You have 7 kids in school but your profile thing says you only have 6 children. Did you like steal someones kid?

Forgive me, but this brings up more questions that only you can answer for your family.

Public school? It depends on your school district. Do they have enough financing to support the needs of the teachers and the students?  Are classes sized and structured to provide your children with what they need? Do buses run on a schedule you can work with?

Private school? Many of those same questions apply but now you need to know that you can afford the program being offered. Is it a good program or one offered because it is something the pastor saw once in a magazine and it seemed the right price?

Home school? Do you have the time, the patience and the true yearning it takes to provide those kids with the best teaching you can possibly give them?

I answer and ask these questions from a varied background. Presently, I am in an internship in an eighth grade Social Studies class in a Title I school and working on my MA in Teaching. Prior to that I taught Art in a Christian school our daughter was attending. We left that school when her health became an issue and we home schooled for a while. It really all depends on how you feel and how each of your children respond to the teaching.

Public school:  Pros:  Socialization of children, formally educated and creditionaled teachers, "standardized" programs to ensure that all children are taught the same thing.  Cons:  I don't agree with a lot of what is taught; teachers with political agendas; teacher/student ratio - teachers can be spread too thin and your kid most likely won't receive personal attention; some kids just don't test well, so standardized tests don't work on them.

Private school:  pretty much the same pros, expect I would add that there may be more favorable teacher/student ratios.  I like the idea of my children being taught Christian values (her father and I, of course, are the forerunners of that though).  Cons:  very expensive, may not agree with the school/church's doctrine, resources may be spread too thin.

Homeschooling:  Pros: you get to teach your children more than just lessons, you can teach your children real life lessons they may not learn in school (such as cleaning, cooking, budgeting, time management, etc); you know your child the best, so you know what his/her strengths and weaknesses are, whereas a teacher in public school may not have time to learn such things about your child; you can afford your children lots of educational opportunities that public school kids may not get, like different field trips and outings; there are now many homeschool groups that get together for sports, art, fieldtrips; there are good curricula for homeschoolers; you don't have to deal with the negative stuff of public schools - just to name of a few pros.
Cons - I do agree that your kids need to be around more than just you; your finances may be too tight for different opportunities; some parents are not organized or educated enough to handle homeschooling.

Just my opinion - for my own daughter, when she's old enough, I'd love to homeschool her as long as we are in an area where she can be around other homeschool groups and still be involved in sports or different classes that way.  I have my bachelor's degree, several courses in education, and I'm very organized, so I feel that I could do well homeschooling my child. 

Public school?
doesn't cost money. as long as you live in a good area, the schools will be top-notch. people from all social classes, rich poor and everything in between. your child will learn things for college, but also things about different kinds of people.

this is only good with a good school system, though.

Private school?
good education, but everybody seems to be snobby and rich. your children will definitely get ahead, but their attitudes about poeple might be a little skewed.

Home school?
your children will not socialize as much and won't have as many options of  classes as they would in actual school. however, you have complete control over what they are confronted with and what they will learn. this is both good and bad.

i'm in public school. i love public school. it is amazing, i have learned a lot about a lot of people and a lot of things.
plus it was free. best experience of my life and it's free. :]

Ugh, I'm not going to go through the pros and cons of each.. I've been in a public school my whole life & I wouldn't have changed it for the world. I can't imagine being home-schooled, esp in a bigger city. It really would have been a downer. As for a private christan school, screw that. They would have kicked my ass out & prolly told me that I was going to Hell cuz God hated me.

I can't imagine having so many kids in so many different places. That just seems like a whirlwind in itself, kudos to you for dealing with it.

Homeschooling - is there a a group of other homeschoolers you can connect your kids with?  That seemed to work really well when my mom was homeschooling my siblings and I.  However, when we moved and couldn't find other groups of homeschoolers, we went to public school.  Social interaction is a must and even though we danced twice a week, it wasn't enough to meet that goal.   It seems that many communities today have an interconnected homeschool system, if you could find something like that, it'd help a ton in the social aspect and with teaching some of the more difficult classes in upper grades.

