Task 2: Home-schooling

by katisss
(USA)

Children should never be educated at home by their parents. What is your opinion?

Use specific reasons and examples to support your answer.

In most countries children attend school and only in rare cases are educated by their parents in a “home schooling” situation. While I accept that this might work well for some families, I agree believe that a school can generally provide children with a better education.

In my view, the most important point is to ensure the overall quality of education for all students. Not only is it impractical for working parents to find sufficient time to teach their children, but they are not pedagogical and subject experts like teachers are. Additionally, in a school a given curriculum and regular tests ensure children learn all the required skills. Parents might be more biased when judging their own children’s skills.

Furthermore, a school can provide equal opportunities to all children in getting a solid education and a balanced view of the world. Some parents might be excellent at teaching, while others are less ambitious or able unfairly disadvantaging disadvantage some children. Similarly, children with special education needs, like being dyslexic, may need the help of an expert more easily available at a school. Finally, some parents have extreme or political views and leaving education to them would deprive children of the chance to explore different views. Children must be given the chance to form their own opinion.

Another important consideration is that attending a school is a social learning experience. When being home schooled, children miss out on having to find their place in a group of peers, an important learning experience for their future. Despite the fact that parents are important role models for their children, teachers can play a crucial role in helping children explore their talents and interests.

In conclusion, while I think parents play a major role in their children’s education, schools have overall proven themselves to provide the better and more balanced education. I think home schooling will be and should be limited to ill children or those living in remote areas.

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IELTS buddy
Feedback

Overall, a well-written and presented essay. I have made the few correction above.

Just a few comments:

I agree that = “I believe / think” etc is better because you are not given a statement that you are asked to agree or disagree with (not a major issue though).

Reduced Relative Clauses

In this sentence:

When being home schooled children miss out on having to find their place in a group of peers, an important learning experience for their future.

You must not miss this comma after 'peers'. You are writing a reduced relative clause i.e.

When being home schooled children miss out on having to find their place in a group of peers, which is an important learning experience for their future.

Missing the comma can make the sentence confusing as you don’t realize it is a clause without it. I had to read it twice before I realized.

Complex Sentences - Adverbial Clauses

Despite parents - this is wrong. These are the possible structures:

Despite + gerund
Despite the fact that + subject + verb

And don’t forget the comma at the end of the dependent clause either (after ‘children’).

You missed it here as well:

When being home schooled (comma here) children miss out on having to find their place in a group of peers, an important learning experience for their future.

It may seem like a small point, but complex sentences can get confusing without this comma.

You only need a comma if you START with the subordinating conjunction clause, in these cases ‘despite’ and ‘when’.

Transitions

And remember, commas after transition phrases:

In my view,

Writing Conclusions

As you will see I crossed the last sentence out:

I think home schooling will be and should be limited to ill children or those living in remote areas

This is a new idea and you should not introduce new ideas into the conclusion (although you can give some general thought about the future).

If you do this, it leaves the person wondering why you think this, so we need to know more. It therefore needs to be in your body paragraphs somewhere and needs to be explained (or left out altogether).

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