AIBU to ask for your opinions on home education?

[MooMooTheFirst]

For background-

I am a primary school teacher that currently teaches nursery and have felt increasingly uneasy about the school system in the UK over the past few years. I've got a 13 month old DS. I am confident I can deliver education at primary level up to year six.

The idea of home education has always seemed 'other' to me but I am slowly starting to feel like it would be right for us.

This isn't a goady post, genuinely looking for a variety of opinions.

Sorry, wrong thread!

I teach philosophy and if there ever was a discipline where students were encouraged to think for themselves this is it. I am also used to teaching one to one as that is the essence of research work. Nonetheless I still do not recognize the educational claims some people are making on this thread.

Preparing for one student is different from preparing for a group but the need for preparation is still there. It's not necessarily easier but it is different.

Not teaching to a specific goal is something I do a lot of as well because of the nature of the subject matter, but that doesn't mean there isn't a content I need to know and somehow transmit, or that knowing how to guide, steer, challenge and develop research skills is easy.

I am not against HE nor do I know much about it, but these are still my concerns.

HEd up to Yr 7 for both DSs. Both went to super selectives in London. Socialisation is not an issue except that they have never been bullied and haven't experienced much unkindness. Children get more civilised the higher up you go l think. They were both G8 distinction on an instrument by age 10.

BUT it's tough on the parent. All the criticism suggests it's the child that suffers from HE in some way but if it's done well l'm afraid it takes its toll on the PARENT. It's hard work.

They had no problems making friends.

I know a couple of people who home ed and their children are thriving. I've always considered it as an option, my son is very atypical in his development and struggled with school at first so I said if things didn't improve I would pull him out. He loves school now and is doing well but I'd never rule home ed out if circumstances changed. I don't agree that socialisation is a problem with a bit of effort. I hardly had any friends at school, I was bullied and most of my friends were made at sports clubs etc. I don't think school taught me conflict resolution either, I got that from work.

All the criticism suggests it's the child that suffers from HE in some way but if it's done well l'm afraid it takes its toll on the PARENT. It's hard work.

This!

One other thing....a negative...most adults when they meet children inevitably ask the child "so how's school"..."what year are you in" etc especially if they don't know the child well. Both of mine were mortified to answer "we're home educated" mainly because of the reaction of the adult. This made me quite sad because they enjoyed being taught at home but doing anything different from the norm irks some adults. I notice that they are very keen to tell people about where they go now. A prestigious school which evokes admiration for them yet they were at their happiest when they were HEd.
Other children were always jealous however and l would have to pretend that HE wasn't so great and their mummy was wise to send them to school.

Re socialisation, one of the things I've often wondered how you find a diversity in socialising when HE? One of the things I valued about school was that I met people with very different life experiences to mine. Different class, different religion, different values. I went to an inner city comprehensive and as an adult I value the experiences I had in learning to get along with very different people to me. Some of whom I didn't like. And that included teachers ;) Being HE you're in a naturally self selecting group, so how do you find people outside your own bubble so to speak? I'd hesitate to do private schooling for the same reason - I've cringed at some gatherings hearing some very uninformed opinions coming out of people's mouths that are clearly based in lack of life experience or even understanding of other experience.

In terms of academics, especially in your situation, your Dc will be fine.
But I do think DCs need to learn how to deal with other adults in charge of them, and to socialise in arenas where they are not the most important person to those adults there.

Also question how it will be for your DC to spend most of their day with you. I would personally have liked this when very young, but would have later hated it.

you often get a different kind of diversity of socialization in HE. Fir instance at most of our meet ups everyone is allowed to join in anything. So you don't get girls segregating from boys and you don't get segregation by age.

I realise gender segregation isn't supposed to be a part of school education but the reality is visible any time you see kids in a school playground. Age segregation is VERY strong in schools. There is a hell of a lot to be learned by playing with children 3,4,5 years both older and younger than you are.

You may get somewhat less mixing by other demographic measures, although the range of reasons for HE are so wide that you do see quite a bit of diversity.

Another important thing people miss out is that kids actually talk to each others parents also. My DD would definitely cite several of the other adults as friends too.

