I home educate - AMA

[MyFavouriteMugHasCatsOn]

I home educate DD1 who would be in y1 if she was in school. She's never been to school but attended preschool part time and hated it. I also have DD2 age 2 at home with me full time. I am a SAHM and have been since DD1 was born, while DH works full time to support us.

AMA!

I'm not an expert, but I'm also pretty knowledgeable about HE as a whole so if you have any questions about home ed more generally, please go wild!

(I'm starting this thread after having seen quite a few threads lately suggesting HE is tantamount to neglect so I'm braced for judgement! I'm hoping some people might read this and see it's valid and the right choice for some families. It's right for my family but that doesn't mean I think you're wrong if you have chosen to send your children to school.)

Thank you very much!

Yes, I do think education in schools can be very screen-based these days. We do watch quite a lot of Horrible History videos though!

We haven't marked any of the celebrations you mentioned although we've read the story of the zodiac and how it relates to Chinese New Year. We did learn a lot about Hanukkah last year though as DD got a book about it and it sparked an interest!

Considering the long-term wellbeing of DD1 is at the heart of every decision I make for her, and I think home ed is the best option for her wellbeing at the moment, but obviously I can't know what she'll think of it all as an adult. This is a nightmare scenario for me! At the end of the day, all we can do is what we think is the best thing for our children.

I'm really sorry to hear your cousins were unhappy with their education and that it's impacted their relationship with your aunt.

I think it's probably a lot harder to start home educating when your child has already been attending school for a long time. I'm so sorry about your DD13's autism breakdown.

I can think of any number of educational opportunities in nature walks that aren’t looking at squirrels to be fair. And I am NOT a home educator!

I can’t speak for the OP but I am planning to send my daughter to school for secondary education. Partly because I think she will get educational opportunities I can’t provide and also because she has friends who go to school who I think she’d start to be jealous of if they’re all together at secondary school and she’s not. My friend thinks there’s no way she’ll cope if she hasn’t already been at school but she goes to clubs and workshops without me there and actually often prefers me to leave her places rather than stay with her so I’m fairly confident she’ll be fine. I’ve brought her up to do as a ‘teacher’ tells her so I don’t have worries she couldn’t cope with having a teacher tell her what to do or anything. I think I will send her to primary for the last half term of Year 6, next year, so she can have a nice fun half term (as she’ll have missed SATs) and make more friends before secondary.

@MyFavouriteMugHasCatsOn really honestly, do you have any judgement towards those who send their child to school? Be honest, I won’t be offended!

I ask because I used to go with my children to a forest playgroup run by a lady who educates her children at home. The other parents were nice people but I definitely felt like an outlier!

This is an interesting thread, thank you for starting it OP.
I wonder if you judge people who send their kids to school, just a tiny bit?
And also, the whole social thing... Does it not worry you that your children always have you present to iron out any problems with other children, and that they won't develop the skill of conflict resolution with their contemporaries? I have children who have been through the school system and I'm frankly completely disillusioned with it, secondary education especially- but social interactions are arguably more important than anything else when it comes to learning, and I couldn't have taught my children what they learned by being at school in that regard.

Definitely no set timetable! We have some non-negotiables we do every day that I make sure we do 5 days a week, but that could include a weekend day if we've been really busy during the week. The non-negotiables are maths, times tables and handwriting. She reads voraciously for pleasure and I read to her each day but I don't need to factor those in as it's like saying I need to make sure we have time to eat snacks or play together - it never gets skipped even one day a week.

We do arts and crafts together most days as she's very artistic, and she draws and paints for pleasure every day too.

We have a gentle rhythm to the day but definitely no schedule!

The local authority are in touch once a year to determine a suitable education is in place.

I did home ed with my now 35 year old son who is severely autistic (amongst other things). He was non verbal till he was 8 and I did home ed on the basis that I couldn’t see any point in having to dress him etc to go on a school bus (or the likes) to learn things that weren’t relevant to him at that stage of his life. I decided to keep him at home and work from the foundations up and that included learning to dress himself and do other self care regardless of how long it took. His life was tailor made to suit him even though he is the youngest of 5 - he was a surprise baby after a decade. Anyway it all worked a treat and when he did start talking it was obvious that along the way he’d also been soaking of information like a sponge and had the equivalent of a nursery education inside of him. He’s 35 now and along the way has also been diagnosed with Epilepsy, Tourette’s and Bipolar Disorder, his life is still tailor made to suit his needs and he lives at home with me and a team of carers needed to provide his 2-1 round the clock care. We don’t live in the UK and we fund his care.

Even now there’s not a day goes by when he doesn’t say something to me and I’m amazed that somewhere along the line he’s learned a certain thing via his computer (he can read and write) or just by living his day.

eta - my son was a wonderful artist until he started to talk and the more spoke the less he drew - he doesn’t draw at all now and can get quite upset when he sees any of the pictures he drew when non verbal.