I spent the first six years of my grade school education in public school and the last six years in a non-denominational college prep school. The district I live in for public school is, well, fine once you get past middle school, but if you want to get ahead, you have to really want it. However, in the private school I went to, it was extremely rare to have a student that didn't go to college, so if higher education is important to you and your child, I'd really suggest private school (if the funds are available).

I'm from Georgia, a state notorious for it's lackluster public school systems, and I also live in a rural area. Of the friends I had when I left the public school system in middle school, I can think of maybe three that don't have any children out of about ten people. I commuted forty-five minutes every day to go to that private school, and while I had somewhat of a miserable time with some people there (I had friends, then lost them, but because of the small population, there's really nowhere else to go), but education-wise, it was much, much stronger than the surrounding public schools.

I can't comment much on homeschooling, as I haven't had much experience with it or the people.

Public schools can either be great or extremely bad. it all is according to how much the teachers care about their students well being. I think with public schools kids will learn more about being an individual and have more life experiences.

Private schools are better funded and so the teaching staff is a lot more motivated and the materials are better for learning. I think the academics are a lot better in the private schools but as for socializing I have heard stories, and there isn't much of that. Especially those with dress codes.

I am not too sure abut homeschooling. From what I know I think it would be easier for a student to learn on their own time, but I don't know if it a strct curriculum or not. You also don't get the whole social interaction that you do in schools which is key when college comes around.

Personally I prefer public schools more.

This is our list we made when making the jump from private Christian to public based on the schools we were looking at:

Public Pro:  Little out of pocket cost (lunches are cheaper, field trips are cheaper and no tuition were high ones), An exposure to different kids in different walks of life, a huge lesson for both the kids and us in Trusting in God and Faith that He cares about even the little things like our friends, our teacher's and such, new teaching styles and methods more likely to be implemented (can also be a con though)

Public Con:  The potential influence of other kids' on our kids, Not so much in the elementary but content in classes in upper grades (also a Pro as it can lead to many discussions on the WHY'S of what we believe though..), Them being with a person of influence for hours at a time that might not believe what we believe as a family.

Private Pro:  The class size!!  A Kindergarten class of 14?? Sign me up!, Bible teaching everyday, A more traditional (ie like what I grew up learning) learning style (can also be a con though), In elementary school the majority of the kids were good kids from good solid families, teacher's who were there and it was so much more then a "job" for them and it showed in the interaction's with my kids.

Private Con:  In the upper grades hypocracy and ambivelance to spiritual matters was showing up,  the cost was our biggest factor, The time it took to get there, 3 times as long as our public school, clique's... even in the elementary were more prevalent because of the small class sizes.

Homeschool:  In all honesty I don't think I could be fair in this area as we have no experience with it aside from watching extended family and interacting with familes at church that do.  It was not what we were called to do so I have not researched it.  I do see that advantage for my one son who is an outside the box thinker, a free spirit who is gifted... a way for him to learn in ways that get to his heart and soul and let him explore things at his own pace and that interest him.  I however am hopelessly unorganized and would fear messing him up by homeschooling! :)  So I guess a con for me would be the pressure to not fail at something so important.

On another note, the private school we attended was quite proud of
their academics and pushing the kids hard but honestly there is not
THAT much of a difference in the education they have gotten in public
vs. their private schooling education... at least no in our district.  I think the district  makes all the difference.  We live in the suburb of a large city and there are districts I would not live in in a heart beat and their are districts that are better then ours... all of them touching the boundary lines of our district.  I guess something we learned is that just because a private school is private and take money to provide an education does not always mean that the money provides an education or an experience better then what you would get in public.  We have had an amazing public experience going from die-hard private-schooler's...