So you aren't the only adult input to their lives at all.

Thanks @morphene. Not sure it's something I'd consider myself but had always wondered how people approached it :)

When it's done in the best interests of the child it can be really positive. It never works if it's done merely to meet the emotional needs of the home educating parent though.

I don't know, I find DCs who have adults as friends, often are not able to deal with the same power relationships that you have with peers as children, and the inevitable rough and tumble that comes with this.
Much easier as a DC to be friends with an adult who forgive you things that your peers would not.

brasty the thing about playgound politics is I don't think they have any value. I know my child doesn't understand the whole 'yesterday we were best friends but today me and queenbee are besties and you have to go away' stuff, because she has seen it once before and was baffled. But I'm okay with her not learning how to bully or be bullied. Most of all I don't want her to learn that name calling and other mild bullying is okay and something you just put up with.

Because adults DONT put up with that kind of thing. Its something we teach kids to live with that we wouldn't dream of living with ourselves.

Im quite happy for my child to skip the whole thing.

that and SATs and split digraphs....

Hitler banned Home Education (a ban that has weirdly stayed in force in Germany). I send mine to school but isn't it great that parents in the UK have the choice?
Oculus Rift inventor (virtual reality thingy) says his success is down to HE. Nobody worries about his social skills when he's made $$$$$$.

Couldn't agree more with your last post Morphene. I didn't learn to "socialise" and co-operate at school. I learned to be scared of almost everyone because mostly they had no qualms about using abuse physical or verbal, to stay on top. We expect children to put up with behaviour that no adult would. On here you're told to go no contact or LTB for far less. I often wonder just how many people DON'T learn healthy boundaries at that formative time and end up in bullying situations and relationships when they're older because of that. School is a brutal place for many children and actually a most unnatural environment. No where else in society are people so strictly segregated by age and often sex.

I do think it should be far more monitored in the UK though. I honestly don't believe you should be able to simply never sign your child up for school and they never come check on you....which seems to be our experience to date.

It depends how you define monitoring though. There is more than one way to skin a cat, how do we decide what is 'good enough'?

Most the HErs I know,
The parents want to be largest-by-far influences on their kids.
They want their kids to reject materialism & other values the parents disapprove of.
There's a deliberate rejection of mainstream values.

They want their kids to not fit in.

Most the HErs I know,
The parents want to be largest-by-far influences on their kids.
They want their kids to reject materialism & other values the parents disapprove of.
There's a deliberate rejection of mainstream values.

They want their kids to not fit in.

I know hundreds of home ed families. I honestly know only three that fit that description and I really had to think hard about that. Most are doing it because their child has additional needs or was badly bullied, others because they have no faith in the system and others because they didn't get suitable school places. There's quite a few reasons the numbers of home ed families are increasing have have been steadily over the past few years.

witsender well Id settle for something to check I wasn't using DD as slave labour, or hadn't trafficked her....

It shouldn't be possible for a child to just not show up at school and noone even comes to see if they are still alive and well...

But yeah...probably some sort of 'are you able to provide for your kids education' light touch affair would also be welcome.

there definitely are a few people who want to control their kids access to knowledge (usually around faith issues) but they are in the tiny tiny minority. Majority are children that weren't or wouldn't thrive in school.

I don't know, I find DCs who have adults as friends, often are not able to deal with the same power relationships that you have with peers as children, and the inevitable rough and tumble that comes with this.

So what?

When you're an adult, you will be friends with adults, anyway.

Yes, children who are very sensitive and can't deal with the bullying of other children may prefer adult friends.

Doesn't mean that if you force them together with the bullies they'll somehow toughen up. They'll probably just be unhappy.

I'm from Germany and didn't have the option of homeschooling, and I was unhappy at school pretty much all the time. Also didn't do much of that oh so important socializing.

And I don't fit in, either. If I had been homeschooled, I would probably be more confident and be able to deal with not fitting into mainstream society better.

From the point of view of a child, home education looks like paradise to me.

From the point of view of an adult, it seems like a lot of unpaid work.