Home schooling has grown at about 15% per year since 1990. With this growth rate in consideration HSLDA estimates there are about 1.5 million children home schooling in the 1997-1998 school year. In March of 1997 a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll found that 6% of parents “Home-schooled, keeping [their] child out of school and teaching the child at home.”  

Q. Why do parents decide to home educate their children?
A. Most parents decide to home school because they feel they can provide a better education for their children than public schools or private schools offer. The rampant problems of drugs, crime, violence, teen pregnancy, and sexually transmitted diseases in our nation’s schools are compelling parents to find alternative learning environments free from these social ills. Home schooling allows parents to promote good academics, common sense morality, and family unity.  

Top DVD Reviews of the month, brought you you by

CARS-LIGHTING MCQUEEN

I loved this movie, and There's an extra coat of hot wax on Pixar's vibrant, NASCAR-influenced comedy about a world populated entirely by cars. Lightning McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson) is the slick rookie taking the Piston Cup series by storm when the last race of the season (the film's high-octane opening) ends in a three-way tie. On the way to the tie-breaker race in California, Lightning loses his way off Route 66 in the Southwest desert and is taught to stop and smell the roses by the forgotten citizens of Radiator Springs. It's odd to have such a slim story from the whizzes of Pixar, and the film pales a bit from their other films (though can that be a fair comparison?). Nonetheless, Cars is another gleaming ride with Pixar founder John Lasseter, who's directing for the first time since Toy Story 2. There's the usual spectrum of excellent characters teamed with appropriate voice talent, loads of smooth humor for kids and parents alike, knockout visuals, and a colorful array of sidekicks, including a scene-stealing baby blue forklift named Guido. Lightning's plight is changed with the help of former big-city lawyer Sally Carrera (Pixar veteran Bonnie Hunt), the town's patriarch Doc Hudson (Paul Newman), and kooky tow truck Mater (Larry the Cable Guy). The Incredibles was the first Pixar film to break the 100-minute barrier, but had enough story not to suffer; Cars, at 116 minutes (including some must-see end credit footage), is not as fortunate, plus it never pierces the heart. Trivia fans should have bonanza with the frame-by-frame DVD function; the movie is stuffed with in-jokes, some appearing only for an instant. Ages 5 and up. --Doug Thomas

DVD features
With the slimmest extras package for a Pixar film debuting on DVD, Cars still shines for home viewing. As with earlier digital-to-digital transfers, the film sounds and looks stunning. There is only one behind-the-scenes feature, a 16-minute cursory but entertaining glance at director John Lasseter's influences (his dad was a car-parts manager), including some of the real-life inspiration for the film such as Michael Wallis's influential book on Route 66 (he also voiced the sheriff). There's a new cartoon for the DVD, "Mater and Ghost Light," which is smile-inducing at best. Four deleted scenes (in storybook format with voices) also show a darker tone the movie may have taken at one point. Best is the adorable short "One Man Band" that showed theatrically with the film, and the film's credit sequence can be seen full screen without the credits (and find the Easter egg for an extended version). Not a tricked-out DVD, but still worth a spin. --Doug Thomas

This is a clean awesome movie and I really enjoyed it with the family!

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TOP SOFTWARE RECOMMENDATION OF THE MONTH

We did a review for the best software titles of the year.  If you are looking for that review, click here.

JumpStart Spanish
 JumpStart Spanish from Knowledge Adventure..You've probably heard that children have a much higher propensity and retention rate for language learning than adults. Some studies say that if you learn multiple languages at a very young age, you have a much better chance of remembering them over the long term.

Programs like JumpStart Spanish are designed especially for children in preschool, kindergarten, and the first grade to make the most of this aptitude. We have been struggling to find a good software that helps teach our son Spanish. Most of the software we previewed were "flashcards." We finally found the best foreign language kids software I have seen.


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