Well, I homeschooled my son for 4 years and now he's in public school - and my daughter did public school for 2 years but now she's in private!!   The biggest con is having them in two different schools... 
I could give you more specifics about why I chose each situation for each child at each particular time, but (and I think you've already figured this out) the most important thing is to do the right thing for each child.   My motto now is one child/one year at a time - they are each where they need to be now, and that may change in the future.   

If you have a college education and the discipline to teach lessons thuroughly, home school your children until Middle School. This way you give them a better education and instill positive practices that will endure then allow them to be socialized when puberty hits.

I'm still debating with myself whether it's better to do this in the 7th or 9th grade/ages 12 or 14. This is mostly due to a conflict between the risk of hormone ladden Middle School years undoing all previous learnings versus the importance of such a transitional period in development.

Then again, if you can afford it--private school the entire way unless it is a religous oriented school. They suffer greatly in the sciences, literature, and ideology due to the limited options they teach about.

*whistles* There's alot of pros and cons in each, I feel there's more cons in public school (though, granted, it really depends on your area)...than the other two, but I'm a little biased.
 I was homeschooled.
It saved us some money because we live out in the middle of nowhere on a farm. It also allowed me to go my own pace...I've always been pretty quick, and would often finish my school year months earlier than expected...and by time I was nearly over, due to my education at home I was already college level in most things and was beyond college level in a few others.
 Backwhen my mom was in public school, she was pretty quick too...she used to tell me stories about her school deciding not to let her skip grades because they thought it would lower the moral of the other kids.
 Nowadays, from the kids I know, I often hear stories of creativity being stomped in public school classrooms...and considering how most of the kids out here are -- I'm glad I was never sent to public school.

The cons are, depending on your kids' ages...this might mea you'll have to spend alot of time with them...and depending your kids themselves, it might take alot of energy.
 Personally, in your shoes, I'd feel that it would be well worth it...but it really depends on what responsibilities you have and what your priorities are.

..also, if you're considering homeschooling, while most programs are pretty unique and decent, it depends on what suits your kids best.

As my brother and I have grown older, we've increasingly done more and more of the work by ourselves. Basically, for us, we have textbooks (with work problems and assignments in them), some pages of recommendations and ideas for extra credits, and tests. We do most of this ourselves, include our parents sometimes when we play sports or do art for extra credits...and the rest of the stuff my parents have to do is ship our finished work out after grading it.
 It used to take more energy and time when we were younger 'cause we didn't know as much then and we needed some guidance learning-wise.

I am speaking as a 17 year old who has been through 10 years of public school, 1 and 1/2 years of cyber school and will continue my education full homeschooled.
From where I am standing-- Public school is an awesome experience. You're kids will get to know others their age and you won't ever be taunted by the words "unsocial". But, as good as that may be, on my end High School was a downer. I went through depression and hated every second I was there. For everyone high school sucks, but if my parents had taken it a different way at the beginning of my HS education, I would be in a much better place.
Cyber school-- would that be considered private school? I don't know... But, my take on that is that it's a much faster pace than public school, which is why I'm finishing out this year with homeschool.
Homeschool-- I get to get a crapload of credits in and I can graduate early which is awesome if your kid wants a job, like me. 
I don't know, I've always had a bad taste with Public school-- I say, you should check out all your options. Pick the best suited for your child education wise. You don't want to blow all your money on a private school that your kid hates and the teachers have tenure and don't do anything or a public school that is more than perfect and your kid loves it. (just examples). You know what I mean? I just really wish that the older I got, I would have had options put infront of me... No one knows how I learn, but me.
Now, one massive thing for me was also the, say Religious part. I'm a Christian myself and it really erked me to see how the kids act. Like at dances and football games. Awful awful stuff. But, as followers of Christ we can also be the light within that darkness. Just continue to pray about it and God will give you an answer.
Oh, and if you do homeschool your kids-- don't worry about how they'll be in college because a lot of the colleges I've been looking at, mostly Christian, have had counselors who work with the homeschooled kids. Pretty awesome investment if you ask me.

Just sayin. Keep praying about it-- you'll get an answer :)