Why is home schooling better for disabled persons?

Question

what i mean here is a retarded person who barely cannot do anything even for himself. and what i need are the arguments about putting them in home schooling method.

Answer 1

Pro- Less chance of having to face discrimination

Con- Would have little social ability as not used to being in a social environment

Answer 2

I don't know if it would necessarily be better across the board; just as I don't think schools are always the best places for these kids to be across the board.

I know that some parents can work it so that it is the best option for the kid, and some schools out there are really great for the kids. Each family has to weigh out what they are capable of and what resources are available to them and decide for their own kids what would be the best course of action.

Answer 3

Pro - the homeschool teacher (probably mother) could focus on self-living skills rather than trying to teach the Intellectually Disabled ("retarded" isn't politically correct anymore, even Mentally Retarded is becoming extinct) about US civil war. As the child grows older, he/she needs to have life skills rather than knowing all the presidents.

Con -  no social interaction and diversity of daily schedules - most of the time, intellectually disabled individuals can't do much for themselves and need assistance with daily living. so they will probably spend numerous hours with the teacher rather than breaking up their day at public school.

Another con would be the lack of resourses the individual might have access to, in public school there are teachers, nurses, speech therapists, psychologists, etc each of the professions could suggest and recommend another professional that the individual might benefit from.

Answer 4

I was homeschooled, am totally for it, but I think mentally handicapped people should be taught by professionals most of the time.  My uncle is mentally handicapped and was taught at homes occaisionally, but he thrives in 'school' where there are teachers that know how to understand him.  Granted, he never went to an actualy school, but they did teach him to write, read a bit, and his numbers.  As with any mentally fit child, a mentally disabled child's education should be decided case by case.

Answer 5

Please do not use the word "retarded".  It is offensive.  It's better to use the term "developmentally disabled" or "developmentally delayed".

What exactly is your position in this situation?  Parent?  Family member?  A student doing a project????

If the child (you said "person") is currently in public schooling on an IEP, then you will have to see what the public school requires to change the LRE (least restrictive environment) to homeschooling.  It may, or may not, be possible to continue any therapy services with the school district.  If the child cannot continue therapy services, then they will have to receive them privately, through insurance, which can get *quite* expensive.

It costs a LOT of money to have the adaptive equipment, curriculum, and other "special needs/education" tools.

Answer 6

Prolly for all the same reasons it may be better for non-disabled persons: individual attention; individualised programme of learning; the opportunity to take full account of their special needs; more time; more attention; less exposure to outside discrimination; less exposure to the vagaries of government funding (or lack thereof!); less exposure to germs and so less ill-health and fewer hospitalisations; being taught by a parent who properly understands all the nuances of their personality, behaviour, needs etc etc

I guess the one potential con would come about though if the time the disabled child spends at school is the only respite the parent gets to attend to their own needs, those of other children in the family, household chores etc.

That, and whether the home-educating parent is capable of encouraging and, where necessary, pushing their disabled child to achieve whatever they can do for themselves no matter how small those achievements might seem in comparison to a 'normal' kid or how easy it might be for the parent to 'just do it for them'. For instance: my 8 year old sister has a number of heart defects. Apart from being small for her age and a bit blue, she is not treated any differently from the rest of us though. The *only* thing Mum and Dad allow her to do any different from the rest of us is that she is pretty much allowed to eat whatever she wants, whenever she wants (because she needs to put on weight and needs the extra joules to stay warm and to grow). However we do know other kids with the same condition who have massively overly protective, suffocatingly over protective, parents; parents who were absolutely horrified the day, when my sister was about 3 and being an absolute brat, my mum just gave her a tap on her bum but the way these uber-protective parents carried on you'd have thought my mum was beating the kid to death!!! I mean we know other 8 year old kids who are still sleeping in their parents' bed. We even know one boy who demands his mum gets up twice a night to fetch him bottles of warm milk and this kid is eight and nothing like as helpless as his parents want to believe!

Having said all that though, there is also a girl with downs syndrome who lives up here; despite the doctors, social workers and school practically writing her off when she was younger by saying she would never be able to do anything for herself, her parents pulled her out of school in order to home-educate her (mainly because of all the professionals' dire and hopeless predications about her future and her capabilities) she now holds down a fulltime job and has got her drivers licence.

If parents believe their disabled child is helpless or are willing to collude with their child in their helplessness, I'm not sure that is the greatest situation to be home-educating in. I reckon disabled kids need parents who are much tougher than average; not only to fight the system to get their child whatever they need but to push the child to achieve everything they're capable of...and then some.

PS School does not equal the 'be all and end all' of social environments - there is a life, even a social life, to be had away from school!

PPS Here (in Australia) it is pretty common for special schools, schools for kids who are physically and/or mentally disabled, to offer distance education just as 'normal schools' do so, here at least, there are recognised precedents for educating disabled kids at home. Maybe there is something similar already in your country?  'Course if you too are in Oz, then try checking your State/Territory's Dept of Education and Training site.

PPPS Why would you need 'arguments about putting them in home schooling'?

Are you sure you are not confusing home schooling with home bound schooling??

Generally, in order to home-school, a parent needs only to withdraw their child from the school register and then simply get on with homeschooling them. Home Schooling parents are not obliged to provide an explanation or arguments to anyone in order to justify their decision to home-educate their own child(ren).

After all removing your child from school in order to home-educate them is no different from removing them from school in order to send them to any other private school (which is essentially what any home-school is).

Answer 7

My husband works with the mentally and physically handicapped and helps them live as independently as possible. Over and over again studies have shown that special needs and developmentally disabled people learn best with one on one instruction. Also, in the home you can focus more on the daily living skills that this person will need as an adult.

Good luck.

Answer 8

My mom works for the NYC school system. Her job is placing disabled kids (particularly those with some degree of hearing loss) into appropriate classes. And every time I see her, she has some fresh horror story for me: the bureaucracy traps kids in inappropriate classes, some of the people on her 'team' are there for their paychecks not for the kids, she thinks one of the psychologists is an actual sociopath (he tries to deny kids their legally mandated services), another psychologist team member is so lazy that he copies *her* reports (and she isn't a psychologist) rather than testing the kids and her boss tried to punish her when she formally reported that the elevator (which handicapped kids *need* to get into the building) was repeatedly broken.

With all of that going on, how could the public schools *possibly* be serving the needs of the disabled?

And one other thing to keep in mind is that, in many public schools, the disabled, particularly the mentally retarded, are 'picked on' (such a benign term for something so cruel and aggressive) in ways that are illegal in real life. These behaviors by so-called 'normal' kids interfere with the child being able to learn at his or her own potential.