This came out yesterday, but we didn't know about it ourselves until I got it forwarded to me from someone active in the homeschool lobby! There are a few details that aren't exactly right, but overall, it's okay. Here's the link to the German article in case you'd rather read it in German (or want to check my translation--corrections and improvements are welcome!) or want to see the photo of me with Marie, and below is my attempt at a decent translation. My husband is better at this, but he's not home and I couldn't wait. :-)
Math test with Mom
by Susanne Issig, September 14, 2007
"Three minutes, 25 seconds. Very good!" Sheila Heinze (last name changed) praises her daughter, Marie. The nine-year-old has worked through a timed math worksheet with challenging multiplication problems. Her mother, an American by birth who usually speaks English with her four children, checks the answers--all correct. A few days ago Marie needed four minutes, 15 seconds for the same worksheet. Pleased, her mother fills in the improved results in a chart, in which she documents the progress of her oldest child.
It's Friday morning, 10:30. Like her peers, Marie has class at this time--just not at school, but at home. Her brother Jacob, almost two years yonger, is also sitting at the table with the colorful tablecloth, working on his German. German is the only subject that their father, Jörn Heinze, teaches the children. The banker works from home one and a half days per week in order to teach his two oldest children in his native language. All other subjects are taught in English by their stay-at-home mother.
Jörn and Sheila Heinze are lawbreakers. In Germany there are compulsory school attendance laws in all 16 states. Those who don't send their children to school should count on getting fines from the authorities and the threat of forced school attendance. The whole spectrum including jail and removal of custody is rarely enforced. Some states, such as Lower Saxony, even quietly tolerate home-educating parents, so-called homeschoolers. Others, however, such as North-Rhine Westphalia, Hamburg, or Bavaria, follow up on individual cases relentlessy.
The Heinze family, who lives in a city in the Ruhr area, has gotten off lightly so far. When their oldest daughter didn't show up for the first day of school, nothing happened at first. Not until months later were legal proceeding started with a notice of a fine, then "a force fine" ("Zwangsgeld"--no good translation that I know of, since it doesn't exist, as far as I know, in English...) was threatened, right before the family was planning to travel to the United States for several months. The parents quickly de-registered their children, who in addtion to German citizenship also have U.S. citizenship, at the registration office. After their return, the two older children attended a local elementary school for half a year, in order to avoid more problems with the authorities.
"I didn't like it much there," says eight-year-old Jacob. "I think the other children didn't like me." Class was "okay," but "pretty boring." He'd already been reading and writing for awhile. "He was definitely under-challenged in the first grade," says Sheila Heinze. Marie was placed one grade higher than she would have been by age, at the insistance of her mother. (The only editorial comment I'll allow myself in this translation: this is NOT true!! The principal asked us (BOTH parents) what grade we thought Marie should be in, we said why we thought she should be in third, the principal at first disagreed, then met Marie, and at HER suggestion, Marie was put in third grade.) Her first--and so far, only--school report card, is filled with A's anyway. After another stay in the United Staes, the Heinzes kept both of their school-age children at home again. "We were simply not convinced that school was the right place for them," according to the 42-year-old father. Too large classes and too little individual attention are their main criticisms. "In the end, it's a matter of conscience, if I live what I recognize as correct," explains Jörn Heinze.
A few months ago, city social workers appeared unannounced at the door, asking about the children and their school attendance. Sheila Heinze explained to them that Marie and Jacob live most of the time in the U.S. and are only temporarily in Germany. They are registered in a Californian private school. The authorities appeared to be satisfied with that.
But it goes against Sheila Heinze to construct such half-truthful explanations. Every time the doorbell rings unexpectedly, she jumps a bit. During the week she doesn't let the children go in the yard or on the street before noon so that it won't be noticed that they're not in a classroom in the mornings. But she wants to continue to teach her children at home, so she accepts that. "I agree that the state needs to supervise what is happening with children," says the 36-year-old. "After all, there are also cases in which the children are neglected at home." She and her husband are perfectly willing to have their small home-school inspected. "But they won't give us this possibility."
