July 27, 2008
TECHNOS QUARTERLY Spring 1995 Vol. 4 No. 1
Home Learning, Technology, and Tomorrow's Workplace
By Rhonda L. Rieseberg
The quiet hum of electrical synergy relays the infinite language of
0s and 1s as a second-grader learns to play piano. A ten-year-old takes the
helm of a simulated spaceship. And business messages scatter around the globe,
reaching their destinations in seconds. Computer technology has affected nearly
every aspect of our lives and has the capability to enhance home learning.
Combine the oldest learning environment with the newest technology, and you
may provide the best preparation for the workplace of tomorrow.
Compared to home learning, compulsory education is a relatively new phenomenon. Emerging in the mid-1800s, this model of education acclimated children to their future working lives in an industrial workplace that required employees to work outside of the home, follow directions, and keep the line running. In contrast, learning at home is a natural process that begins as the infant develops into an inquisitive, rambling toddler and continues as the child rows, tests boundaries, and strives to “do it herself.” The inherent flexibility of home schooling meant that it could be applied with success in nearly any home. In the centuries preceding the Industrial Age, families of means who could have sent their children to private “schools” often chose instead to provide their children with tutors—sometimes the emerging poets, playwrights, philosophers. Or scientists of the day. Home schooling was also prevalent, although more immediately “hands-on,” in families of the working class who taught their children the skills needed to earn a living on the family farm, with a home-based cottage industry, or through a journeyman-level trade.
Even when free public education for all was offered, some families chose home schooling to ensure the curriculum did (or did not) include a religious perspective. In the late 1960s and 1970s, dissatisfaction with traditional schooling began to increase the numbers of home-schooled children. But the dramatic resurgence in home schooling has occurred since 1978, when an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 children in grades K-12 were home schooled. By 1994, the U.S. Department of Education estimated that 500,000 children were being taught at home. The Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) estimates that there are currently between 700,000 and 1 million children being home schooled in America. The entrance of many middle- and upper class families into the home schooling arena signals two things: a pervasive dissatisfaction with public or private school and the increasing public acceptance of home schooling. Many parents who turn to home schooling wonder how teachers can help their children when they must manage class sizes increased by reduced funding, diversified by mainstreaming, regimented by federal and state curriculum demands, and threatened by the presence or potential for violence and drug activity.
Home schooling is legal in all 50 of the United States. According to HSLDA, 40 states do not require home school parents to have any specific qualifications, such as teacher certification. In at least 17 states, home schools or groups of home schoolers have qualified as private or church schools. Thirty states require standardized testing or evaluation, and 14 of these 30 states provide an alternative to testing [see the Measuring Up Sidebar]. Connecticut, for example, only requires a portfolio review.
| Shared Characteristics of Home Schools |
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| —Marching to the Beat of Their Own Drum! A Profile of Home Education Research ©1992 Brian D. Ray, president, National Home Education Research Institute |
The Resourceful Home School
A typical home school's network of resources is so diverse that even without
technology, home learning is a rich and active process. Add a personal computer
and some or all of its applications, and the home school opens windows of
learning opportunities and acclimates the home-schooled child to one of the
primary media of tomorrow's workplace.
Local home schoolers often pool their resources and form groups based on mutual interests. These support groups, sometimes called cooperatives, or co-ops, may meet to learn about geography, travel to areas of historical significance, discuss, consider, and share curriculum, and organize and host special events, such as a Christmas pageant or the President's Physical Fitness Program. Co-ops increase a home school's resources, teaching expertise, and social interaction.
Another local resource is the public library, which in addition to reference materials, books, and a rich selection of magazines and newspapers, may also subscribe to periodical databases, such as Infotrac, and maintain a video and film library complete with viewing equipment. Some public libraries have made their electronic catalogs available online, giving the home school with on-line access the ability to conduct library searches and ascertain checkout status before driving to the library to pull the materials from the shelf or search through other library holdings.
