Making an educational decision is difficult when your child has no difficulties in the typical public school classroom. When your child has learning issues, the decision is weighty.
There are several factors to consider. Do you know enough about your child's disability to know how they learn best? Do you like being around your child? Do you feel like your child would do better being taught at home?
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Considerations:
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Pros
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Cons
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| home schooling |
Child can learn at own pace. Social peers are often not aware of learning difficulties because the children are not educated together, thus there's no social stigma with a Learning Disability. Child can ask as many questions as he wants so he gains more understanding. Child gets more opportunities for practice when there are fewer children. "School Day" ends without additional need for homework, tutoring, therapies, etc. as they become part of the school day. This gives the child a chance to play and be a child! |
Requires parental dedication and diligence to line up an appropriate program. Parental patience may be stressed when child struggles and parent must be able to calmly deal with learning difficulties. No "off" time for teaching parent during the day. |
| Tutoring |
Concentrated learning from an experienced provider. Can gain excellent progress and improvement. |
Lengthens the child's school day. The child may be too tired to learn effectively. Cost. |
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| Private School |
If serving child's specific disability, can gain excellent progress and improvement. Child does not feel "different" from school peers. |
Homework can be significant. Cost. |
| Public School |
Free. Time off for parent. Child will be with children from a variety of backgrounds making them more "worldly" wise. |
Programs often fall short of child's capability level. May be "adequate", but not designed to maximize child's progress. Social stigma of "special education" often damages self-esteem. Child will often become victim of the "Matthew Effect", getting further behind in standard curriculum while spending time working on remedial subjects. May never get "Regular" diploma, limiting future options. Stress of dealing with "Special Education" requirements, such as IEP meetings, can be significant. You may find this IEP Training of benefit. |