Do pre K children actually need a formal classroom environment? Shouldn't they just play with each other until they are six or so?

So playing in the back yard (ok, those might be a bit thin on the ground in Brooklyn, work with me here) with the rest of the neighborhood kids would be fine, without all the venue finding and teacher hiring and etc. There's a reason we delay classroom instruction. Or at least, there used to be.

Homeschooling is very common in the State of Washington. Homeschooling co-ops are fairly common, too. You don't need to hire a teacher, even. A teacher must oversee the curriculum and check the child's progress regularly (like monthly) but does not need to oversee daily lessons.

With my awesome 20/20 hindsight, I wish I'd done that with my boy.

There is a co-op preschool in my old neighborhood in Central Austin. Some of our friends had their kids enrolled there and loved it. Part of the appeal is that the parents actually HAVE to be involved and so are more invested in what goes on.

While I'm sure there are some "formal" preschool environments out there, I don't know of any. They're not sitting at desks practicing penmanship.

Most little kids love their preschools. My daughter certainly does. They play all day and the learning activities are games, songs, and art. They have a theme each week (this week it's Easter), a letter, a shape, and a number. They learn how to play together and share toys and practice some self control.

We can debate the usefulness of "reading readiness" and other preschool programs for the very young all day long, but the bottom line is this: Testing for Gifted and Talented programs, and private schools, starts in Kindergarten. If your kid isn't designated as one the the "smart kids" by second grade (or worse, is dubbed one of the dumb ones), good luck getting much out of their education. You have to deal with things the way they are, not the way they should be.

"Sure, parents can get books and teach their kids, and I wish I could remember some of her insights so I can convey how amazing she is..."

Hey, I can convey one of those insights instantly: quit using dollars per pupil to measure how much effort you're putting into "education".

By the time you pay administrators of a dozen feel-good programs, bus drivers and the caterers, you have zip point shit to use on the students. That's why you have organizations looking for donations to get classroom supplies!

Direct attention. That's how you turn a chore of memorization into a zest for learning. "Click" had something to say about this.

I know a group of parents who did this. They turned an upstairs loft into a schoolroom. It was for past preK though. And I think teh parents each took an 'extra" subject on to teach them, too, like music and spanish and art.

"By the time you pay administrators of a dozen feel-good programs, bus drivers and the caterers, you have zip point shit to use on the students. "

Not to mention $150 per crappy mass-market textbook.

I've done some work with a sort of home-schooling coop here. It's less formal than what the BBC article describes, but they have some homeschooling parents who get their kids together for certain activities. For instance, if they need to hire a subject matter expert to teach a particular class, or for a recreational activity. They even have a coop prom.

Anecdotal: My father is retired and an RVer. He's met more than one family with school age that are "home-schooled" in the RV parks. They spend about 3-4 hours a day on school work, and part of the curriculum involves the current location. If they are near Rushmore that is involved, or Bull Run, etc.

I think I would have loved growing up that way.

Oklahoma is another BIG homeschooling state. People move into neighborhoods so they will be close to a particular home schooling community in a particular neighborhood. The parents split up the homeschooling duties, with a particular parent handling history, another handling English, another handling Biology, et al.

Separately, my brother found a buyer for his home .. b/c the buyer was a homeschooler who wanted to homeschool 12 children in a large room of my brothers house.

What does "compulsory" mean?

Lots of red meat on this one:

http://paulgraham.com/nerds.html

What does school teach kids?

I think it's a great idea. You would think liberals would love it--you could inculcate any ideology you wanted into their curious little minds this way, but no, lefty libs are quite reflexively against home-schooling. I seem to not be capable of understanding their reasons why, despite living in Austin for 17 years. Can anyone explain the lefty opposition to home-schooling from THEIR point of view?