Having no time to myself is the hardest bit by a long shot. I am exhausted by the end of each day and very grateful for weekends when DH is around and also to my lovely MIL who visits infrequently (because of distance) but for a fortnight at a time and is an invaluable help.

Weekly: we swim twice, go to the library once, have 1-2 playdates, and on the other days try and get out every day for a walk, to the local museum or the park.

Learning stuff then we do literacy, numeracy and art stuff each day and then some topic work on whatever she's interested in (this week has been outer space and WW2). We also do art history and classical music in small amounts quite frequently. Looking at Vivaldi and Van Gogh at the mo.

School is actually a service you opt into in the UK - if you don't apply for a school place, you're home educating! We actually did apply for a school place as I was still dithering when it was time to apply but withdrew our place when they were allocated as we'd realised by then we didn't want it. There wasn't actually any support whatsoever, we were just informed the HE team would be in touch to check she was recieving a suitable education when she hit compulsory school age.

We probably cover all subjects, but do them as topic work rather than studying geography, history, science etc. We don't do loads of music as she's not very interested. So far we've listened to a range of classical music and talked about the instruments/pace/how it makes us feel etc, and done singing. She has also learned a little ballet and looked at the music from famous ballets.

Computing wise we don't do much as I'm fairly anti-screen but she has learned how to use a coding app aimed at 5-7yos.

We slightly follow school term times as we see more of her friends who go to school during the school holidays and step back from academics slightly to make more time for socialising.

She is absolutely aware of schools! She knows which of her friends/family members are home educated and which go to school and even owns a school uniform for dressing up. She is very glad not to go to school.

This would not be my DD who is working more than an academic year ahead in maths and has a reading age of 13 aged 5. Also the term is home educating, not home schooling - very few home educators are trying to replicate school at home.

I will be very surprised if state pension exists when I am retired! But also, I'm saving the country the £5000+ per school year a school is given to educate a child, plus FSM for the years she is eligible, plus the funding she would be given for her SEN which I assume would likely be another £6000 at least based on friends with children with similar SEN.

I'm not going to claim anything for which I am not eligible!

Yes, this too!

Not at all!! The only situation I'd judge someone for sending their child to school would be if they were extremely unhappy at school and there was a parent at home who would be financially, emotionally and academically able to home educate and they decided not to for a trivial reason.

@DontyMon this answer is for you too!

Well, I will say something that surprises me is just how much ds learns from just us talking. On the school run today he learned the words dimorphic and migration (saw a pheasant and some geese flying) talked about camouflage and hibernation, collective nouns (flock of sheep and birds but pack of dogs.)

That must be a lovely thing about HE; having that time to talk. I try but life is so busy I am conscious we don’t do enough of it.

I'm hyper aware of this so I really try to take a step back and let my DD try and solve her own problems. This is very much a work in progress 😅Because my DD is very young for her age (and with poor social/emotional skills) we're quite a long way away from being able to resolve conflict with peers but I try to give her plenty of opportunities to fail and problem solve in other areas. And leave DD1&2 to work out disagreements between themselves as long as no-one is being ridden roughshod over by the other one.

Thank you for sharing your story - your son sounds absolutely wonderful and you clearly did a fantastic job of providing him with exactly the education he needed.

Do you think part of your reason for home educating is to avoid going back to work?

Haha, I think the number of comments suggests there’s been plenty of interest after all :)

Yes!!! It sounds like such a cop-out to say they learn via talking to an adult, but honestly this is a huge part of home ed for us. I am very grateful to have the time to have these conversations (and it sounds like you're doing a fantastic job fitting in conversations that matter around your busy lives!).

It's not a reason for it but it is definitely a benefit of it for me! I would a million times rather be at home having quality time with my family than working, but we wouldn't be home educating if it wasn't what was best for the family.

I'm actually wondering if a lot of the negativity I've read on Mumsnet about home ed (not here! People have been lovely!) is an anti-SAHM rhetoric rather than specifically anti home ed.

I've sometimes thought about home educating. I've been helping my toddler to learn to read and it has felt immensely meaningful. For various reasons, mainly financial, I probably won't end up actually doing it but I think it can be a wonderful option. I find it a little sad that it's something seen as something not worthy of a very intelligent woman's time and energy.

What's your opinion on home educating methods that are popular online? Do you have a homeschooling philosophy? Do you think it's useful to have a "philosophy" or is that just a branding/online influencer/curriculum provider marketing thing? (For example, comparing Charlotte Mason/classical vs Alpha School vs Waldorf inspired...)

Do you follow any specific methodologies or have any people who have influenced your home ed style?

also do you have any tips / recommendations for people who are aspiring home educators?