Comparing Reading Skills of Conventionally-Schooled and Homeschooled Children

Abstract

Reading is part of our everyday life. Children enhance their reading skills through the help of different teaching reading strategies. Different reading skills are vital to children’s development because reading skills are essential for one to function in our society. Nevertheless, the variety of teaching reading strategies goes with the variety of learning methodologies and the different formal education systems that may entail. This led to the conduct of this study on comparing the reading skills of conventionally-schooled and homeschooled children. In the study, an adopted questionnaire for teachers and homeschooling parents as well as different reading worksheets for kindergarten, grades 1, 2, and 3 that is sourced from various sources were administered using convenience sampling. A mixed method of research was the study’s research design. Research respondents were homeschooling parents and conventional school teachers as well as select homeschooled and conventionally-schooled pupils who belong to the following grade levels: kinder, grade one (1), and grade two (2). The gathered data underwent statistical analysis -- percentage frequency, median, Mann-Whitney U - test of difference and z-score. Results revealed that homeschooled children are significantly more skilled in reading than from conventionally-schooled children. Furthermore, the data gathered revealed different teaching strategies used to improve the reading skills of conventionally- schooled and homeschooled children. These can be summed up to bottom up process, top-down process and interaction of the bottom-up and top-down process in reading.