Homeschooling

Homeschooling students get some or all of their education outside of traditional schools. The general term "homeschooling" includes a wide range of educational options and philosophies.

Homeschooling parents oversee their children’s education, usually providing some of the instruction themselves. In addition, they can mix-and-match other instructional approaches, including hiring a tutor; using a correspondence school (or the modern video- or computer-based equivalent); taking classes at local museums or nature centers; joining with other families to share teaching responsibilities in a co-op; and encouraging the student to self-instruct using library books, traditional textbooks or workbooks, knowledgeable mentors and/or hands-on experiences. Some homeschoolers also include local "after school" enrichment programs like scouts, 4-H, sports, music lessons, karate or dance classes, public library programs, and summer camps as part of their educational program.

In the United States, as of 2003, an estimated 1.1 million students - about 2.2% of children in grades K-12 - were homeschooled.

Families who homeschool do so for a number of reasons. Frequently mentioned reasons include concern about safety, drugs, and peer pressure at other schools, dissatisfaction with academic instruction at other schools, the ability to provide religious or moral instruction along with academics, the ability to control what the child is being taught, flexibility in meeting the needs of a child with special needs (such as a physical or mental health problem, a temporary illness, or giftedness), and flexibility in scheduling family life.

In the United States, opting out of public schools is not new. When Thomas Edison's public school teacher said he was "addled," Edison's mother took him out of public school and taught him at home. But because of compulsory education laws—the first was passed in Massachusetts in 1852, and by 1918 every state had them—schooling at home was a violation of truancy laws, and was rare until the 1970s.

The origin of the U. S. homeschooling movement is often credited to John Holt and his 1964 book How Children Fail. Holt was "a left-winger who regarded schools as instruments of the bureaucratic-industrial complex." However, the movement was also catalyzed when social conservatives became alarmed at the 1962 U. S. Supreme Court ruling which banned school-sponsored prayer in public schools.

Truancy laws brought pioneering homeschoolers into conflict with local officials. The first New York Times story on "home schooling" appeared in 1974, and concerned two parents charged with "educational neglect" by the Westchester County Department of Social Services. Tests showed that they performed at or about grade level "except for one who is a little slow in reading," and the parents received strong support from a state senator. By the mid-1980s the Times was running articles with titles like "Schooling in the Home: A Growing Alternative" and "There Are Benefits In Homeschooling," and states were legalizing homeschooling A 1997 article said "It's not only Christian fundamentalists any more" and a 2003 article noted "Unhappy in Class, More Are Learning at Home."

High-achieving Christians who were educated at home

Some high achievers have throughout history have been Christians who were educated at home, though it should be noted that prior to the 19th century most children worldwide were educated within their family. Here is a list of some of them:

• Leonardo da Vinci^{[Citation Needed]}
• Claude Monet^{[Citation Needed]}
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart^{[Citation Needed]}
• Stonewall Jackson^{[Citation Needed]}
• John Paul Jones^{[Citation Needed]}
• Robert E. Lee^{[Citation Needed]}
• Douglas MacArthur^{[Citation Needed]}
• George Patton^{[Citation Needed]}
• Thomas Edison^{[Citation Needed]}
• Cyrus McCormick^{[Citation Needed]}
• George Washington^{[Citation Needed]}
• John Quincy Adams^{[Citation Needed]}
• James Madison^{[Citation Needed]}
• William Henry Harrison^{[Citation Needed]}
• John Tyler^{[Citation Needed]}
• Abraham Lincoln^{[Citation Needed]}
• Theodore Roosevelt^{[Citation Needed]}
• Joan of Arc^{[Citation Needed]}
• William Cary^{[Citation Needed]}
• Jonathan Edwards^{[Citation Needed]}
• Dwight L. Moody^{[Citation Needed]}
• John Newton^{[Citation Needed]}
• Charles Wesley^{[Citation Needed]}
• John Wesley^{[Citation Needed]}
• Brigham Young^{[Citation Needed]}
• George Washington Carver^{[Citation Needed]}
• Pierre Curie^{[Citation Needed]}
• Charles Louis Montesquieu^{[Citation Needed]}
• Blaise Pascal^{[Citation Needed]}
• Bernhard Riemann^{[Citation Needed]}
• Booker T. Washington^{[Citation Needed]}
• Adam Yahiye Gadahn
• Franklin D. Roosevelt (private tutors at home through age 14, then entered Groton)
• Patrick Henry^{[Citation Needed]}
• William Penn^{[Citation Needed]}
• Henry Clay^{[Citation Needed]}
• John Jay^{[Citation Needed]}
• John Marshall^{[Citation Needed]}
• John Rutledge^{[Citation Needed]}
• Hans Christian Andersen^{[Citation Needed]}
• Pearl S. Buck^{[Citation Needed]}
• Agatha Christie^{[Citation Needed]}
• Charles Dickens^{[Citation Needed]}
• Bret Harte^{[Citation Needed]}
• C.S. Lewis^{[Citation Needed]}
• Sean O’Casey^{[Citation Needed]}
• Daniel Webster^{[Citation Needed]}
• George Clymer^{[Citation Needed]}
• William Livingston^{[Citation Needed]}
• George Mason^{[Citation Needed]}
• Charles Pickney III^{[Citation Needed]}
• George Wyeth^{[Citation Needed]}
• Ansel Adams^{[Citation Needed]}
• Clara Barton^{[Citation Needed]}
• John Burroughs^{[Citation Needed]}
• Andrew Carnegie^{[Citation Needed]}
• George Rogers Clark^{[Citation Needed]}
• Florence Nightingale^{[Citation Needed]}
• Leo Tolstoy^{[Citation Needed]}
• Charles Fletcher Lummis^{[Citation Needed]}
• Christopher Paolini^{[Citation Needed]}

Persons of the Bible

• John the Baptist^{[Citation Needed]}
• Jesus Christ

Other Homeschoolers

• Andrew Wyeth (1917- ), American artist, was tutored at home until he was 18.
• Mary Breckinridge (1881-1965), pioneering American midwife and founder of Kentucky's Frontier Nursing Service. Mary's father was a diplomat, and she was educated in America and abroad by private tutors.
• John Walker Lindh Checkered educational history, in and out of public schools, partly homeschooled.