<p>Dizzymom–if he is interested in the audition, he should try it. Is this his first try at an audition like this? If he doesn’t do well, than he can decide if he would like to try something like this again, knowing that he’ll have to devote more time to it. Auditioning is a learning experience. Will he get any written commentary? That sort of feedback is always useful for growth as a musician. Did preparing for this opportunity help him to become a better player–if so, then it is a positive thing, no matter what the outcome of the audition is. One of my daughters recently auditioned for something she did not win (violin). I really don’t care that she didn’t win, nor does she seem to. She learned her piece really well, and has grown as a musician by working hard on it. The process of getting ready for the audition was worthwhile. She is ready to try it again next year.</p>
<p>It’s interesting that first you say that your son is extremely social, and that he has willingly given up other interests for his social life. Then you envy the home-schooled kids, and say in the very same breath that a social life is not a high priority for them. If that’s true, then you have done well by your son, by measuring his needs and desires rather than pushing him for his achievements. It sounds like your son would not have been happy being home-schooled. It doesn’t work for every child, no matter how talented. (That’s why my d thanked me for not home-schooling her; she loves her social life.)</p>
<p>BTW, my H studied at the pre-college division of Juilliard from 6 until 18 (then the college division), also studying piano and percussion. Very few students in pre-college were home-schooled. And the fact of the matter is that a piano is a solo, not orchestral, instrument, so no matter how talented, opportunities for pianists are extremely limited. Unless he has the passion for music, so that it consumes him, more practice time wouldn’t help. One of my H’s teachers told him, “If you can picture yourself doing anything else with your life, do it.” It’s an amazingly difficult life. How many extremely talented and well-trained pianists are there for how many jobs? The bottleneck is drastic. Many of H’s friends are professional musicians (orchestral instruments) who freelance and cannot make a living.</p>
<p>It sounds like you have more regrets than your son does. What does he say?</p>
<p>(Oh, and of course send him to the audition if he wants to do it - the worst that can happen is they say no, but they can’t say yes if he doesn’t try. Please keep us posted.)</p>
<p>Your impressions are correct, Dizzymom, regarding the greater control over time available to homeschoolers. As I’m sure is obvious to you, that’s one of the major reasons such families choose this option. In that regard, you’ll be interested that a recent graduating senior we knew – quite accomplished on the violin, & concertmaster or her youth orchestra – took a gap year for the specific purpose of intensely studying music. In her case it was for musical theater, actually, not for further instrumental training. She was accomplished in both directions.</p>
<p>I agree with Chedva that even students geared toward a particular passion may not find the homeschooling environment right for them, because of competing social or other e.c. needs, desires. Since you’ve “listened” to your S in that regard, you can hardly blame yourself for not providing him with a 48-hr. day. Would he warm to the idea of a gap year?</p>
<p>One of my jobs is teaching homeschoolers. In States where the public education system is esp. wanting, there does seem to be a bifurcation along 2 poles: the very capable, advanced, & even gifted student, versus the student considerably below grade level, & struggling. In that latter case, btw, homeschooling will not work unless the parent(s) are themselves professionals in the field or willing to learn what it takes to succeed – which would be a massive investment of time. And since these latter students are generally from poor environments, that investment (replacing employment) is not available to the parents. (A certain amt. of cash is also required, for specialists & materials.) Our homeschoolers lack a “middle class.” I can see that one of the posters does not repeat that situation for her group. We used to have a middle class of h/s in our State; now it is mainly the choice for those desperate to escape a mostly failing system.</p>
<p>
I think few can really argue against the notion that homeschooling is generally more flexible than public schooling. But I dont think this automatically means homeschooling is more advantageous than public schooling. It just completely depends on the people involved. You may think homeschooling is this great solution, and maybe it is, but it could be a bad choice for you.</p>
<p>The day the kid stays home, all eyes and ears turn to you for that kid’s education. If you are up for this, then homeschooling could probably have been fine. If not, then it wouldn’t. All in all, it sounds like your kid is doing great. You made your choice. It was a good choice. Let him audition and grow. Share his grief if he fails, but don’t coddle him with excuses because if he really wanted this, he could have sacrificed and practiced more. And lets be honest here, homeschooling has nothing at all to do with this.</p>
<p>
Yeah. I think that is true for my family also. A normal teen social life is not terribly important to us, depending upon what normal means. If it means sacrificing honor for the family in favor of narrow and artificially defined peer groups, then not only is this not important to us, but we reject it outright. But if it means hanging out with peers of all ages, including teens, and yet having a strong bond with family, then we are all for it. Our way seems to work for us. But we always keep our eyes peeled for better ways, rather than harshly judging how others are raising their kids.</p>
