The Kentucky mother of an autistic boy who says he was stuffed in a duffel bag for misbehaving in class has pulled her son out of school, the Associated Press reports. Sandra Baker said that although classes resumed Tuesday in their central Kentucky school district, she will home-school her 9-year-old son, Christopher. Baker says she won’t send Christopher back to Mercer County Intermediate School until the teacher responsible is fired and the staff is better trained to deal with children with developmental disabilities. Baker says she saw her son in a bag Dec. 14. The case has spurred an online petition calling for the firing of school employees responsible…
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Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.
‘Unschooling’ gaining popularity, allows children alternative learning tools
School’s never out for 14-year-old Zoe Bentley. Nor is it ever in, reports the Huffington Post. The perky teen from Tucson, Ariz., explores what she likes, when she likes as deeply as she chooses every day of the year. As an “unschooler,” Zoe is untethered from the demands of traditional, compulsory education. That means, at the moment, she’s checking out the redwoods of California with her family, tinkering with her website and looking forward to making her next video on her favorite subject, exogeology, the study of geology on other planets…
…Read MoreAfter home schooling, pomp and traditional circumstances
The 26 young men and women, seated in alphabetical order, were nearly silent as they waited for their high school graduation to start. No giggles. No buzz. No camaraderie. And no wonder: they had met just once before, at the rehearsal two weeks earlier where they got their caps and gowns, reports the New York Times. They had come on this muggy June evening to the Miami Zoo, past the flamingos and the tiger, for an hourlong ceremony that Grace Rodriguez, the organizer, proudly called “the very first South Florida home-school graduation ever created.”
…Read MorePeanut allergy issue stirs controversy at Florida school
According to Reuters, some public school parents in Edgewater, Florida, want a first-grade girl with life-threatening peanut allergies removed from the classroom and home-schooled, rather than deal with special rules to protect her health, a school official said.
“That was one of the suggestions that kept coming forward from parents, to have her home schooled. But we’re required by federal law to provide accommodations. That’s just not even an option for us,” said Nancy Wait, spokeswoman for the Volusia County School District.
Wait said the 6-year-old’s peanut allergy is so severe it is considered a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act. To protect the girl, students in her class at Edgewater Elementary School are required to wash their hands before entering the classroom in the morning and after lunch, and rinse out their mouths, Wait said, and a peanut-sniffing dog checked out the school during last week’s spring break……Read More
Home schooling’s appeal spreads to mainstream
Studying at Harvard, meeting for group French lessons, volunteering at a hospital and spending a day in the wilderness are just a glimpse into a typical day of home schooling, which looks dramatically different today from just a mere decade ago, Reuters reports. Once considered distinctly Christian, the movement is deepening its mainstream roots, experts say. While a majority of home school parents still cite religion or values as a top reason for keeping their children out of public schools, home-school education has been increasingly appealing to a broader audience…
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