I wasn't sure I should hijack the thread to talk about homeschooling, but since ML has already set it free, i guess I'm safe.
My 13 year old seventh grade nephew can't read as well as my 8 year old homeschooler. Nephew goes to public school. Son's never been. Nephew's also taken a test every year that states he's reading above average in his age group! So, homeschool does have its highlights.
Although my kids go to public school, I'm generally supportive of homeschooling and think that, for many families, it's as good or better for their kids. We are fortunate to have excellent programs in our local district, but we have lived in other areas that have not been as good of a fit for my two children, and as a result, I have educated myself on homeschooling, to the point of even developing tentative curriculums, in case I needed to quickly pull them out. That said, your argument above confuses "correlation" and "causation". Your son is homeschooled and is a high-acheiver. Your nephew attends public school and is an average achiever. However, just because these things occur together doesn't prove one caused the other -- that's faulty logic.
It's probably safe to say that your 8 year old son would have outstanding reading skills whether he was homeschooled or not. He's clearly got the genes for it, plus he's got great family support -- you still would have read to him early on, helped him with phonics as he sounded out words, taken regular trips to the library, surrounded him with books at home, etc., no matter where he attended classes. Whether he would have reached his full potential in a mediocre public school is definitely arguable, but to say that the only reason he's doing well academically is because he's "never been" to a public school simply doesn't follow. Similarly, while it might be true that your nephew could improve his reading skills by being homeschooled, it's also just as possible that he could improve just as much by having better family support, attending a better quality public school, or by being willing to put forth a stronger effort on his school work ... or it could be that he simply isn't wired to be a top reader.
To include a personal example, my children are high-achievers despite my daughter attending K-2 in an inter-city public school where 95% of the kids qualified for free-or-reduced lunch and my son attending a "fun" preschool rather than the fancy academic one that the upwardly-mobile neighborhood moms swore by. Years later, they routinely outscore kids who had many more "advantages", and that includes some kids who were/are homeschooled. Would they have reached an even higher level by now if I'd kept them home? Certainly it's a possibility ... but objectively speaking, I think the positives and negatives have balanced out nicely for them and I can't think of much I'd change.
Kathy (who hopes "bashing" public schools is just as unacceptable as "bashing" homeschoolers -- too much of the decision is in the details, and can't be painted with a wide brush.)
