I expect she extrapolated from the British system and eleven is when kids go from elementary to whatever the next level is called, and if they’re going to be sent to boarding school that’s when it’s likely to happen. Just my WAG.
Hogwarts probably has some sort of financial aid system for kids like Tom Riddle, incredibly magical orphans with no money. Of course, since Harry Potter is an incredibly magical orphan with a small fortune, they never needed to get into it.
As a book geek, though, I will confess to being bothered by the fact that the Hogwarts students don’t appear to have any literature in their education at all. Of course, some literature classes seem more designed to squash a love of books rather than foster it, so maybe that’s for the best…
I don’t think homeschooling would be as simply as that even for wizards. Wizard parents do need to hold jobs and make money, and plenty of parents just aren’t cut out for teaching. Some may homeschool (perhaps Mrs. Weasley did?), but I imagine most hire private tutors or go in with a group of other families to set up a small school.
This was an issue of great interest around the table in the dining hall one night. It seems there must be some sort of higher education for wizards, as we know there is an extensive organization of magical politicans and civil servants, as well as wizards working in fields like banking and medicine. Hogwarts does not appear to offer the sort of training that would be needed for these jobs. Given the general lack of knowledge about Muggles on the part of wizards, I doubt that many (if any) ever attend Muggle universities. Even if they wanted to, I don’t know how they’d get accepted if all their school records were from a school that, to the Muggles, doesn’t even exist!
Hagrid does only teach in an area he has special experience in. Such things aren’t terribly unusual even in the non-magical world – for instance, the acting professor at my college does not have a graduate degree, and was hired largely on the basis of her extensive background as an actress.
In Goblet of Fire, Percy worked in the Ministry of Magic, and he only graduated the year before. Maybe they rely on on-the-job training. They could also use apprentice programs for other professions, like healing.
Yeah, I don’t think there are magic universities. They are taught all they need to know at Hogwarts.
As for American schools… I’m sure there might be one next to Roswell, NM ;).
As for American schools - the Salem Witches’ Institute is mentioned in chapter 7 of Goblet of Fire. We also know there is a Quidditch team in Texas, and an American version of the game called Quadpot, from Quidditch Throughout the Ages, both of which imply a talent pool to draw from. So there are probably several wizarding schools in North America. I have occasionally amused myself by imagining that there’s one for each state in the US, rather like the state magnet schools for math and science or the arts - perhaps the South Dakota school only has about 30 students . . .
I agree that children younger than eleven years probably aren’t deliberately taught much magic. In the same chapter of GoF, we see one child playing with his father’s wand and expanding a slug, and two young girls riding on “toy” broomsticks that only fly a yard or so in the air, so it’s clear that they know about it and think it’s normal, but it’s also clear from the reactions of those around them that they’re not supposed to be using it around Muggles, and that the boy with the wand isn’t supposed to have it at all, Muggles or not.
The purebloods at Hogwarts do seem to know more about wizarding history than those raised by Muggles, so presumably they’re taught something about that. They also seem to know how to read and write, how to use a library, how to do basic arithmetic, some geography, and a little bit about Care of Magical Creatures. They don’t seem to know much about science of any sort (including the magical chemistry and botany they’re later taught as Potions and Herbology; Astronomy might be an exception, but we’re not told much about that class at all), Muggle history after the approximate founding of Hogwarts, literature (Muggle or wizarding), or any math higher than very basic geometry. All this is stuff that homeschooling could easily take care of if most wizarding mothers are stay-at-home. It could also easily be handled by tutors.
In http://www.scholastic.com/harrypotter/author/transcript1.htm we find out that there is no formal wizarding university. However, we know there are trade journals - Transfiguration Today, for example, is mentioned in one fo the books. Those wizards with higher qualifications seem to have gone through apprenticeships rather than institutes of higher learning - Charlie’s study of dragons in Romania may well be an example.
I must echo look!ninjas and say that, based on the information in the books, Hogwarts has some large gaps in its curriculum. It often comes across as more a technical school than anything else. It does offer science (chemistry, botany, and astronomy, as Omorka mentioned), some history, and I suppose Muggle Studies could be considered a kind of social studies or anthropology class, but there does not appear to be anything in the way of art, music, literature, rhetoric, logic, politics, economics, higher math, or even foreign language other than the spell language. If there are no magical universities then the wizards and witches are lucky they don’t have to compete with Muggles for jobs, because their education does not seem very well-rounded.