Home schooling parents can also look for support and information from regional, state, and national organizations, such as the National Homeschool Association in Rodeo, New Mexico, and the HSLDA in Paeonian Springs, Virginia. Parents who choose to home school through high school can enroll their child in one of the many accredited umbrella schools that provide a high school transcript when the student has completed a correspondence curriculum. The hundreds of colleges that have accepted home schoolers include Harvard, MIT, and Princeton, plus state universities ranging from the University of Alaska at Fairbanks to the University of Michigan.
The introduction of the computer to the home school, and the applications that have followed (interactive software, CD-ROM, networking), can provide the homeschooled student with resources few public or private school students enjoy at all—or with as much freedom afforded the home schooler. In the CD-ROM format, cumbersome reference sources become accessible and enjoyable research tools. Electronic databases currently on CD-ROM include various encyclopedias as well as the 1994 Guinness Multimedia Disc of Records, the KGB-CIA World Factbook, and Toolworks World Atlas. Available software programs for the K-12 learning environment include Reader Rabbit, a reading comprehension program; Newsroom, a simplified desktop publishing program; Typing Tutor V, a touch typing tutorial; and The Oregon Trail, a software program that teaches how to plan and execute a simulated journey from St. Louis to the Oregon Territory. Home schoolers who want to learn a second language could invest in a multimedia Japanese program called Power Japanese, which is a self-paced language laboratory that teaches the writing of Japanese characters as well as speaking skills.
And when a home school adds a modem and online access, parents and children both can find ample resources and opportunities for interaction with others interested in home schooling. Through Internet, children can access Academy One, an educational service with classroom discussions and resources, and Homer, an online curriculum offered by Imsatt Corporation of Falls Church, Virginia, through which students can study and be tested on nearly any subject (providing an online correspondence school). Online bulletin boards systems, or BBSs, provide home school families with opportunities to explore interests, query experts, and discuss home schooling concerns. A student interested in astronomy, for example, might want to “listen in” to the Canadian Space Society BBS, the Observer's Database, or the Homeschool BBS [see the Home Schools On Line Sidebar].
Christine, 7, uses an ancient technology, an abacus, to learn math, while Nick, 11, draws his concept of a spaceship. Their mother, Toddie, has turned their attention from the computer now, though both children use it in their home learning lessons.
The Socialized Child
How best do children learn how to get along with others? Surrounded by 30
kids of the same age? Or placed within a small group that includes contact
with children of different ages and with adults in a variety of settings?
Even as the applications of technology continue to transform the workplace,
success in tomorrow's service-oriented economy will still depend on the human
touch—the socialized child who learned how to get along with others and
refined that ability on his or her way to the workplace. Financial service
counselors, for example, may never meet their clients face to face, but their
success will largely depend on their ability to meet client needs and resolve
client problems.
Critics of home schooling question whether even the most active and outgoing home-school environment can compete with the socialization offered in a more traditional school setting.
Learning how to get along with others from different backgrounds and cultures and learning informally from one's peers are key advantages cited for the public and private school setting.
Several studies indicate that home schooling encourages a healthier socialization that more closely mirrors the working world. A 1992 master's thesis by Thomas Smedley entitled “The Socialization of Home School Children” (Radford University of Virginia) compared 20 home-schooled children to 13 demographically matched children from the public school system using the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales, which gauge a child's social maturity by evaluating communication skills, socialization, and daily living skills. Smedley found that the home-schooled children were better socialized and more mature, scoring in the 84th percentile, while the public school children scored in the 27th percentile. “In the public school system,” he concluded, “children are socialized horizontally, and temporarily, into conformity with their immediate peers. Home educators seek to socialize their children vertically, toward responsibility, service, and adulthood.”
In “Comparison of Social Adjustment Between Home and Traditionally Schooled Students” (1992 dissertation, University of Florida), Larry Shyers compared behavior and social development test scores of two groups of 70 children ages eight to ten. One group was home schooled, and the other group attended public or private schools. Shyers found that the homeschooled children had fewer behavioral problems because they tended to imitate their parents, while the other children modeled themselves after their peers. “The results seem to show that a child's social development depends more on adult contact and less on contact with other children as previously thought,” he said.
