‘When one teaches, two learn.’

Robert Heinlein.

True education is a journey from converting the human being into being humane. It is useless if it does not make you a good human being.

‘ The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and critically. Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education.’

Martin Luther King. Jr.

The quote sums up the importance of being educated. 

Education is about focusing, setting and achieving one’s goals in life. At the end of the journey we must reflect and ask ourselves: ‘ have I achieved my goal…?’

With the increasing popularity of Homeschooling, the Traditional Education system feels challenged and my article deals with some of the more relevant features and the reasons why today, many parents are preferring Homeschooling over traditional education.

Homeschooling and Traditional Schooling are different in a sense; they have different environments.

Traditional Schooling has the child immersed into a whole new environment. At the Kindergarten Stage the little child is traumatized and it can take months before they settle down to the new environment of the school. This can at times hamper the progress of the child as viewed from a psychological point, when they come to school for the very first time. They are anywhere between ages four plus to five plus when they find themselves segregated in classrooms with unfamiliar faces of children and teachers. Most of them cry for days and are unhappy because everything around them is unfamiliar. Though they’re given candies to pacify them it may not be very helpful. Every child is unique and different. Some adjust quicker than others and love being among other children.

Today the world has reached its pinnacle in the field of Technology, Medicine etc. and is also the precursor to a whole new system of education.Many parents today prefer to Homeschool their children for physical and emotional safety. Home Schooled children do not have to worry about going to school, the child feels safe and secure because they spend most of the time with family members and are said to be emotionally stronger.

The Traditional Education System may need to be revised in order to continue delivering education successfully in the present digitized world.This form of education is without doubt the oldest and is an active mode of learning as there is a high level of communication between a student and a teacher, as well as between students. It helps increase the students’ level of confidence and improves their communication skills. Home Schooled children may not have as many opportunities to interact with other children hence, they are deprived of the chance to form relationships and this may affect them socially in later stages of life.

Home Schooling is not an effective approach to provide children with education because it lacks qualified educators. As a parent you may teach a child what is necessary and important to learn, but not being a certified teacher, your child may not be learning the right things in order to move forward. Home Schooled children learn at their own pace and various techniques may be used that can advance teaching. Home Schooling tells you how to learn the subject. Traditional Schooling encourages children to work in groups and interact with their peers that prepares them for the real world. They have multiple qualified teachers teaching the various subjects and there might be a teacher that they don’t like. Consequently, the child will develop an aversion to that particular subject. The teachers role in the classroom is of vital importance to the progress of her students. Her role is two-fold. Besides teaching them their subjects she has to mother them by understanding and being aware that each child is unique and different coming from different family backgrounds.

Traditional Schooling and Homeschooling have two distinct features; they have different environments and a different approach to learning.The main focus of Home Schooling is personal growth and Traditional Schooling prepares students for the real world. 

Home Schooled children learn their subjects taught by their parents who know their child better than anyone. Home Schooled children may experience loneliness and crave a greater degree of social interaction, this is because they may not have as many opportunities to interact with other children of their own age, while others, maybe socially awkward when placed in certain social situations.

Traditional Schools have multiple qualified teachers to teach various subjects and the objective is to prepare children for real life situations by encouraging them to work in groups and interact with their peers and serve to build a child’s social skills to handle social challenges in the future confidently.

Let’s take a look at the pros and cons of both systems.

Traditional Education is the best mode of the educational system and the oldest form of delivering education. By sending children to a traditional school, parents are free and are able to seek employment. Whereas, Home Schooling can be very time consuming, we have one parent who is the teacher and is not free to be employed.

Children attending traditional schools are always worried about reaching school on time, they have to put up with bullies, most of them are exposed to peer pressure, work stress, excessive competition and drug abuse, things that parents cannot protect them from.

Although, Traditional Education is practiced all over the world it is losing to Homeschooling, the very crux of the matter why parents today, prefer to Home School their children, besides avoiding  all the above problems that are so very prevalent in most of the schools, at least their child is free of being judged by other people.

In conclusion I’d like to state that Home Schooling might be time consuming but learning takes place and what is more important is that the child is safe. On the flip side Traditional Schooling is the ideal platform for education worldwide but there are innumerable defects that have crept into the system and learning is not happening as effectively as opposed to not at all.

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