The Heinzes listed the countries in Europe where homeschooling is allowed, such as Denmark, France, Great Britain, and Austria. In the U.S., the mother-land of "homeschooling", about three million children learn at home. Educational scientist from Bonn, Professor Volker Ladenthin, supports the demand of parents to have a controlled legalization of home education. "Making these families into criminals is a scandal," he said in some interviews. After that he received a "flood of e-mails and letters from homeschool parents, who thanked me or described their difficulties with the bureaucracy," reports the professor. However, there were no responses whatsoever from political, scientific, or school administrators. There are great reservations in Germany against such permission, because school is not just seen as an educational institution, but also as an "institution of socialization," according to Ladenthin. Those who don't wish to let their children be formed through school attendance according to the norms accepted by the community are automatically suspected of having darker intentions.
This skepticism arises in part from the fact that the German homeschool movement began initially with fundamental Christian parents, who want to protect their children from worldviews other than their own. The main argument usually is that they don't want their children to be exposed to sexual education and the theory of evolution. But families with these views that have appealed in the court of federal law have not had any success. In the meantime, more and more education-conscious academic families are coming on board, whose motivation for rejecting school is not, or not mainly, religious-based. These parents simply don't trust the German school system to effectively teach and raise their children. Therefore, at least for elementary school, they want to do it themselves.
Even though Volker Ladenthin argues for allowing homeschooling, he certainly does not see it as a cure-all for the much maligned German education system. "Only a minority of parents is capable of giving their children a well-grounded and expert education," he says with concern. He is critical of the tendency of homeschool parents to keep their children very attached to them and to give them few opportunities to compare their family life with outside. "This can seriously limit the children's realm of experience. Social learning can also be too limited." The Heinzes counter such soncerns with the fact that their children do have contact with other children, such as in music school or recreational groups. However, they are careful about whom they tell that the children don't go to school. "That doesn't make it easier to maintain open contact with the outside world," says Jörn Heinze.
At the beginning of next year the family will go to South Africa for awhile. There, it's no problem to teach children at home.
by Susanne Issig, September 14, 2007
"Three minutes, 25 seconds. Very good!" Sheila Heinze (last name changed) praises her daughter, Marie. The nine-year-old has worked through a timed math worksheet with challenging multiplication problems. Her mother, an American by birth who usually speaks English with her four children, checks the answers--all correct. A few days ago Marie needed four minutes, 15 seconds for the same worksheet. Pleased, her mother fills in the improved results in a chart, in which she documents the progress of her oldest child.
It's Friday morning, 10:30. Like her peers, Marie has class at this time--just not at school, but at home. Her brother Jacob, almost two years yonger, is also sitting at the table with the colorful tablecloth, working on his German. German is the only subject that their father, Jörn Heinze, teaches the children. The banker works from home one and a half days per week in order to teach his two oldest children in his native language. All other subjects are taught in English by their stay-at-home mother.
Jörn and Sheila Heinze are lawbreakers. In Germany there are compulsory school attendance laws in all 16 states. Those who don't send their children to school should count on getting fines from the authorities and the threat of forced school attendance. The whole spectrum including jail and removal of custody is rarely enforced. Some states, such as Lower Saxony, even quietly tolerate home-educating parents, so-called homeschoolers. Others, however, such as North-Rhine Westphalia, Hamburg, or Bavaria, follow up on individual cases relentlessy.
The Heinze family, who lives in a city in the Ruhr area, has gotten off lightly so far. When their oldest daughter didn't show up for the first day of school, nothing happened at first. Not until months later were legal proceeding started with a notice of a fine, then "a force fine" ("Zwangsgeld"--no good translation that I know of, since it doesn't exist, as far as I know, in English...) was threatened, right before the family was planning to travel to the United States for several months. The parents quickly de-registered their children, who in addtion to German citizenship also have U.S. citizenship, at the registration office. After their return, the two older children attended a local elementary school for half a year, in order to avoid more problems with the authorities.
