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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Why do people fear Home Educators so much?

810 replies

sebumfillaments · 16/08/2017 22:06

Not a TAAT but inspired by the other thread, I was stunned by the level of vitriol aimed at home education. Is it all borne from fear and ignorance?

Home Ed isn't about replicating school. And education isn't (in our case) about gaining qualifications from an institution to increase their value in the workforce!

So why so much animosity?

OP posts:
Mustang27 · 17/08/2017 08:15

Other tedious white middle class arseholes.

Wow MargaretTwatyer that was a really classist thing to say** and does not make you look like a very tolerant person. I have not met an unfriendly home educator and most of the people Iv met are genuinely lovely and very tolerant of others, although I must admit Iv not met many I generally find them intelligent and interesting people but maybe because I s

Mustang27 · 17/08/2017 08:16

Sorry fat pregnancy fingers as I was saying maybe because I don't go in with stereotypical assumptions.

Brittbugs80 · 17/08/2017 08:17

The main thing I don't understand is that legally my dd must attend school

No. Legally your child must receive an education. That education doesn't have to be delivered in school. You can deregister your child from school in writing with a letter to the school and LA. Unless you are already under the flag for neglect/abuse then no, Social Services won't be round with their van to collect your child.

The LA will send someone round and request a meeting where they want to see lesson plans. Under my LA they also return within 6 months to see lesson plans and work completed by the child.

Your Husband is sort of wrong. HE children are able to sit exams and can register for exams and sit them at a local college. Parents can teach them to the level required or a Tutor can be used if needed.

LEMtheoriginal · 17/08/2017 08:21

Brittbugs - We do all of those things anyway and of Course there is learning but that's just everyday life.

InspMorse · 17/08/2017 08:21

The non-conformist 'off-grid parenting' types give Home-Ed a bad name. Nightmare.
theunconventionalparent.co/about/

Painfulpain · 17/08/2017 08:22

Oh come on mustang

Home educators are OVERWHELMINGLY white middle class

Witsender · 17/08/2017 08:28

Of course you do it LEM, but that doesn't mean there isn't any value to j doing it as part of HE. Apart from anything else, it takes a lot less time to learn/teach something at home than it does at school, so even if you saw no educational value in it at all you would still have time on top of any other activities.

Also worth noting that the LA have no right whatsoever to ask for or see lesson plans. They don't even have the right to visit. If they have due reason to believe a child is being neglected then under a SS remit they have a right, and within that a SAO can be ordered or discussed. At that point obviously a parent has to prove various things. But you have to be fucking up quite badly to get to that point.

NerrSnerr · 17/08/2017 08:29

I don't fear home educators and I think that home education is probably right for a small proportion of children. What I don't like is that fact that home education is not regulated at all. I have been on threads where people have told their stories about home education being a cover for abuse but they had no access to adults to tell them what's happening. The home educators on the thread didn't seem to give much of a shit about that and because their children are ok, the unfortunate ones don't matter. I judge that.

JoelyB · 17/08/2017 08:29

Home educators are OVERWHELMINGLY white middle class
Well that's that then. Damned. Guilty without need of trial.
If there's one thing more unforgivable than opting out of Gradgrind's Academy, it's being white and middle class. Because obviously you get to choose.

MsGameandWatching · 17/08/2017 08:30

Home educators are OVERWHELMINGLY white middle class

That's odd. I home educate in London and this is not at all my experience. As I said before the majority of us have little choice in Home Ed and we come from all walks of life.

Mountainviewloo · 17/08/2017 08:30

I can definitely see the appeal of HE if done well. However I would go beserk at home 24/7 with DC, I need to work to maintain my sanity!

BertrandRussell · 17/08/2017 08:31

Actually, it seems to me that home educators fear school much more than the other way round..........

PolarBearGoingSomewhere · 17/08/2017 08:32

While I agree that a good education is about being equipped to follow one's passion, what happens if that passion is to be a doctor? The clutch of certificates comes in pretty handy then! Or, what if the passion is engineering but because the child missed the engineers coming in to work with year 9s for a week, they don't realise it?

Many of the things mentioned here as the benefits of home ed are achieved by good, engaged parents in the 13 weeks of school holidays and 104 days off at weekends each year.

Obviously it is not clear cut and in an ideal world the decisions would always be taken in the child's best interest. However some children who would thrive in home ed have parents who have to work FT and some children who'd do better in school have parents whose beliefs, or perhaps the way their lives are set up to home ed an older sibling, miss out.

For a lot of children a later school starting age would be better, or part time schooling. I do a more flexible school system would be the best compromise but I know that won't happen, partly because of funding etcan but also because the status quo serves a capitalist society pretty well.

JoelyB · 17/08/2017 08:36

BertrandRussell Maybe they fear the improper use of ellipsis will be taught? 😁

Mittens1969 · 17/08/2017 08:36

**I've known 2 home ed parents.
One did a great job and got her son into a brilliant secondary school. He's doing well and will go far.
The other, I can only describe the boy as socially stunted. It seems to be more for her benefit than his.
I think it can really work well if the right person is doing it. If not, it could be the greatest barrier to the poor child's future.
Like PP said. It's all very well and good not to stifle someone with certificates and exams, but we live in the real world.'

This. I agree, it depends on who is doing the home Ed. I know it's better for some children, who are not coping with mainstream education.

But there aren't enough checks of what education these children are getting.

Witsender · 17/08/2017 08:37

Where we are the majority of hedders are white, but there isn't much diversity here full stop. However certainly not all.middle class, far from it.

As for abuse, it is awful, naturally. But it is also rare, so penalising a whole sector of society is ridiculous. The majority of cases of severe child abuse you are in the news have had an awful.lot of adults involved who have screwed up, and involve kids who go to school.