IMO, it would be easy for wizards to homeschool. Wizarding families seem to be fairly “nuclear”; Mom stays home and Dad has a career. The professional women we’ve met in the books are spinsters, such as Professor McGonagall, Bertha Jorkins, and Madame Maxime. Other female teachers at Hogwarts, matron Madam Pomfrey and innkeeper Madam Rosemerta don’t seem to have any children. The amount of freedom Rita Skeeter had when she wasn’t in a jar indicates she didn’t have any family obligations. Mrs. Weasley obviously had no career, and there is no mention of Lily Potter or Mrs. Malfoy having jobs (I assume Mrs. M is a trophy wife).
So if it’s enculturated that when a wizarding woman gets married, she settles down and stays home with the kidlets, then I bet they have plenty of time to teach little Abigail and Stuart their ABC’s, especially when they can use magic to make housekeeping easier!
Well of course it isn’t well rounded… it is simply to learn magic :D.
Hermoine took both Arithmancy and Runes, which I would stick in the higher math and foreign language categories respectively. Perhaps.
Haven’t quite worked out any brilliant ideas for that quite yet…however, accommodations could quite easily exist for students in Tom’s situation. A scholarship of sorts, maybe? Surely something would be worked out in the event of such a case because it would hardly be a common event.
Well, we know Harry attended a Muggle school, as did Justin Finch-Fletchley, so it’s reasonable to assume that a good chunk of Hogwarts’ students have. My theory on wizard elementary schools varies, depending on my mood - homeschooling would probably be the case for the Weasleys, as Ron hasn’t had much exposure at all to Muggle stuff (remember, he’s fascinated by the fact that Muggle photos don’t move.) There may be “private” schools for wizarding families, though - many of the Hogwarts students come to the school WITH friends, so it’s reasonably likely they know them form some sort of educational setting.
WRT Tom Riddle - while his parents were dead, his grandparents were still alive into his teenage years, when they were murdered. The Riddle family was wealthy, so Tom probably inherited - the fact that he was in an orphanage is more likely because he had no guardians, rather than no money.
I think it’s clear that at least some of this is deliberate. There was a thread a while back that pointed out that Wizard economics seem rather primative and poorly suited for long-term financial stability. While I doubt Rowling has worked out the details of Wizarding economic theory, this seems consistant with her depiction of Wizard culture as overly traditional, insular, and even backwards. Wizard society seems even more class-based than modern British society, and includes strong elements of racism (not only anti-Muggle sentiment, but even [magical] race-based slavery, as seen in Dobby) and isolationism. Over all, it is very poorly fit to compete with Muggle society, and survives primarily because of: a) its extreme secrecy, which prevents direct competition with Muggles, and b) the dwindling superiority of magic over Muggle technology.
So far, Rowling has mostly used these things for humor (especially Mr. Weasly’s lack of education about basic Mugglisms), but in Book IV, we started to see these elements used more dramatically (e.g., Hermione’s concern for oppressed magical races, and Hagrid’s experience of anti-Giantism). My guess is that this trend will continue, especially as we will definitely start to see more of the effect the growing crisis has on the adult Wizarding world. I believe the whole series is leading up to a climax that will involve a widespread upheaval of Wizarding culture that will result in the liberalization of Wizard society and the reversal of these negative elements, including Wizard secrecy. Harry, who will at this time be finishing the highest level of Wizarding education, will of course play a major role in all this. Perhaps he will become the first Minister of Magical and Non-Magical Cooperation, or the first headmaster of a fully integrated Hogwarts, accepting Magical and Non-Magical folk alike. Pure speculation, of course, but remember where you read it first!
Malfoy appeared already competent on a broomstick by his arrival at Hogwarts, and Hermione seems to have known at least some wizarding history (though that could be accounted for by her reading all her books before school began!).
If we turn to Ursula K. Le Guin’s Wizard of Earthsea books, we find that young mages are trained in the apprenticeship model.