a220  1200  03 Sep 88
AM-Classless Society, Bjt,0751
Parents Who Choose To Educate Their Children Could Face Legal
Problems
By LAUREN BLAU
Associated Press Writer
    LOS ANGELES (AP) - A quarter million school-age children across
America won't be returning to the classroom this month.
    Instead, they'll learn reading, writing and arithmetic at the same
table where they eat breakfast, and Mom and Dad will be the teachers.
    The U.S. Department of Education estimates more than 260,000
children are being taught at home, more than twice as many as in
1985, primarily for religious reasons.
    Other motivations range from doubt about the abilities of public
schoolteachers to shielding children from peer pressure.
    ''I see it as a reaction of one part of the population to the
overinstitutionalization of the child,'' said Patricia Lines, a
research analyst at the Department of Education.
    Red Balfour, who heads a home-schooling program for Orange County in
Southern California, said he gets at least five calls a day from
parents interested in the growing movement.
    Parents taking such action could face legal problems. Some states do
not have statutes that specifically address the practice, and
disputes have developed over who is qualified to teach their children
at home.
    The Home School Legal Defense Association, based in Great Falls,
Va., provides legal advice and representation to its more than 9,000
members, said attorney J. Michael Smith, the group's vice president.
    Smith said his group intervened in two cases during the 1987-88
academic year, and both were dismissed in court.
    A couple in the Covina Valley district east of Los Angeles lost a
case last year in which officials claimed the child didn't have
structured lessons. The district also complained the parents had only
a high school education.
    In California, where some 2,100 home schools are registered,
requirements for home teaching are vague, said Fred Fernandez,
consultant for non-public schools at the state Department of
Education. No statute provides guidelines for home teaching; the law
mandates only that instructors be ''capable of teaching,'' he said.
    Micki and J. David Colfax of rural Boonville have become national
heroes in the home school movement. Their oldest son, 23-year-old
Grant, graduated magna cum laude from Harvard in 1987, and his
brothers Drew, 20, and Reed, 18, now attend the university.
    ''I think public schools, especially high school age children, are
mostly a holding operation,'' Mrs. Colfax said. ''I think there's an
enormous waste of time.''
    The Colfaxes, both former teachers, began teaching their children in
1973 when they moved to a ranch about 100 miles north of San
Francisco. Mrs. Colfax said she wasn't impressed with the public
education in the area.
    Parents who choose to keep their children at home for religious
reasons point to the teachings of veteran educator Raymond Moore, who
runs the Hewitt Research Foundation in Washougal, Wash.
    His foundation supplies lesson plans for more than 5,000 students,
who he claims average significantly higher on standardized
achievement tests than the public school norm.
    Ms. Lines said federal data on students taught at home confirm
Moore's claim.
    ''Home schoolers enjoy tremendous advantages,'' Moore said. ''They
are positively socialized instead of being peer-dependent,
narcissistically socialized.''
    Moore, who often appears on Christian broadcasts, said bad teaching
is the enemy, not public schools.
    Sharon Weir, a Seventh-day Adventist from Downey, Calif., said she
taught her two older daughters at home during their early elementary
years and plans to teach her 4-year-old when she reaches school age.
    ''I wanted to keep my children away from any negative influences,''
she said. ''When you're home-schooling, it's just the mother and
child one-to-one. You know if your child is getting the material.''
    Support groups have sprung up throughout the country for parents to
meet and exchange ideas and for children to have an opportunity to
interact with each other.
    Gary McIntire, 7, of Yorba Linda, Calif., is one of a few dozen
children in Rainbow Kids, a group made up of home-taught youngsters
and their parents who meet once a week to work on projects or go on
field trips.
    His mother, Sue McIntire, said she prefers to teach him at home
because she doesn't like the socialization that children face at
public schools. And she believes Gary can learn better with the
special attention.
    ''Where he's strong we can go at the speed he's ready for, and where
he's not we can slow down,'' she said.
    
 
AP-NY-09-03-88 1444EDT
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