution.

"can you provide a scenario where a teacher could discuss the flaws of this theory without relying of a belief system that is incongruent with the scientific method?"

I was objecting to a teacher who referred to the ultra long time spans. I was giving the theory of "carbon 14 rise" (which I still hold to in modified form) as an objection against conventional carbon 14 dating (which back then went back 40 000 years, and that was then one argument against the Biblical timescale).

I was not asking him to conduct this discussion, I was asking him to reply in my discussion, and I was silenced. Not first or second question, but next one.

I think he quickly nailed that I was religious (back then not yet Catholic), and used that as pretending my argument depended on my religion. In fact not, if carbon 14 rose, radically, it was lower before, if it was lower before, the mere mechanics of the method will give too high an age. The cue to getting 39000 BP into the Biblical time scale (if carbon dated), is, back in 2957 BC (year of the Flood), the carbon 14 level was not yet 100 pmC but just 1.628 pmC.

If it was 1.628 pmC a little less than 5730 years ago, the remainder (in dead organic samples which unlike the atmosphere don't renew) is now a little more than half that level. And reaching that would have taken 39000 years if one had started with 100 pmC.

That I believe it true doesn't make the carbon 14 level five thousand years ago 1.628 pmC. But that they believe it to be true also doesn't make the carbon 14 level 5000 and 39000 years ago close to 100 pmC. The question can either not be settled or must be settled on other grounds, and the other ground I stand on is history, more specifically Biblical history.

VI

11:25 and socialised

Ironic. Four children. No team work, no adaptability (but real adaptability, not adapting to bullies) ... seriously.

Sufficient education? Perhaps they didn't believe the Theory of Evolution?

If the Wunderlichs had been Muslims, the guys involved in persecuting them might have got very unpleasant visits, in some cases perhaps lethal ones.

For any fan of Samuel Paty, he would have been alive if the Muslims in his town had felt confident in trying to open private schools or, if that failed, trying to homeschool.

To me, he is not a victim of Muslim fanaticism primarily (in a sense to Muslim pragmatism even: a family that hadn't as far as we were told tried to take their children out of school, a school girl given the opportunity to walk out of class, who didn't dare to), but to the Secularist Anti-Home-School squad which idolises him.

Dear Black Forest Family, it is a very [f]amous case here in France, it will probably be easy to look up, and if English translations are too incomplete, you certainly have friends around who know French and can translate sources from here.

Meanwhile, the guys who persecuted Dirk and Petra, and their four children, they were lucky that this family was not just Christian, but the kind of "non-denominational" who think that turning the other cheek applies equally to all Christians, to all situations.

VII

13:54 I can spot a possible flaw when you mention the "limited" study point.

The president of the organisation may have

• gone to academia (after 12th grade)
• looked up test results for non-homeschool and homeschooled backgrounds and compared

This obviously leaves out all and any homeschoolers who didn't continue after 12th or even after 9th grade (not sure when your schooling obligation ceases, in Sweden when I grew up, it was grades 1 to 9, not K and not 10 to 12.

Fine. But academia is overrated as a path to success. If in 1900, you could get a tenure as Professor of a University subject without a PhD, so back then, having one for the relevant subject or even mildly tangential subject would have been an asset; in 2000 you can get a PhD and so did ten others competing for that tenure, so if you remain in Academia, you can be stuck at subalterne, less exciting and less well paid, tenures. Similarily, to get a good job outside Academia, in 1900 getting there first was much more of an asset than it is in 2000.

You've heard the Irish bull?
- This stove saves half your fuel expenses!
- Fine, I'll buy two and save all of them!

Society and Academia have done a similar priorising mistake. Are you aware that neither Astrid Lindgren nor Philippe Labro started their carreeres in journalism from academia? They just got hired in papers and started writing (Astrid Lindgren didn't stay a journalist, she's most famous as children's book author).

More and more blocks and checks are put into place before one can get started in life, and this leads to more and more people getting marginalised in sometimes fairly painful ways.

There is a youtuber in Sweden, at high school she got grades varying between E, D and (her high) C.

She runs a café.

VIII

dialogue

Hans-Georg Lundahl

14:22 The study only investigated 0.5 %?

Sounds like a sample. Do you have any evidence it was a biassed sample?

The Black Forest Family

Yes, all of those who participated in this study came families with registered participation in the same homeschooling organization and families self-reported.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family Wait, if the families self reported, where did the numbers for non-homeschoolers come from?

