Home education

[Chortlesauraus]

Inspired by another thread but......AIBU to think that home schooling is a bit weird and the people that go down that route can sometimes be a little strange themselves?

I can't even really put my finger on why I find it all so odd....but maybe I'm missing something that home schoolers can enlighten me about

I always get the sense that people who home school are cut from the same cloth as Steiner School enthusiasts.....but that's just me casting wild aspersions 😆

I home educate my daughter and have done for nearly two years , she would be Y9, it was not a choice I wanted to make, I would prefer her to be at school, but her MH was awful and school totally lacked giving her support.
She is now a different child, the anxiety,insomnia, nightmares have gone and she is your typical teenager!
We attend home ed groups that have a lot of teens, so she is not isolated and has started iGCSEs, she will go to college to do A levels.

I was home schooled for the last few years of high school due to personal dramas and medical issues and I’m perfectly normal (well whatever “normal” is..) albeit I recognise that I did “normal” schooling before I entered home school so it’s not like I did it from day dot and had no social skills.

I did notice that my learning abilities were stronger than my friends when I went to university because I’d had a few years of having to motivate myself to continue and learn as opposed to my schooling being 50% based on attendance and I didn’t have teachers to lean on and pay special attention to me. If my kids wanted to be home schooled at some point I wouldn’t think twice about it and let them experience it. It’s not easy, much like working from home isn’t easy.

🤔 I wonder, does the question imply that everyone who sends their child to school is boring and beige? I’ve had one child go all the way through school and another who’s home educated. I wonder which category I fall into 😂

This is timely!

This week I have started home edding my 11 year old ASD boy.
I'm definitely not weird, my son just cannot cope in a mainstream school environment due to sensory and language perception issues. He is a bright child but the environment at school was so anxiety inducing that he became suicidal. We tried for 2 years from when the anxiety first started to get support at school to enable him to stay but even with a full EHCP they could not differentiate enough to create the learning environment that he needs.

He wants to learn and there are so many resources available both free and that you can pay for. He socialises/ plays sport every day.

I don't know what his educational outcome will be but I know that his mental health will be far better than if we continue to send him to a 'one size fits all' educational establishment. I suspect his educational outcome will also be better.

He is able to learn things that they don't teach at school , he started a computer programming online course yesterday. There are many flaws in the UK education system.

Our daughter is year 4 and possibly also has ASD. I think I may homeschool her too, although for the moment she would rather be at school.

I like the idea of home schooling but don't think I'd consider it. I wonder whether there is any research on the benefits or the negatives?

‘so it’s not like I did it from day dot and had no social skills.
That’s a remarkably blinkered view. Why do you think social skills can only be learnt at school?’

My daughter learned more about antisocial skills at school, she’s never been treated so badly in the home ed community, quite the opposite in fact. It is a very blinkered view indeed!

Ps: youtube is full of homeschoolers. I'm not always sure that much schooling/educating is happening, in the traditional sense. But I suppose that's the point.

It baffles me that people think not going to school means no social skills! Do you people not leave your houses? Do you not take your children to activities, visit family, the park, swimming lessons, karate, gymnastics, the beach, holidays etc? How boring your lives must be if the injy socialisation your children get is between 9 and 3 in school. What a limited experience of socialisation that is too.

My cousin's son is home educated, he also isn't allowed to eat sweets and is only allowed to watch tv once in a blue moon. Next they'll be wrapping him in clingfilm

Not saying That's what everyone who decides to home educate is like but I think my cousin and his partner are a bit over protective in a way. I've considered home educating in the past but both my kids that are in school are doing really well

Depends on reason for home schooling surely?

We lived abroad/ remote and homeschooled as well as using the local system.

We might be a bit weird though.

I don't know what a Steiner school is.

Agreed on the telly and sweets, that's hardly unusual. 😂

I work in a state school and my children go to school but I think home education is amazing. Children are free to learn at their own pace, be more creative, learn to be individuals. Everything state schools suppress. They don't feel the constant pressure, competition and often a sense of failure. Close family home educate and they have raised totally normal, sociable, well rounded, successful individuals. State schools are failing pupils on so many levels and in addition to the pressures of social media, I believe the unrealistic expectations set by schools are contributing to the soaring mental health issues suffered by teenagers. I would love to home educate but sadly I can't give up work.

Kids go to school not only to learn but to SOCIALISE and learn how to mix with other human beings!

Yes, and that's what my eldest was failing to do at school, academically he was doing fab. However, he struggled to socialise, spent his playtimes sitting on a bench reading, waiting for class to restart. By the time he came home, he had no energy left for socialising, it had been sapped by being surrounded by people all day at school. He wouldn't do scouts or other after school activities.

This was not the main reason we home educated him for secondary, but it is an added bonus to see him come out of his shell, to make new friends and want to spend time with them. To enjoy scouts and youth group. To ask to do new clubs and activities. To enjoy playing organised sports.

When I was at school we were always told we were not there to socialise!

I homeschooled my son for his last three years, mainstream school just isn’t geared up for different learners, some of the things taught are blatantly untrue and I felt he wasn’t getting anything out of it apart from frustration,he’s a really independent kid, living he’s now 17, living abroad by himself, running his own business, learning a new language, tons of friends , we arnt that weird, we are all pretty successful but just don’t fit in with mainstream directive with their left wing bias!!

I've Home Ed some of my children for different reasons. I have met some interesting people and some I don't click with. But I've also met weird people on the school run and at school. I guess the biggest difference I've noticed is that people who home ed (not always their first choice but sometimes due to SEN) are prepared to spend a lot of their time with their children and there's a lot of people who send kids to school who spend very little time with their children (before and after school clubs etc) who is anyone to judge what works for different people.
Isn't everyone just weird? I'd like my kids to start school at 8/9 and for the week to be a maximum of 3 days.

I posted on the other thread too. My siblings and I were all homeschooled until we were 7/8ish. We're from a very normal, vaccinated (!) family. My dad's in software design and my mum's a paediatric nurse; so both scientifically minded, not whacked out hippies like some on this thread seem to assume all homeschooling parents must be
They chose to homeschool us so that we could travel (educational in itself) and so that we didn't spend our childhoods sitting in a classroom learning how to pass a test. Both my parents are from countries where children start school a bit later, so they taught us the basics (more than what our peers were learning in "real" school, but in fewer hours per day) and the rest of our time we spent playing. We spent lots of time with other children and have grown up socially very normal, and gone into professional jobs.
Not every non-mainstream life choice is "weird" or solely the preserve of the strange or socially awkward.

People going on about 'socialising', don't you realise that the ages of 4-16 are the only years in your life you are forced to spend time with others based purely on the fact you are the same age? When you go to college at least you have chosen the same subjects to study, so have that in common, work, I would hope there is a shared interest in chosen careers or at least mutual moaning. Anti natal classes, share excitement for upcoming babies, the toddler groups, you have children in common. All different ages though!

Why should I force my DD to socialise with the people of her own age, who in the majority bullied her on the way so of one hobby young lady? She socialises well within HE groups, at Air Cadets, in youth club, at karate and within our local community!

The only social thing she was learning at school was the more anti-social someone was, the more they could get away with!

Do you have to have a certain level of income to home school successfully- get resources, attend meet ups, science groups?

@Bagadverts it can be as cheap or expensive as you want it to be. Most things are free, lots of places like museums hold home ed days etc, there are lots of free events and all sorts of things. Of course then there are other groups which cost money, and you can either use free resources or buy your own. There are a lot of free education websites, people without computers use the library. It’s very varied and depends on the individual

Bagaverts
Good point

TheBigFatMermaid
Gotta deal with everyone else tho