Online resources such as Google and Ask Jeeves have radically changed research opportunities for the home schooling population. The availability of quality materials is another factor in the movement of homeschooling into the mainstream. Large institutional catalogue databases for such publicly funded institutions as Vancouver Public Library and Library of Congress, digital image collections such as New York Public Library and informational databases such as the Smithsonian and the BC Archive serve as a primary, authoritative resources for homeschoolers and networked schools.

Public institutions have a mandate of knowledge collection, availability, and dissemination. The provision of funding for a Web presence, and the creation of online databases of textual and graphic materials was itself a driver for an increase of Internet use.

It is interesting to note, however, that the Homeschooling Handbook, (1999) recommends ‘information on the Internet as a supplement to what is available at the local library’, and recommends the Web be used for accessing support groups, for arranging field trips, finding electronic discussion lists, and accessing Search engines.

The usage therefore, appears to be that of accessibility of different options for source materials in the interest of individualizing the learning experience. There does not seem to be a completely wholesale shift to virtual materials. For example, many of the for-profit companies maintain a web presence primarily as a means of selling packages of print materials of curriculum materials.

Indeed, the nature of the underlying philosophy of homeschooling; that of hands on, localized, individualized, family-based and community-based learning experiences would seem to preclude a wholesale move to the virtual realm.

Homeschooling: discussion