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    by Mike McHugh

Adult Re-education: An Important Benefit of Home Schooling
Date Posted: December 28, 2006

National studies have revealed that in spite of our nation’s preoccupation with and commitment to raising educational standards, the United States has over twenty-five million adults who are "functionally illiterate." Various educational authorities from differing backgrounds have also concluded that America is a nation at risk because we are rapidly becoming incapable of competing economically with other industrial nations due to the fact that our work force is grossly undereducated.

Most of the efforts currently under way in our nation to combat the plague of educational malpractice, (brought to us by tax supported government schools) are coming from the private sector. Of all the non-governmental initiatives that are cited by analysts as an important factor in the movement to re-educate young adults, however, the one that is rarely mentioned is home education---but it should be!

All across the U.S., over one million parents have opted to become directly involved with the education of their children through home education. Although it is true that virtually none of these parents are truly illiterate, yet, it is entirely probable that a number of them received poor instruction in at least one key area of their education. The simple truth, is that the vast majority of adults living in America today,(many of whom may even be considered successful), have at least one major area of weakness in their education. Very few adults can honestly say that they seldom struggle with spelling and grammar tasks, or with math, science, or history for that matter. The golden opportunity to learn a given subject well has slipped by many parents, and in most cases unless these adults are put in a position where they need to re-learn subject matter, they will not try.

This is precisely why home education is fulfilling such a vital role in the movement to re-educate adults in the U.S. When parents take on the task of teaching, they are often placed in the position of having to go back to school themselves. Many parents in home education circles find out how little they really know about important topics. They also begin to see how their government school training has programmed them to approach learning and the world around them from a worldly and secular perspective. After all, most parents in America have been carefully sheltered from a biblically oriented education.

As one who has worked in the field of Christian home schooling for nearly thirty years, I well remember reading numerous letters from home school parents who humbly admitted that they were sometimes "learning right along with their children". The time has come for more parents to recognize their need to face their own academic shortcomings, and to use the option of home education as a means to improve their own base of knowledge. Children need to recognize that learning is a lifelong pursuit, and this principle is transmitted to young people in vivid color when they can see it lived out by their own parents on a daily basis. The sooner adults strip off their pride or indifference and admit that their own education is far from perfect, the better. The future of our nation, its free institutions, and the family rests largely upon the imperative of adult re-education.

"Word from Scotland" from Sandy Shaw

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Biography Information:
This column is written by the staff at Christian Liberty Academy in Arlington Heights, Illinois. As a pioneer in the homeschool movement, Christian Liberty ministries has been operating a full service, K-12 home school program for over thirty years and a Christian textbook ministry (Christian Liberty Press), since 1985. The mission of Christian Liberty is to provide parents with quality, affordable educational products and services that will enable them to teach their children in the home and to train their children to serve Christ in every area of life. A more extensive explanation of the CLASS home school program can be obtained at www.homeschools.org.
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