<p>I also know two extremely gifted young musicians, both going to competitive public high schools, making close to straight A’s in AP and honors classes. They have routinely been accepted into All-State and All Regional orchestras, and both were accepted to Tanglewood’s summer program. Staying in public schools has not hurt them or their practicing; they make time for that which is important to them.</p>
<p>Socializing and socialization are, to me, different terms and concepts.</p>
<p>Tokenadult, I don’t think he’s developed an interest in jazz, per se. I studied classical piano for thirty years and he grew up hearing me play and perform. Due to health issues, I can no longer play, and in a strange way, that has probably allowed him to “own” the piano more so than he otherwise might have. </p>
<p>Chedva, if music was his only passion, he could easily balance it with the demands of school. He participates in another activity that takes 20-25 hours a week. I am well aware that this is his personal choice, but I didn’t think anyone would begrudge me a few longing glances at those with more flexible schedules. Perhaps I should have used the subject title “Not enough hours in the day” or something similar, because by using “home-schooling” in the title, it suggests that I’m interested in nitpicking the pros and cons between home-schooling and traditional schooling, which wasn’t my intent. I’m interested in bringing Einstein back to life so he can somehow bend time to suit my kid’s needs, at least temporarily.</p>
<p>Of course I will allow him to go to the audition. I contacted his music teacher and asked her to spend some time explaining the reality of the situation to him so that he goes in with his eyes open. He can handle the disappointment, but wouldn’t most of us parents rather see our children succeed when they risk themselves greatly? There will be no second chance for him; he cannot maintain this demanding schedule next year when he is also taking more AP’s and studying for the SAT, etc.</p>
<p>Peggy, you seem to get what it is that I’m trying to say. Just about the time we have the information we need to help our kids achieve their goals – it’s about two years too late, right? And then the next one is completely different! Engineering – wow! </p>
<p>I’m not coddling S with any excuses at all. I vented here because I have to maintain the cool, calm exterior with him. No guarantees on audition day, though.</p>
<p>WHo is to say that homeschooling would have changed anything? My D played soccer for YEARS, played for one year in highschoo, didn’t like the intensity and missing of all the other activities, and found other passions in her HS she would never have found if she stuck with her sport, if she had focused so much on one thing</p>
<p>I am not saying anything about homeschooling per se, jsut that to question your choices as a family because of ONE audition, one day, while you had four years of great times, and the opposite could be said for homeschoolers, if homeschooling worked for your family, no point it worrying about what MIGHT have been missed</p>
<p>If your son TRUELY was into the music thing soley, with all his heart and soul, it was his LIFE, he would have given up his sport, but he enjoyed that as well, so he made both work, to go back KNOW and question a path because he is competeing against kids who had a totally different experience is not fair to yourself or to him</p>
<p>I don’t think homeschooling would have changed that</p>
<p>Was he happy in HS, did he learn, did he have fun?</p>
<p>That is your answer</p>
<p>Good point CGM. I wasn’t so much questioning my decision over this one audition as wondering whether other parents of traditionally schooled children ever took a glimpse over the fence and wished they could, temporarily at least, opt for the greater flexibility homeschooling offers.</p>
<p>There are trade-offs either way.</p>
<p>Dizzymom,
In the future educational world, which may be more near than far, there will be the dual ability to site-school half the day, or 3 days/week, and homeschool the remaining hours. Currently students pretty much have to choose. While highschoolers currently cannot enroll in 2 schools at once (charter or formal home) + part-time at an accredited site, your son’s is not the only situation which should cry out for that flexibility. …Because, as you note, there are advantages to each. </p>
<p>One thing that your son has gained is the irreplaceable opportunity for class discussion in core subjects. Depending on the talent of the moderating teacher, the shared & interactive learning which takes place in a classroom really has no substitute. Students of all personalities benefit from that exchange, both directly & indirectly. The presence of peers, & their give & take, promotes certain kinds of connections in the learning, not to mention creativity & stimulation. That is totally aside from the socialization aspects.</p>
<p>It is very difficult for my homeschoolers to find sufficient opportunity for close reading/analysis of novels, to discuss lab findings & make suppositions in teams, to speculate about different approaches to a math problem or a current events situation. Even the more sophisticated, experienced parents who have taken enormous efforts, often over several years, to locate homeschool networks & group situations, can rarely find appropriate class-level learning environments on a consistent basis. Rather, they tend to find book clubs, reading clubs, creative writing groups – all of which are interesting, stimulating, enjoyable – but not necessarily as academic as desired, at least on the high school level. (They are less structured, have less discipline attached to them.) As you know, they are free to choose comm. college classes, which may even be academically on their student’s level, but comm. college is not on a high school student’s psycho-social level.</p>
