Len Lipkin

Don’t Trust Your Friends Redux

When ultimately a choice is made, it makes sense that a parent wants reassurance that they have made the right one. Influencing a friend or neighbor to make the same school choice is a validation.

Len Lipkin

Ignore Test Scores

The easiest thing to find when evaluating a school is the schools performance on standardized tests. How much weight should you put on those scores in your school decision?

Len Lipkin

Don’t Trust Your Friends When it Comes to School Choices

There is not a single school among the large number that I have considered that do not have passionate advocates and vocal detractors.

Len Lipkin

Crunch Time

Though I visited a lot of schools last year, there are about 10 schools that I would like to visit this year for the first time, and several that I visited last year that I want to visit again. I wish that I had done more last year, but I can't do anything about that.

Lisa Marchiano

Why I Homeschool Part 3: Socialization

Homeschooling offers another social advantage for us. While we have some activities that we stick with all year long and therefore see the same kids each week, we also participate in lots of classes, workshops, and clubs where my children will not know any other kids. My children therefore get plenty of practice in being thrown into new social situations.

Lisa Marchiano

Why I Homeschool Part 2: Curriculum

Where does the “school” part of homeschooling come in?  Here is where we get to what I imagine other parents are thinking of when they say “I could never do that.”  In their minds, I imagine, my children are hunched over workbooks at the kitchen table while I quiz them on phonics rules, or demand that they recite their times tables.  More than one parent has told me that they thought about...

Lisa Marchiano

Why I Homeschool Part 1: Time and Fun

“I could never do that!” That is the single most common response I get when I tell people that I homeschool.  It perplexes me.  “Why?”  I sometimes want to ask.  What is that they think I am doing that feels impossible for them to do to?  Of course, homeschooling is not for everyone.  School choice is a very personal and complex decision, and homeschooling is not even an option for most...

Len Lipkin

School Choice Based on Parental “Qualities”?

One of the things that I have noticed during my school search are the parents sitting next to me in open houses.  It occurs to me that one of the factors that has emerged as important to me indirectly are the parents of the children at the school I choose.  This point cuts across many themes that I have written about on this blog over the last 8 months, most directly parental involvement in the...