The home schooling environment strengthens the bond children have with their family, and parents remain the primary source of direction and guidance while the child develops his or her critical thinking skills. The child also remains an integrated part of a home that may include older and younger siblings. If an older child, she may help younger siblings with their homework. If younger, he may look to an older sibling for help. And when the home school joins other home schools for field trips, sports events, or special activities, the combined group will include children of many ages. This mixed-age, mixed-ability environment more closely mirrors the workplace than the single-grade classroom, with its emphasis on ensuring that a group of children of similar age will work through a prescribed curriculum over a nine-month school year.
The workplace of the 21st century will be a multi-ability, multi-generational workplace in which students who conform with their peer group may struggle to compete, while students who move beyond peer expectations and develop personal expertise and independence will likely find exciting and challenging opportunities.
The Lifelong Learner
Those who will thrive in the workplace of tomorrow will be lifelong learners,
people who are constantly seeking new and better ways of doing their jobs
and enjoying outside interests. The more easily acquired habit of lifelong
learning is perhaps the most significant advantage of the home schooling environment.
The typical home school provides students with one-on-one instruction, a flexible schoolday that integrates daily living with learning, and greater freedom to pursue interests. Learning is perceived as an activity that permeates all parts of daily life, from the orderly pursuit of the knowledge needed to understand calculus or use Lotus 1-2-3 to the serendipitous ideas and insights that occur when one turns an active, questioning mind upon the worlds of information, thought, and experience in which we live.
Because learning occurs during school hours and often beyond as children complete homework or pursue topics of interest, the work is perceived as a natural, ongoing part of life rather than an activity that occurs while confined to a school building, classroom, or study hall.
The Workplace of the 21st Century
To better understand the workplace of the 21st century, we should first consider
how the workplace has changed since the end of World War II (CQ Researcher
chronology, February 28, 1992). During this postwar era, American workers
have experienced the emergence and disintegration of an unspoken pledge of
reciprocal loyalty between an employer and its employees. In 1956 William
H. Whyte, Jr., described this emerging corporate employee in The Organized
Man. Signs of change, however, began appearing in the 1970s, with a series
of oil crises in 1973 and the first phase of corporate restructuring among
manufacturers in 1979. Rising labor costs and growing competition from abroad
prompted U.S. corporations to increase automation and open plants in countries
where labor costs were lower.
The 1980s began with the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s. During the recession of 1981-1982, corporations eliminated millions of blue-collar jobs in an effort to compete with foreign producers. Within a few years, white-collar jobs began landing on the chopping block with increasing frequency. In 1985, IBM began cutting its workforce, and in 1989 a wave of bank consolidations and closures resulted in the loss of more than 100,000 jobs by early 1992.
Restructuring in the 1990s increased cuts in white-collar employment as corporations eliminated many middle-management positions. As the recession that began in July 1990 continued, white-collar unemployment began to mirror that of the blue-collar professions and spread throughout U.S. industry. In August 1990, Sears announced a cost-reduction program that would cut about 33,000 positions by the end of 1991. On January 7, 1992, it announced the elimination of an additional 7,000 positions through automation of customer-service tasks. By early 1992, General Motors announced it would eliminate 74,000 jobs; IBM, 20,000; Pan American World Airways, 7,500: and McDonnell Douglas, 3,800.
As the editor of Workplace Trends, Dan Lacey tracked the steady and permanent loss of millions of jobs that occurred in publicly held corporations. In 1991 U.S. corporations had announced more than half a million permanent staff cuts, a phenomenon that Lacey attributed to “the end of the post-World War II boom days. Everything that everyone considers normal about work—long-term steady employment with a full range of company-paid benefits and ever-rising wages—is a way of life that came about in America after World War II....For middle-class America, the style of employment that is disappearing has been not a luxury but a requirement. That's why we're talking about trauma and turmoil.” When Congress considered the Expanded Training Opportunities Act in 1994, Connecticut Representative Sam Gejdenson would note that about 75 percent of laid-off workers in 1992 were permanently laid off—the highest annual figure since this category of workers was first tracked in 1967.