<p>At our site school high school classes end at noon; they supposedly have independent study for the rest of the day. However, the program is not as monitored as it should be, & it still depends on adults to guide this time to some degree. (So theoretically it’s an example of a hybrid.) The most successful homeschooling takes enormous work, time, planning, & <em>driving</em> (to groups, clubs, e.c.'s, lessons both academic & artistic, tutoring, etc.) Neither the totally homeschooled nor the totally site-schooled student is the ideal model, i.m.o. But one thing that site-schooling can do is to promote the formation of identity & the affirmation of that. We need others to bounce off of, in order to realize how much the musician we truly are, or the soccer player, or the academic.</p>
<p>Dizzymom, I’m sorry if you thought I was begrudging you - I simply wanted to present the other side - that if a child has passion, he’ll do what is necessary regardless of homeschooling or high schooling. I’ve often looked over the other side of the fence - I work full time. Would my d be better off if I had been able to work part time and participate in her class in elementary school, had lunch with her, eliminated after school? I don’t know. There would have been other issues - would I have been able to pay for dance lessons? </p>
<p>There are always the “roads not taken.” I wonder about my own life too, not just hers. But there’s no way to know if it would have been better or worse. That’s all I meant to say.</p>
<p>
I dunno. Maybe this is true. But my experience has taught me that homeschooling is WAY superior on this point. In our school, identity is first formed in the home and this is done so rigorously that the kid grows very eager to express his identity everywhere. He does this at home, then thoroughly into and throughout the community, into the town, state, country, with a vision to export it to the world. It breeds a LOT of initiative because the homeschooler must himself seek and create opportunities by which to express. My thirteen year-old, for example, finds she is a great journalist and businesswoman not just by having a family member critique her work. She discovers it by publishing a community paper and by making money through selling advertisements. If the circulation is not wide enough due to a lack of interest, well, the advertisers are just not going to waste their money. If the circulation is big enough and growing, it affirms the kids talents and further forms her identity. When other regional papers quote from her publication, then she knows she is a value to the whole community and exactly HOW she is a value. Eventually, she will express this value to the world. I find my kids and the other homeschoolers we know, are very well developed and forward-thinking in this area, and while things may differ for other families, I do not think my kids would be anywhere near as developed here were they public schooled.</p>
<p>Homeschooling is tough (so is public schooling), and it is not for everyone (which is also true of public schooling). But in my familys case, nothing else has yet been able to even come close.</p>
<p>Second-guessing at this stage of the game seems counter-productive. As has been said by so many, there are pros & cons to every form of education–public, private, charter and homeschool. We all do the best we can with the resources we know are available to us at any given time. Perhaps we might have made other choices if we knew then what we know now, perhaps not. My kids started out in public school for grades K-8 & then transferred into an exclusive private HS, where they’ve made some great friendships & had some wonderful teachers. I know I wasn’t up to homeschooling either of them and admire folks who have successfully been able to offer their kids that option.
I’ve seen kids thrive in their HS while other kids are overwhelmed by the workload & expectations. None of us will ever know what would happen if we & our families chose different roads from those we have.</p>
<p>From a student’s point of view:
I have been through homeschool, private school, and public school.</p>
<p>From what the original poster said, I would not be concerned. Balancing a tight schedule is an invaluable skill to have. Unless your child expects to become a professional/best-in-the-world at music, you have not made a mistake. Besides, you cannot change the past. Make the most of what you have and your child will go far.</p>
<p>Here are my opinions:
Homeschooling can provide a good base education and provide some specialty education that is hard to recieve in public school. Unfortunately, homeschoolers do not recieve the same experience that private/public school students get. That is both good and bad.</p>
<p>Private schools are a mixed bag. The one I went to was very strong on math and science. However, it did not offer very much diversity in educational options.</p>
<p>Public High schools are what you make of them. The top-level classes can get a student into nearly any college of their choice. Plus, there are often hundreds of electives to choose from. Unfortunately, there are many negetive pressures and some courses will not prepare students for what they need.</p>