Which has more overweight or obese children, public school or homeschool, or is there no difference?

I agree with K - this is a very complex question and would be very hard to study.

There is a *little* research on this. It's an area I've been personally interested in. There was a master's thesis written by a student at the University of Kentucky that concluded that homeschooled students eat a bit more, but it didn't go into a obesity rates. If they're more active, then they'd burn off any extra calories. There is also a study out of the Phoenix area that found that the 11th grade level, homeschooled students score lower on levels of physical fitness. I've put the links as my sources. But these two tiny studies are pretty meaningless with regard to the big picture. However, I do think they're interesting as they defy popular opinion.

I don't think that there is any evidence and it would be anecdotal either way. That's because in order to draw any conclusions, the researchers would have to hold all other demographics of the schooled and homeschooled students constant. Race, economic status and geographic location are all factors in obesity rates. People in the southern united states are more likely to be obese than in the mountain or western states. Statistically Black and Latinos are more likely to be overweight than White populations. Asians have the lowest rates of obesity. Poor people are more likely to be obese. Homeschooled students often don't reflect the other demographic characteristics of a community. So just to compare homeschooled students to schooled students would not mean a lot unless the researcher held constant the other demographics. In other words, unless the researcher used equal numbers of schooled and homeschooled students of each race, social class etc, it would be a comparison that wouldn't mean much. That would be nearly impossible to do. Observational conclusions about this don't mean much. Many people don't recognize what is considered overweight by medical charts. A child who looks healthy can be considered overweight by charts.

My own observations are that I've seen homeschooled students who are very fit and not, and schooled students who are like. In the upper-middle class suburb where I live now, I see fewer overweight and obese students, both homeschooled and schooled, than when I lived in a lower economic (aka. inner-city/minority) area. Well, it's pretty obvious; parents here have the money to sign them up for sports and other activities, as well as the money to buy more nutritious food. They also are more likely to belong to the racial groups who are less likely to be obese. We aren't reliant on lousy grocery or liquor stores, as they are in inner-cities.

My last thought is that I do think that homeschooling has the *potential* to provide better food choices and more activity,but it's all about choice. . If parents bring home junk food or don't provide opportunities for activity, it doesn't matter where they study. Homeschooling is no guarantee of good parental choices about food or physical activity. Schooled kids can bring their lunches their lunches to school. Personal choices make the difference here.

Like people have pointed out, it would be nearly impossible to determine that. Any observations are anecdotal and more than likely biased by the observers preference in education. Any studies would have to be voluntary and therefore subject to selection bias; if the fittest homeschooled students volunteered while the least fit didn't, it affects the validity of any studies. Same for publicly schooled students.

I think if the data were available, it would probably show little difference if like groups of homeschooled and schooled students were compared. Often the number of kids more likely to be overweight (minority and poor) who are enrolled in public schools in greater numbers than the number who are homeschooled. Homeschooling might provide better food choices, because there are fewer outside opportunities for junk; ie: the lunch line, but there is no forcing a homeschooling mom to bring home only healthy food. Homeschooling definitely provides more time for physical activity, but the question is whether that extra time is used that way. Impossible to know.

Answer: There is no way to know.

I've never seen any research done on this, so anecdotal evidence is likely all you'll find. While I have seen obese children in both settings, I've seen far fewer in homeschool settings. Schools tend to have students sitting for long periods of time (getting up only to change classes), while at home students can walk around more and play or be active more often. Schools give so little time to eat lunch (and no snack times for most) that children in schools tend to practically inhale their food, as well as eat a lot of sugary foods and other junk; at home, students can et at a more reasonable pace--and so are more likely to stop when full, and tend to eat healthier foods.

Studies have shown that homeschooled children tend to watch much less television than schooled children do, and that likely has an effect, too.

I don't know if it is even possible to determine that. A lot of states don't even require homeschoolers to register.

Now that I think about it, very few kids at our homeschool co-ops are overweight (about a couple hundred kids between both in total). Probably less than 2 or 3 percent. But then, these are only the kids in our groups, which happen to be extremely active groups, almost everyone is in at least one or more sports or dance or karate, there are co-ops and park dates weekly and field trips and camp outs... so it might just be that we are a more than average active community.

Homeschool = Healthier food choices, and potential for more exercise.

Public School= definitely more exercise (sports, walking from class to class), much less healthy food.

I doubt that there are stats kept on that; I would think (hope!) that since the kid eats more @ home than @ school, the home choices would have more of an affect.

Then there's the high-poverty areas where the kids get most of their nutrition from school and parents can't afford much OR healthy at home.

Sigh.

Complex stuff.

I don't think there is any info on that. I've seen obese kids in both groups, just as I've seen extremely fit, healthy kids in both groups.

All the best.

it depends on a kid's diet ; is it healthy or unhealthy and that is based on what a kid eats at home so.

no difference!