If a study says category such and such is doing so and so much better than their peers at university, where did the study get the numbers for non-homeschooled peers?

The Black Forest Family

All public schools are required to report academic achievement statistics to the U.S. Department of Education.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family And if that is where the study by the home school association (Brian D. Ray, right?) got his stats from, he didn't get them just from homeschoolers self reporting.

And whether his sample was just 0.5 % of homeschoolers, or 0.5 % of an entire population with 2 % homeschoolers, the mention from Jeff Allen certainly involved 0.5 % of the population, i e 25 % of the home schoolers.

IX

15:38 Yeah - but that's because private schools have caught up with homeschoolers. Public school has caught up with neither.

15:42
"ACT participation rates" - I can get how homeschoolers could goad each other to more participation - but only if they expected good grades.
"and sociodemographic characteristics" - meaning being homeschooled with a bourgeois family with reading habits and habits of quiet gives you the advantage of coming from such a family that you wouldn't miss in a private school, but you would miss in public school, by dilution.

X

dialogue

Hans-Georg Lundahl

17:02 It would seem 25 % in both years, and that's a pretty good score (insofar as Academia is any good at all) for any given subgroup.

0.5 % is 25 % of 2 %,
0.8 % is 25 % of 3.2 %, fairly close to the 3 % we were talking about.

Probably higher than those planning Academia from Bronx or suburbs similar than that, and that doesn't mean public schools there close down.

The Black Forest Family

You are misunderstanding the issue with the test group.

25% is not about whether or not it is a "representative population group", but that in many states, 100% of the children are required to test, regardless of whether or not they plan to be college bound.

Homeschoolers which choose to pay out of pocket to take the ACT or SAT likely intend to pursue college and likely either took additional preparatory classes or feel that their academic achievement would be a good platform to pursue additional post-secondary education. This leads to an inflated over estimate on the average likely ACT score of a homeschooler should all homeschoolers be required to test.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family "Homeschoolers which choose to pay out of pocket to take the ACT or SAT likely intend to pursue college"

Precisely my point.

Would 25 % of the high school in Bronx intend to pursue college?

The Black Forest Family

Not sure about the fascination with the Bronx, but as a whole, 61.8 percent of recent high school graduates enrolled in college in October 2021.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family Sure. If you pit homeschoolers against all other groups together.

But not if you pit them against each group of public school children separately.

A nation with 61.8 % high school graduates going to college is obviously a nation devaluating the value in "what work will it get me" of going to college.

If the school in Bronx (and similar) isn't closing down for less than 25 % going to college, you don't close down homeschooling either, were pretty exactly 25 % seem to be doing that.

The Black Forest Family

....I'm really trying to follow your line of argument but jumping to "closing" homeschooling isnt now on a completely different path entirely.

My refute of the initial statistic is give caution to those who use it to say that homeschoolers outperform public school children academically. These studies are inherently flawed and as shown, overinflate Performance for homeschoolers.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family I appreciate you don't want to close down homeschooling, but some probably do - as some Germans, perhaps in 1919 and certainly by 1938 were doing. Macron has recently tried that in France and I think Trudeau did sth similar.

So, it was not an accusation against you, just a caution against taking your observations to such lengths.

The Black Forest Family

No. The study conducted by Brian Ray was not gathering statistics on homeschooling from the US Department of education. You are welcome to read his study (which was funded by a homeschooling lobby group) - He asked homeschooling students who belonged to a specific organization to self-report standardized testing scores.

In contrast, the comparative sample from public schools is open source information provided by the US Department of Education. The US Department of education does not collect or analyze any wide scale assessment of homeschooled kids because there is not regulatory pathway to do so. Many states do not even require homeschooled parents or families to register or notify them when they pull their kids out of school.

And again, you are misunderstanding statistics. His sample was 0.5% of all homeschoolers (approximately 12,000 people).

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family "You are welcome to read his study (which was funded by a homeschooling lobby group)"

Is it available online?

"His sample was 0.5% of all homeschoolers (approximately 12,000 people)."

But Jeff's isn't. That's what I am not misinterpreting.

"The US Department of education does not collect or analyze any wide scale assessment of homeschooled kids because there is not regulatory pathway to do so."

According to Jeff, they are in fact getting 25 % of the homeschoolers, and that's what I am talking about.

I rechecked the video

and having done that, I added:

Hans-Georg Lundahl

@The Black Forest Family At 15:34 you are citing Jeff Allen, PhD.
16:18 2 % homeschooled = 0.5 % of students who took the test were homeschooled
= 25 %