"I didn't like it much there," says eight-year-old Jacob. "I think the other children didn't like me." Class was "okay," but "pretty boring." He'd already been reading and writing for awhile. "He was definitely under-challenged in the first grade," says Sheila Heinze. Marie was placed one grade higher than she would have been by age, at the insistance of her mother. (The only editorial comment I'll allow myself in this translation: this is NOT true!! The principal asked us (BOTH parents) what grade we thought Marie should be in, we said why we thought she should be in third, the principal at first disagreed, then met Marie, and at HER suggestion, Marie was put in third grade.) Her first--and so far, only--school report card, is filled with A's anyway. After another stay in the United Staes, the Heinzes kept both of their school-age children at home again. "We were simply not convinced that school was the right place for them," according to the 42-year-old father. Too large classes and too little individual attention are their main criticisms. "In the end, it's a matter of conscience, if I live what I recognize as correct," explains Jörn Heinze.
A few months ago, city social workers appeared unannounced at the door, asking about the children and their school attendance. Sheila Heinze explained to them that Marie and Jacob live most of the time in the U.S. and are only temporarily in Germany. They are registered in a Californian private school. The authorities appeared to be satisfied with that.
But it goes against Sheila Heinze to construct such half-truthful explanations. Every time the doorbell rings unexpectedly, she jumps a bit. During the week she doesn't let the children go in the yard or on the street before noon so that it won't be noticed that they're not in a classroom in the mornings. But she wants to continue to teach her children at home, so she accepts that. "I agree that the state needs to supervise what is happening with children," says the 36-year-old. "After all, there are also cases in which the children are neglected at home." She and her husband are perfectly willing to have their small home-school inspected. "But they won't give us this possibility."
The Heinzes listed the countries in Europe where homeschooling is allowed, such as Denmark, France, Great Britain, and Austria. In the U.S., the mother-land of "homeschooling", about three million children learn at home. Educational scientist from Bonn, Professor Volker Ladenthin, supports the demand of parents to have a controlled legalization of home education. "Making these families into criminals is a scandal," he said in some interviews. After that he received a "flood of e-mails and letters from homeschool parents, who thanked me or described their difficulties with the bureaucracy," reports the professor. However, there were no responses whatsoever from political, scientific, or school administrators. There are great reservations in Germany against such permission, because school is not just seen as an educational institution, but also as an "institution of socialization," according to Ladenthin. Those who don't wish to let their children be formed through school attendance according to the norms accepted by the community are automatically suspected of having darker intentions.
This skepticism arises in part from the fact that the German homeschool movement began initially with fundamental Christian parents, who want to protect their children from worldviews other than their own. The main argument usually is that they don't want their children to be exposed to sexual education and the theory of evolution. But families with these views that have appealed in the court of federal law have not had any success. In the meantime, more and more education-conscious academic families are coming on board, whose motivation for rejecting school is not, or not mainly, religious-based. These parents simply don't trust the German school system to effectively teach and raise their children. Therefore, at least for elementary school, they want to do it themselves.
Even though Volker Ladenthin argues for allowing homeschooling, he certainly does not see it as a cure-all for the much maligned German education system. "Only a minority of parents is capable of giving their children a well-grounded and expert education," he says with concern. He is critical of the tendency of homeschool parents to keep their children very attached to them and to give them few opportunities to compare their family life with outside. "This can seriously limit the children's realm of experience. Social learning can also be too limited." The Heinzes counter such soncerns with the fact that their children do have contact with other children, such as in music school or recreational groups. However, they are careful about whom they tell that the children don't go to school. "That doesn't make it easier to maintain open contact with the outside world," says Jörn Heinze.
At the beginning of next year the family will go to South Africa for awhile. There, it's no problem to teach children at home.
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