I home-educate my four kids,AMA

[wiziliz]

Used to be a primary school teacher, now I home-educate my kids . Ages 12,8,6&3 (no special needs)Ask Me Anything.

honestly guys< wake up!

private schools are businesses!

it costs a lot of money to provide a single pupil with all the resources, equipment, materials etc to do all the practicals required for triple science GCSE.

Thats at least 30 practicals for each student, many of which use up expensive materials and add wear and tear to expensive equipment, and paid technical support, not to mention all the time, investment and paperwork that the safety procedures require, and then you have the fact that most students do most practicals more than once.

of course if you are running a business you are likely to go with the option of not paying for that and doing a free alternative.

however the iGCSE is sold to parents, it is a lesser qualification, chosen for economic reasons

Urbanbeetler
Yes ,We believe in 'education is power' I am very lucky, we are very well off financially, i dont have to think twice or save up before i could buy anything for my kids education. My kids are slightly ahead of their peers.

I'm home educating my son with autism..(not through choice)
Can I ask
How do you manage screens.ipad ,laptop ..gaming..im struggling massively with this so would be glad of advice..
How much do exams cost ,as I will probably have to put him back in school for secondary to do them.

Sorry to interrupt on this thread by my BS meter was going haywire.

They are used for children learning abroad without access to facilities we would consider normal here, or they are used by private schools to maximise their profits.

True, they can be delivered with basic facilities.

The reason selective independent schools like them is because they have long been more rigorous than GCSEs (although the 9 - 1s are closing the gap), but probably the main reason is that they have much more longevity with less government dabbling. A school knows that they can teach a specification for 8+ years, and so can invest in or develop top quality resources.

So you were a primary school teacher?

Was this in a state? How long did you teach for?

I don’t know about the science but state schools used to do the English igcse because it bought better results (ie easier surely?).

That’s why they were stopped from using it.

SerendipityFelix thats alot of questions. Are you religious?
Reasonably.
If so are you teaching your children solely according to your faith, or are they learning about all faiths and secular philosophy as well?
Our teaching has nothing to do with faith. we learn about other faiths too.
How do you decide what subjects and topics they are going to learn about?
I have a set curriculum.
How do you decide what workbooks/worksheets/curricula to follow?
I go through lot of curriculums, books, check reviews, and buy then buy them.

Do you attend any HE social or study groups?
we do attend HE groups.

What county are you based in?

Do you worry at all about the lack of shared experience (not socialisation) they will have with their peers?

Sorry, I meant 'country'

Slimmingsnake We have been very strict from the beginning about screen time. We don't have a T.V ,My kids are allowed to watch videos on the laptop for not more than 30-60 mins. We don't have any Xbox etc , also my kids don't have their own ipads ,phones (kids dont need them) Me and my husband dont use much technology for all unnecessary purposes, that helps a lot. its not fair that we use all these all the time and tell the kids not to use too much technology. If we are using the laptops (work related) we tell our kids and they understand 100%

My understanding of iGCSE’s was that they were more rigorous than the old ones for maths but easier for everything else. The new 9-1’s supposedly harder for all GCSE’s.

Certainly Ds2 who has just sat 9-1’s seems to think igcse’s were easier in the post exam question comparing.

Surely you must be doing English language as well? And therefore 8 subjects? Do you think that will be enough for medicine? Am curious because Ds3 goes to a bonkers (but fab) school where he does 8 GCSE’s (his brothers grammar does 10 - which seems the usual amount here since 9-1’s introduced). I think it will be fine for what he wants to do. If he decides he wants to aim high (Oxbridge) I would probably suggest he did distance Latin himself, but I would be a bit worried if he wanted to do medicine with 8 subjects.

Aren't IGCSEs 9-1 ?

I disagree about phones. I think secondary aged children do need them because that’s how that age group socialises a lot of the time now. Obviously they’ll survive without them but will mark them as different (important to teens) and make them more insular/reliant on the family for socialisation?

Also phones useful when they are out and about alone. Mine started to really go out and about/get themselves to school & activities in early secondary years & a phone was essential for that imo.

Devil DD was looking at medicine, and all the medical schools she looked at were only interested in the 8 best GCSEs.

She took IGCSE maths early because the top set were offered it. At the time (2016) it was considered more rigorous than GCSE, and was considered better preparation for A level maths.

Sorry I might have missed a subject. She will be doing 8 subjects.

just googled and seems iGCSE’s are now offering both. Can’t quite work out whether they’re different syllabuses/papers or just graded differently.

It just doesn’t leave much room to have a bad paper in one subject Lonicera.

I did hear that maths was considered more rigorous for iGCSE than the old GCSE’s, but heard the opposite was true for the other subjects and 9-1 GCSE maths is meant to be more stretching,

Devilishpyjamas I don't agree with online socialization, My kids carry a phone when they are out on their own, but not a smart phone, just a simple nokia phone.

This is a good discussion about the politics of GCSEs vs iGCSEs www.spectator.co.uk/2015/03/the-i-in-igcse-is-for-independent/

You may not agree with it OP (& I can understand why) but it will make your kids very different from their peers and affect their chance to form friendships away from the family. Just because that is his teens socialise now.

How willyhey socialise with others away from you - particularly important as teenagers surely?

What do you do for PE, music or PSHE?

Do you believe that school-education is a terrible experience & best avoided? Do your children believe that, also?

You mentioned morals OP , can you expand please?

And although I may sound anti-home ed I’m not. I think it can be great for all younger kids. For some teens who are struggling with bullying at school I think it can be a life saver. I wasn’t sure which way secondary was going to go for Ds3 and was ready to home ed (via an internet school) if it went pear shaped (in fact he’s thrived), but I don’t know how you replace that bit of spending long periods with friends outside the home and away from family (generally going to & from school).

Ds2 started by taking the bus in year 7 and then started walking with his mates around year 9.

Ds3 started using the bus at the end of year 7 and at the end of year 8 started walking home, stopping off to play football on the way home with friends. I don’t know how you replace that sort of daily practice of independence skills when you home ed. I see that a much a part of education as the academic stuff and it was not knowing how to recreate that that put me off home ed as a first choice (obviously different if someone is having a miserable time at school).

raggedWhat do you do for PE, music or PSHE?
I have a curriculum for PE, my kids go swimming 3 times a week, play basketball and tennis. And also we go for long walks.