Oddish · 17/08/2017 08:37

Home educators are OVERWHELMINGLY white middle class

Where have you got that from? in my city there is a whole range of home educators, many different races, religions, 'classes', backgrounds. I'm going to assume your assumption is unfounded unless you have access to some as yet undisclosed collection of data. Or is it just your experience of 2 or 3 families you are aware of?

drspouse · 17/08/2017 08:37

@Brittbugs80 The other child is in school, hence my comment about homework.

My relative manages financially by spending most of the day on their small business and almost none actually home educating.
The teenager does go to some clubs but spends most of their time at home alone, maybe 3 hours a week at clubs, evenings with their sibling, weekends sometimes with younger relatives. So they don't socialise outside the home with peers.
They are a typical sociable teenager and where they live (not UK) your average teenager would be arranging solo trips to the shops with friends etc but none of that happens.
To be fair they have tried school three times:
Once was a not very good primary school which I agree was not suitable. They had other options which involved a longer commute or moving house - which they later did so it wasn't impossible.
Once was a good school but the last year of primary. The school were shocked at the child's level of achievement but got them up to scratch.
And once was in a moderately suitable school but the teen didn't settle and was withdrawn as that's the reaction to any difficult situation. There are many other options available, some of which would involve moving (but as above that is possible, to be fair they do live rurally but most other local families commute or move e.g. weekdays at a relative's house, if they don't get on with the local school).

Anatidae · 17/08/2017 08:39

Tbh if I lived in Sweden, I would probably feel very differently about school.

Well up to formal school start age it's great. They have mixed age, small groups and they just learn to play, eat together, and generally be civilised (learning to share, to be kind etc.) they're outside most of the day regardless of weather, they go to the woods, the parks, or just hang out and have fun on the (massive, well equipped) play area. Lots of independence, carefully watched but allowed to run wild within that boundary. It's great. No tests, no formal stuff. It's cheap (120 quid a month max) and the teachers are degree qualified with decades of experience at ours.
At actual school age it isn't so good any more. Ironically the pendulum is seen as having swung too far towards permissive rather than child led.

Surely the solution is to make ALL kids have access to good, appropriate state schools? Regardless of physical or mental needs, all children's needs should be met by the system or it's failing. If a child is being bullied the solution should be to make the parents educate them, it should be to sort it the fuck out.

The JW kids - that's so sad. And that's why home ed is banned here. Because for every loving parent trying to meet the needs of a child outside the mainstream, there's one taking their kids out proselytising. Which is child abuse in my book.

Mustang27 · 17/08/2017 08:40

Fair enough but that was just name calling tbh.

I'm not going to say I know otherwise I'm sure that is likely true. I know three different families two were white,one was not born in this country, the other were two artists and I'm not entirely sure of their financial standing but they didn't look like they were comfortable financially and the third were a black family both parents were highly educated/high earners and did not feel school was enough for their children.

I agree with the lady that said she was mentally exhausted doing it I think I'd be the same. I admire anyone doing it for the right reasons and solely for their children. I could not as neither am I intelligent enough nor am I equipped to be entirely sure I wouldn't be failing them. I will consider a Montessori type education. I thrived in mainstream but both my brothers struggled and it was horrible to watch so Iv personally seen both sides of mainstream education and don't want to force my son into the wrong education system.

RaspberryRuffless · 17/08/2017 08:40

My son has been HE for almost a year. He has been to school too but he's HE now due to ASD and MH issues and school refusal. Although it wasn't my first choice to begin with, I love it now and wish I had done it earlier. School has scarred him far more than HE ever could. He's been to both mainstream and SN.

From my point of view, I like that I have "control" of my own child - as in I can decide if and when we go on holiday (we haven't due to his anxiety, but we could if we wanted), he's not stuck in a classroom for 6 hours a day/5 days a week, I get to help my child learn the things he's interested in learning and I know he's properly looked after and safe.

It's a parents responsibility to make sure their child gets and education. Some choose to send their child to school to do that and some don't.

MyWhatICallNameChange · 17/08/2017 08:42

I don't fear school. I do fear for my child's mental health and wellbeing should he go back to school.

And I may be white, but I'm definitely not middle class.

People are still thinking home educating is about being at home! It's not - we spend a lot of time out and about doing various clubs, meeting friends, and yes, if the weather's nice just going to the park or beach. That's the fun of it!

Because there aren't 29 other kids to settle and control and it's all 1:1 my DS only needs to spend a couple of hours doing the work he would have spent all day doing at school.

The school where it was so focussed on SATs results they only did maths and English anyway, the kids were lucky if they got to do art, science, music. Lots of them went to secondary school having rarely used a computer! (And yes, I know, it's just one school, but it was the one my kids went to)

Look at the schools cutting GCSEs like music and arts because they don't fit in the narrow band of the English baccalaureate.

BertrandRussell · 17/08/2017 08:43

"BertrandRussell Maybe they fear the improper use of ellipsis will be taught? 😁"
Grin I was home educated. I laugh in the face of grammatical orthodoxy.

Witsender · 17/08/2017 08:43

I have nothing against school at all, our local one is lovely. (I am a governor, I have to say that 😂) If there was more flexibility within the system, flexischooling or the like we would consider it again. But full time just wouldn't suit our kids. The oldest in particular is a very anxious child and really suffered being away that long, and it was completely unnecessary. There is no scope for difference, very few alternatives.

LakieLady · 17/08/2017 08:44

Pretty much every child I have met who has been home schooled ...has been odd.

Many of the home-schooled children I've known have been odd, too, but I think that's why they ended up being home-schooled - they were odd and struggled in school.

Most of them got an education though, although I knew one family whose idea of home-ed was to sit them in front of "educational" stuff on tv.