do home ed children need to access tutors/teachers?

[eurotrash]

I apologise if this is a really stupid question but I'm literally clueless on this!

Dh is in the midst of setting up a small business concentrating on various aspects of education - tutoring 1:1, groups, 11+, teaching teachers about sats content, consultancy, even some companies want some basic grammar taught for their employees etc. he's a very experienced English teacher but fancies a change.

Anyway, I have a relative who works in education at the LEA who said that home ed numbers in our area are high and rising and he should target that market.....but I just assumed home ed children are taught at home by their parents? Is this the case?

Thanks very much in advance x

[Helloyouall]

I am looking into home ed (primary age). English is an area I would be interested in. So there may well be others. Surely all home educators are different with different areas they want support for?

[RancidOldHag]

Tutors can be useful, depending on the age and stage if the DC, or if there is a small group who would like their DC to do something focused together.

Ther really isn't a single template for what people might want. But if you had capacity, advertising with the aim of raising awareness of how your services can fit flexibly into a range of approaches might be worthwhile.

(IME, amount of external tutoring increases with age of DC, especially if there is a decision to enter for any public exams).

[tudasaurus]

I home educate DS (7). I pay for him to attend a home ed science group, there are about 6 children and it is run by a qualified teacher. I have seen music and drama teachers advertising similar groups on our local page. I find the group useful because the teacher brings in resources we wouldn't have access to at home and they can do experiments etc, but it is still a small, child led group and nothing like a classroom setting.

[NewLife4Me]

We used a teacher for languages but it was a friend who volunteered.
You may get the odd subject here and there but doubtful you could run a business from the proceeds.
It could be some of your clients though.

There are many reasons why a parent or child might choose H.ed and many don't have official lessons or study any curriculum.
It may be difficult for you to plan lessons for this, unless you knew exactly what subjects they may want to study and how in depth they'd want to go.
Some just decide to go with the flow and learn what they want to.

[meditrina]

One area he might be able to target is families who HE for the primary years, but want their children to enter school for secondary. Short courses to align them with what schooled children will have learned might find takers. Pitch it more as 'easing the transition' rather than 'SATS crammer' though.

[eurotrash]

Thanks all. He's setting up a very fluid and flexible service for lots of different services within education so def not formal lesson planning or strict tutor etc. Just another area to consider for offering services if people want them. Thank you!

[eurotrash]

Meditrina - that's a really good idea! I've passed that one straight over! Thank you!

[Saracen]

In my area the main demand is for focused tutoring for IGCSEs. People want tutors who have experience with the specific exam they are going to sit. Some get individual tutoring but most are in tutor-led study groups.

For kids who aren't doing exams yet or at all, there is great enthusiasm for tutors who have a real passion for a particular topic. It almost doesn't matter what the topic is, so long as it's driven by the tutor's own natural excitement rather than being aimed in an opportunistic way at whatever the tutor thinks might "sell" if you see what I mean. Tutors with no experience of home education often don't comprehend the extent to which their success depends on communicating this excitement to the kids rather than on persuading parents of the educational merit of their content. We know that if our kids are interested, they are learning. It doesn't require any more justification than that. We don't care about them making three sub-levels of progress in maths. Yeats's idea that education "is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire" is popular. But I don't know that that fits in very well with your husband's business, which seems to have a different focus.

[eurotrash]

Saracen - really interesting thank you. He teaches igcse now so that's good to know.

What you describe for non exam children rings quite true. He's fed up of teaching what other people says he has to teach and wants to break free and offer people what they actually want.

He's very creative and adaptable and would love to to do creative writing or poetry or dissecting Harry Potter sessions with children who wanted to learn about it without it being linked to a curriculum and an exam mark!

[TullyBear]

My girlfriend and I are teachers and might be looking at some tutoring. Does anyone know if there is much demand and how do we get in touch with parents who are looking at it?