By the time the recession ended, most experts conceded that the unspoken contract of reciprocal loyalty had become a relic of the past. When bottom lines shifted into black, many companies maintained their leaner staffs and reinvested their profits into upgrading technology instead. Research by professors Erik Brynjolfsson and Thomas W. Malone of MIT's Sloan School found that “even as the typical company in this study eliminated 20 percent of its employees over 10 years, it tripled its investment in information technology.” Instead of hiring additional permanent staff, these companies began outsourcing their overloads and seasonal work to leased, contract, or freelance workers. According to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of leased workers in New York and New Jersey increased by 20,000 between 1990 and 1993, a 17 percent increase in three years.
In analyzing this sea of change in the American workplace, the February 28, 1992, issue of the CQ Researcher noted that “while corporate restructuring may enable U.S. firms to better compete in the global marketplace, it also foreshadows a fundamental change in employer-employee relations: Growing numbers of Americans will be forced into part-time work with low pay, no job securing and few benefits. The keys to success in this less-predictable workplace will be education, training, and a willingness to alter career goals. Above all, experts caution, employees should not expect lifelong employment with a single company.”
Scrambling onto a Horizontal Playing Field
So what should employees expect, and how might home schooling work in this
brave new world? In his “On Excellence” column, management guru
Tom Peters contends that the success of the economy, companies of all sizes,
and individuals “will mostly be a function of our ability to embrace
dislocation, pain and ambiguity….The order of the day is perpetual reinvention
and revolution, constant re-creation, continuous curiosity, wild plunges into
the abyss.”
Pioneering business educator Peter Drucker concurs and notes that “the center of gravity has shifted to knowledge workers. And they own the tool of production….It's between their ears. They can take their skill anyplace—and they do. They no longer see themselves as members of an organization. They look upon the organization as their tool….We are moving toward a society of networks” (William J. Flannery, “Peter Drucker Reflects on Economic Sea of Change,” February 5, 1995. St. Louis Post Dispatch).
Fortune executive editor Walter Kiechel III characterizes the defining activity of the age as scrambling—scrambling for footing on a shifting corporate landscape and scrambling to upgrade software, learning, and financial reserves. He has identified six trends that would reshape the workplace, including emerging networks of specialists, the leveling of labor onto a more horizontal playing field, and the shift toward lifelong learning.
| Six Workplace Trends |
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| —-Walter Kiechel III, “How We Will Work in the Year 2000,” Fortune (May 17, 1993) |
As employees scramble onto this horizontal playing field, a winning strategy would include entrepreneurial skills: flexibility, initiative, independence, and a lifelong learner's desire to anticipate and master the skills required to compete for the jobs in the 21st century. The benefits of such lifelong learning are not extras that will secure the best employment, but necessities that will help secure any employment in the future. In the first decade of the 21st century, the Labor Department projects that most of the 24.6 million new jobs added to the U.S. economy from l990 to 2005 will be high-skill positions requiring more training than most of the jobs they will replace.
By nature, home schooling encourages these entrepreneurial skills. The school day is more flexible, allowing greater opportunity for in-depth study as needed or desired. And learning is an integrated and natural part of the home schooler's life. In a study reported in 1993, University of Michigan assistant professor of education J. Gary Knowles surveyed 53 adults who had been home schooled. Knowles found that 40 percent had attended college and nearly two thirds were self-employed. “That so many of those surveyed were self-employed supports the contention that home schooling tends to enhance a person's self-reliance and independence,” he concluded.
The Virtual Workplace
Parents who include on-line access in their home school will provide their
children with valuable preparation for the virtual office of the future. Advances
in technology and the trend toward outsourcing have created the virtual corporation
that, according to Walter Kiechel, has been pared down to its core competencies
and sends out for everything else.
In 1993, home-based workers accounted for 33 percent of the adult work force. Of these 41 million workers, 81 percent were self-employed and l 9 percent were telecommuters, according to Home Sweet Office by Jeff Meade (1993, Peterson's Guides).
