Educating Your Children: The Home Schooling Option
An ever growing number of thoughtful parents are concerned about the status of public schools in many cites across North America. At the same time, a good number of families are struggling to make ends meet. They simply do not have excess funds available to send their children to private schools. One solution that many families are embracing is home schooling. With each passing school year, more and more families in North America — indeed, in many countries around the world — are electing the home schooling for their children.
There are some definite benefits and specific drawbacks to choosing home schooling for your children. Turning to the positive elements of home schooling first, chief amongst them is the fact that parents have greater control over the education of their children.
One of the more significant complaints frequently expressed about both public and private schools is the lack of input and control a parent has over the education of his or her child or children. While there are certain educational standards that must be met when it comes to home schooling, a parent has a significant degree of discretion over how his or her child or children will be taught.
In addition to more control over the educational process, most parents who are involved in the home schooling of their children believe that their children are obtaining a far better course of education. Many of these parents simply believe that public schools are not up to muster and that home schooling ensures that their children will be properly educated.
Of course, when contrasting home schooling with the private school alternative, educating your children at home is significantly less expensive. The tuition costs and other fees associated with most private schools continue to increase each and every year. As a result, many families simply have been priced out of the private school market all together.
People who are involved in home schooling believe that education children at home works to develop a stronger bond between parents and children. The very fact that children will be spending more time with their parents because of being schooled in the home enriches the relationship between the generations.
There are some drawbacks to home schooling as well. The primary complaint that some education experts have in regard to home schooling is based on the need for children to interact socially with other children. These experts maintain that one of the most important components of attending school — be it in a public or private setting — are the opportunities for children to interact with each other. These opportunities are more limited when a child is home schooled.
With that said, there are now different organizations and associations that have been formed that bring children who are home schooled together for different activities and events. Home schooling advocates assert that these activities and events allow children who are home schooled ample opportunity to interact with other children their own ages.
Most education analysts believe that the trend towards home schooling will continue onward into the immediate future. These experts believe that an ever growing number of parents are going to elect to educate their children at home as an alternative to problematic public schools and expensive private schools.
Why Learn Spanish?
Why learn Spanish of all languages? Why not Italian, French, or even Russian, because it seems to be the most practical language to have these days living in the US. With an ever-expanding Latin American population, being able to speak a language that is becoming so widely used would be an invaluable asset. Schools are even becoming bi-lingual and Spanish is stressed. There are even parts of the country; Miami springs to mind, where there are most likely more people for whom Spanish is their first language than there are people who are native English speakers.
Even outside of the states, Spanish is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world; the ranking is apparently in dispute as I found numerous statistics. Most Latin American countries, those in Central and South America speak Spanish with an ever increasing amount of people in the United States. That is almost an entire hemisphere full of a language. And then there is Spain as well, while that Spanish may be slightly different than the Spanish in Latin America, Spanish it still is.
There are an ever-increasing amount of reasons why people should learn Spanish. Not only because of the amount of people who speak it but in a more selfish way it is becoming increasingly valuable to speak a second language professionally. The problem is that people in the United States tend to be more than a little arrogant in their thought that English is the most important language and they simply dont need to speak anything else.
Being bilingual gives one opportunities to live and work outside of the country that would be unavailable otherwise. It gives one options. And given the large amount of counties in which Spanish is spoken it gives one a lot of options.
Improve Your Mind Power With Spanish
Our “mind power” is largely in the way we use our words, and limited by our vocabulary. Words, and the concepts they express, are different in each language, and there are differing common expressions. That’s why when you learn a new language, you learn new ways to think.
Most Americans see money as something created, not as a static quantity to be divided up. This is no coincidence. English is one of the few languages that speaks of “making” money. In other languages, the verb used is “to gain,” “take,” or “get.” The words used affect how people think about money. Personally, I think “making money” is a very healthy perspective.
Hablas Español?
Did you know that in Spanish, you’re not thirsty, cold or afraid? You have to say “I have thirst (yo tengo sed)”, “I have coldness (yo tengo frio),” or “I have fear (yo tengo miedo).” Could this change the way a person experiences things?
Definitely. Therapists are now telling people to stop saying or thinking things like “I am afraid.” That way of expressing it creates too much identification with the feeling. It’s healthier to say “I feel fear.” You’re not afraid, you’re a human; fear, like all feelings, is just a temporary visitor.
In Spanish you “take” a decision (tomar un decision). Is it possible that “taking” a decision could be less stressful than “making” one? It might subconsciously limit you, too, since you generally “take” from what’s available, while to “make” leaves your options wide open.
Other Advantages Of Learning A Language
You gain words when you learn a language, but also the ability to understand things better. Who can speak more precisely about snow; someone with three words for it (snow, sleet, powder), or an eskimo with 22 words for it? Which is more efficient, the German word “zeitgeist,” meaning “the taste and outlook of a period or generation,” or the nine words I just used to say the same thing?
According to the research, most people experience a general improvement in memory from studying a language. Research has also demonstrated that you can halt age-related decline in mental function by learning a new language. Tuck that little tip away for later in life, or better yet, why not start learning a new language today?