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["Lynda" <lurine AT softcom.net>]

Gloria, can you please explain to me why you are so positive that you 
wouldn't have been exposed to or have been involved in music or basketball 
if you hadn't gone to public school?

How is that if you hadn't been bullied you wouldn't have learned to deal 
with things that happened to you later in life?  You mean to tell me that 
you think you had to be emotionally abused early in life inorder to survive 
adversity later in life?

And let me clear something up that p.s'ers seem to want to believe is the 
gospel and that if they keep repeating it often enough it will make it the 
truth, "I'm sure there are exaples of home schooled kids who get to do 
things like that and more."

No, Gloria, there are "examples" of homeschooled kids that get to do those 
things, it is a reality of everyday life in the day to day life of the vast 
majority of homeschooled kids.

Of course, *all* homeschooled kids don't get to do that but then *all* 
public schooled kids don't get to do the things you mentioned.

My mother and father were BOTH very involved in the p.s. I went to, but that 
didn't make them a better experience.  One of the more traumatic experiences 
was the first day of school and there was nothing involved parents could 
have done to make it any better!  I had a nanny from Georgia and as a 
consequence I had a southern accent.  A THICK southern accent!

Teacher:  Lynda, can you stand up and tell everyone your name and where you 
are from (we lived in the projects and there were folks working in the 
shipyards from all over the country, hence the question).
Lynda:  Ma name is Lean Da and ahmmm from hee are.
Teacher:  No, dear, I mean where did you move here from.
Lynda:  Yaa ree ka
Teacher:  (Getting a little impatient)  No, I mean where are you originally 
from (giving me the 'is this child stupid or what' look)
Me, now totally confused:  Pointed out the window and said "San Francisco."
Teacher:  Never mind!  Sit down.

At the end of the day I got one of those enfamous notes pinned on my blouse. 
The note really ticked my mother off (I later found out that the teacher 
said my mother should work at teaching me the difference between the truth 
and a lie) and she stomped off to school with me the next morning, not that 
it did any good.  A month later I end up going home with another note pinned 
on my blouse.  This time my Dad took off work to talk to the teacher.  Seems 
I wasn't supposed to be reading books or writing in cursive and that I was 
to quit immediately because I might "harm" the other children by being ahead 
of them!

Hells bells, even those ghetto schools were probably better than 99.9% of 
the public schools are now.  We had field trips at least once a month (the 
Planetarium, the Aquarium, the Natural History Museum, Golden Gate Park, the 
Oakland and SF Zoos, the Golden Hind, just to name a few), we did cooking 
for each country we studied, we had ballroom and square dancing lessons 
(ballroom dancing graduation was at the Hyatt Regency, another field trip), 
orchestra, choir, drama, art, creative writing, swimming lessons and that 
was all in grammar school!

I was in the orchestra.  I aced all the math classes.  I loved history.  Won 
the prize in ballroom dancing.  However, that doesn't stop me from finding 
that public schools suck.

I guess the brainwashing didn't take with me <g>  I don't find a need to 
justify all the bad stuff and there was plenty of that!

Lynda
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Gloria Morris" <gloriamorris59 AT gmail.com>


> Some of my happiest memories from my years growing up are my
> experiences in the grade school and high school orchestras. I played
> violin and LOVED it. The year our high school string quartet went to
> state was such an amazing experience for me. Now, folks thought I was
> a little strange as a kid, walking around humming the second violin
> part to Beethoven's Fifth Symphony (we also played in a symphony with
> the band kids), but, in addition to horses, music was a great passion
> (it still is), and the public school system allowed me to pursue it to
> my heart's content. I also played piano, and I would play for the
> chorus in grade school, for plays, and I played for our graduation. I
> know for sure that if I had been home schooled, I'd never have gotten
> the chances to do what I did, musically. I know that I'd not have had
> as many opportunities to overcome my native shyness and stage fright,
> and I'd probably not have been able as easily, later in life, to give
> talks in front of a thousand people, had I not had those sorts of
> performance opportunities at a young age. I'm sure there are examples
> of home schooled kids who get to do things like that and more, but I
> know I'd not have been one of them.