China’s homeschooling quandary

(Ecns.cn) -- Six-year-old Tommy takes a self-retracting tape measure to Tian Zhiming and pulls the metal strip out in front of him with curiosity. Tian asks the boy if he wants to see what's inside it. He then helps Tommy take it apart.

This is a typical scene at the "Magic School," a small operation sponsored by a homeschooling "alliance" of five parents in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province. Tian Zhiming is its founder as well as a teacher.

In China, an increasing number of parents are choosing to homeschool their children, reports China Newsweek, resulting in a broadening network of families seeking alternatives to traditional education.

Parents who share the same educational philosophy sometimes create homeschooling alliances, which help prevent their children from learning exclusively in an atmosphere of social isolation.

Such alliances encounter problems, however, particularly when the number of participants grows too large; as numbers swell, disagreements about teachers, educational materials and instructional plans are more likely to arise.

Moreover, some mature homeschooling alliances have tended to move toward gradual convergence into schools, a phenomenon that runs counter to the original idea.

The Magic School is located in a rented apartment, and there are currently only five students – two six-year-old boys, two 13-year-old girls and Tian's own two-year-old daughter.

Because Tian holds a master's degree and his teaching principles are well received by the other parents, they are happy to let the children homeschool together.

The children study Chinese, English and other cultural aspects with Tian in the mornings. In the afternoons, they participate in various other activities, including biological observation and experiments, discussion of documentaries, computer and Internet design, balcony gardening and baking.

To date, the parents have been very satisfied with Tian's approach, and plan to further decorate the house in order to create a better environment for the children. Tian is paid a monthly salary of 3,000 yuan (US$472) by the other four parents.

Despite the success of the alliance, there is an ongoing debate among the parents – particularly about whether the alliance should grow.

The Magic School will be more sustainable if more families join the program, says Tommy's mother.

She adds that the school does not currently have a stable student structure, since children may drop out at any time.

Furthermore, more families will bring down the shared costs, she says. Now, each parent has to pay up to 2,000 yuan (US$315) a month to cover rent and educational materials.

Although the other parents agree with Tommy's mother, they also worry, mostly about how to cope with a mounting workload if more children join.

And hiring professional teachers could conflict with the original idea: Most parents who homeschool do so because they believe their children are not properly educated in normal schools.

For now, the number of students at the Magic School is within bearable range, yet many other homeschooling alliances across the country are struggling with the issue.

"Oceanic Home," which now has more than 20 students, is one of them. At first it was like a kindergarten, but as the children grew up the alliance began hiring professional teachers and foreign tutors to handle different fields of knowledge. That's what the parents at Magic School are afraid of.

Some attempts to organize failed at the outset. A group of parents in Nanjing wanted to set up an alliance, for example, but the plan fell through when two of them insisted that the school be located in the community where they lived.

Homeschoolers here have another problem. China's compulsory school law states that citizens must attend school for at least nine years, which means the decision made by homeschooling parents is in fact illegal. So far, no official action has been taken.