Homeschooling Catches On in China

A new opening in a usually tightly controlled country

Homeschooling in China is in an emerging stage, with about 18,000 children across the country receiving education at home, according to a report released by the 21st Century Education Research Institute Saturday, the Beijing Morning Post reported.

Out of the homeschool kids, 60.42 percent are aged between 4 and 10, and the majority are boys. Most of them have previously attended conventional schools, though 37.99 percent had only ever been homeschooled. First grade or kindergarten was the most common time for parents to pull kids from school.

The report showed five main reasons for homeschooling, with the majority of cases, 54.19 percent, coming because parents disagreed with educational ideas in the regular school system, 9.5 percent believing the system was too slow, 7.26 percent feeling that children lacked respect at school, 6.07 percent saying their kids were tired of school life, and 5.59 percent citing religious conviction.