Research & Statistics
Resources
Kingdom of Children : Culture and Controversy in the Homeschooling Movement (Princeton Studies in Cultural Sociology)
More than one million American children are schooled by their parents. As their ranks grow, home schoolers are making headlines by winning national spelling bees and excelling at elite universities. The few studies conducted suggest that homeschooled children are academically successful and remarkably well socialized. Yet we still know little about this alternative to one of society's most fundamental institutions. Beyond a vague notion of children reading around the kitchen table, we don't know what home schooling looks like from the inside.
Sociologist Mitchell Stevens goes behind the scenes of the homeschool movement and into the homes and meetings of home schoolers. What he finds are two very different kinds of home education--one rooted in the liberal alternative school movement of the 1960s and 1970s and one stemming from the Christian day school movement of the same era. Stevens explains how this dual history shapes the meaning and practice of home schooling today. In the process, he introduces us to an unlikely mix of parents (including fundamentalist Protestants, pagans, naturalists, and educational radicals) and notes the core values on which they agree: the sanctity of childhood and the primacy of family in the face of a highly competitive, bureaucratized society.
Kingdom of Children aptly places home schoolers within longer traditions of American social activism. It reveals that home schooling is not a random collection of individuals but an elaborate social movement with its own celebrities, networks, and characteristic lifeways. Stevens shows how home schoolers have built their philosophical and religious convictions into the practical structure of the cause, and documents the political consequences of their success at doing so.
Ultimately, the history of home schooling serves as a parable about the organizational strategies of the progressive left and the religious right since the 1960s.Kingdom of Children shows what happens when progressive ideals meet conventional politics, demonstrates the extraordinary political capacity of conservative Protestantism, and explains the subtle ways in which cultural sensibility shapes social movement outcomes more generally.
The Homeschooling Revolution
Research Organizations
The Home School Researcher
Education Resources Information Center (ERIC)
Cato Institute
National Home Education Research Institute (NHERI)
Home School Research from HSLDA
Homeschool Research Analysis
Home Schooling and the Question of Socialization
Virtually all homeschooling parents will hear the question at some point ... What about socialization? It is a puzzling question to homeschoolers, as the term itself has various meanings. This well-documented paper by Richard G. Medlin takes a look at this question and concludes that homeschooled children certainly are not isolated. In fact, they associate with and feel close to many types of people. Their socialization skills are very good and they demonstrate good self-esteem, confidence, and resiliency.
Evidence for Homeschooling: Constitutional Analysis in Light of Social Science Research
Homeschooling: A Growing Option in American Education
The Rise of Home Schooling Among African-Americans
Homeschooling Grows in the Black Community
How do Unschoolers Turn Out?
As more and more families take up unschooling, self-directed education, researchers have pondered whether it is a successful learning model or not. Peter Gray and Gina Riley offer the results of a survey of 232 parents who unschooled their children. The results were overwhelmingly positive about the unschooling experience. In a follow-up survey, Gray asked children who had been unschooled for their feedback. They recounted their experiences and how it affected their lives as adults, with most saying that the advantages outweighed the disadvantages of unschooling.
Statistics on Public School vs. Homeschool
Academic Statistics on Homeschooling
How Home Schooling Will Change Public Education
Homeschooling Comes of Age
Structured homeschooling gets an A+
Parents' Literacy and Their Children's Success in School: Recent Research, Promising Practices
Homeschooling Benefits: Children less preoccupied with peer acceptance
U.S. Department of Education Longitudinal Study of 2002: Homeschool Student Questionnaire
HSLDA's Position on Tax Credits Generally
Homeschooling - ERIC Digest
Homeschooling Facts
Homeschooling in the United States: 2003 Statistical Analysis Report
Research Facts on Homeschooling
NHERI, the National Home Education Research Institute, has compiled these research facts on homeschooling. These fast facts cover the number of homeschooled students, demographics, motivations for home educating, academic performance, social, emotional, and psychological development, socialization, homeschool successes, and general interpretation of research on homeschool success.
The Case for Homeschooling
Statistics and Data for Idaho and the U.S.
Homeschool Statistics and Achievements
Home School Research from HSLDA
The Characteristics of Homeschooled and Nonhomeschooled Students
Homeschooling in the United States: 2003 Statistical Analysis Report
Homeschooling in the United States: 1999
1.1 Million Homeschooled Students in the United States in 2003
Research Facts on Homeschooling
NHERI, the National Home Education Research Institute, has compiled these research facts on homeschooling. These fast facts cover the number of homeschooled students, demographics, motivations for home educating, academic performance, social, emotional, and psychological development, socialization, homeschool successes, and general interpretation of research on homeschool success.
The Case for Homeschooling
Estimated Number of Homeschooled Students in the United States - 2003
Homeschooling Rates by Student and Family Characteristics
Featured Resources
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