The National Project on Home-Based Work at City University of New York predicts that the trend toward telecommuting will increase from 6 percent of the adult workforce in 1992 to nearly one-third of the workforce in 2020—a trend made possible by the job skill-level changes that have occurred since l 950 and advances in technology. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the percentage of jobs classified as professional has held steady at 20 percent in l950 and l99l and is projected to remain at 20 percent in the year 2000. A complete reversal is projected for unskilled and skilled jobs. In l950 unskilled jobs accounted for 60 percent of the job market, with skilled jobs accounting for 20 percent. The reversal of roles reached a midway point in l99l, with unskilled jobs declining 15 percent to 45 percent and skilled jobs gaining 15 percent to reach 35 percent. By the year 2000, the Bureau predicts the reversal will be complete and continuing, with 65 percent skilled jobs and only 15 percent unskilled jobs.
Advances in technology have made telecommuting and home-based businesses a growing number. As a travel counselor for American Express, Michele Paul answers calls routed automatically to the business telephone line in her home, which is equipped with the same reservations terminal her co-workers use. In the first year after she switched to telecommuting, Ms. Paul's productivity rose 22 percent (Robert E. Calem, “More Working, Less Driving,” April 18, 1993, New York Times).
The telecommuting trend dovetails nicely with some of the advantages of home schooling. Those who work at home can create their own schedules, enjoy fewer interruptions, allocate time flexibly, and include family needs. They gain time that would have been spent commuting, breaking for lunch, and dealing with chatty co-workers. If telecommuting is combined with required days at the office, they can enjoy the break from the structured work week.
Telecommuting, however, demands self-discipline and initiative, two skills constantly encouraged in the home school environment.
Tomorrow's workplace will include many of the tools of today, including a computer, the information highway (cyberspace), modem, fax machine, teleconferencing options on the telephone and computer, and CD-ROM and videodisc technology, pager, and cellular phone. Even in today's workplace, laptop computers and cellular phones can create a virtual office in any location. By 1994, nearly 75 percent of U.S. corporations used an e-mail system. Revenues from video teleconferences have increased dramatically from the $113.3 million received in l990 to exceed $1.4 billion by 1996, according to projections by the Market Intelligence Research Corporation. In August 1994, the top five on-line services included CompuServe (with 2 million subscribers), Prodigy ( l .3 million), America Online (900,000), Delphi (120,000), and Genie ( l00,000). The largest on-line computer network is the Internet. As of l995, more than 20 million people were using “the net” daily, according to the International Internet Association. A 1994 Sprint Business Survey found that 97 percent of mid-size companies used fax to communicate, 75 percent used a toll-free number, 57 percent used voice mail, 49 percent used computer e-mail, and 20 percent used video conferencing. According to Wired magazine and USA Today, North American businesses sent almost 6 billion electronic mail messages in 1993. If each message had 50 words, it would be like sending 1,000 manuscripts the length of War and Peace every day.
Changing the Wetware
Enhanced with technology, home schooling can provide one of the more compatible
environments for preparing children for the workplace of tomorrow. In prefacing
a series of charts outlining the rise of the Information Age, Thomas A. Stewart
cautions that “the glories of high tech must not distract us from the
enduring wonder that technoweenies call ‘wetware’ Wetware is what
you have between your ears" (“The Information Age in Charts”, Fortune,
April 4, 1994). One of the most diverse and rich ways to charge a child's
wetware is to provide a nurturing, flexible environment such as that found
in many home schools, fill the environment with people, paper, and technological
resources, and stand to the side.
Click here to access the Measuring Up Sidebar that accompanied this article.
Click here to access the Home Schools On Line Sidebar that accompanied this article.
A
freelance editor and writer, Rhonda L. Rieseberg has worked with the
International Conference of Building Officials, Prentice Hall Computer Publishing,
The Earth Technology Corporation, the Agency for Instructional Technology,
and National Educational Service.