To disagree with JSP re Home schooling debate on Loose Women

[Stickladylove88]

Don't normally watch Loose Women but caught a bit of it today. They were discussing home schooling - Stacey Solomon decided to home school her children after the school system didn't work out for them.

Janet Street Porter was very critical of this saying that children need to learn to be resilient and shouldn't be removed from schooling because it's a bit difficult. They need to be prepared for the real world not in a bubble. She said that we don't improve the state school system by withdrawing our children from it, parents need to take an active role in improving it.

I personally feel a little bit that home schooling is a last resort and needs to be monitored so that children are being educated properly in the same way that schools are monitored. However, parents should always have the right to do it, the school system doesn't work for every child and I'm not sure it makes a child more resilient being stuck in a situation where they're miserable and powerless for years on end. I think the government have far more power than parents to make the state school system better. Do others agree or is JSP onto something?

Don't want this to be a home school bashing thread, I respect whatever choices a parent makes.

I may be wrong but I don’t think she has kids does she?

It’s just playing devils advocate isn’t it?

All of the HE advocates seem blind to the fact that there are a large number of children who receive no education. Many will be from troubled families but not all.

Yep. The most important thing is that all children get to access a good education. Not wanting to be monitored is not a good enough reason to allow any child to fall through the cracks and be vastly disadvantaged.

LordProf Not having kids does not mean she knows less about HE than the average parent with kids at school. This has nothing to do with having kids, and everything to do with what you know about HE and kids being HE.
Sounds a bit like those who criticise midwives who have never had kids, although they may be very experienced and great midwives.

General child well being checks for those in school and out of school would be expensive but may help address issues of welfare better (may also help with bullying, mental health issues and check on basic literacy and arithmetic)

Agree with this. They have these where I am, every year until school age children go to the child health clinic for a health and developmental check up (and sight and hearing tests) with a chat about home life/nursery/friends and then at school age it carries on with the school nurse/school doctor where the chat also includes problems in school, bullying etc. Home education is rare here so not sure where the children who don't go to school would go for their yearly check up, in my opinion they should go to the school health care too even though they don't attend.
It's really important that children don't fall off the radar, less abuse and neglect cases will be missed this way.

I'm a qualified teacher but the thought of HE my children sends shivers down my spine. My children might have been academically OK but being cooped up with me most of the would have been horrendous. I would have slowly gone off my head.

Hah same here derxa just trying to teach DD to read and write in English has been a lesson and a half in how hard home educating must be! I lack patience though.

I wouldn’t want to HE my DC personally, because I don’t have confidence in my ability to provide my DC with an adequate education (although that would be less of an issue if I could afford to buy in tutors), but the current state school system doesn’t work for all children.

DS1 has high functioning ASD, and we’ve been in the position where his teachers bluntly told us that their school wasn’t right for him and advised us to move him. DS1 doesn’t have an EHCP (we applied but council refused to assess) so special schools or EMP arent an option for him. We fortunately managed to find a more inclusive and supportive mainstream school, which he’s being educated in now.

I know other families locally with ASD children who’ve had similar problems with schools, and I know a few of these who’ve ended up home schooling because of the continuing lack of support and the negative impact that was having on their children. These children wouldn’t have magically developed resilience and all the rest of it if left to flounder without the support they needed and weren’t getting.

"The problem lies with children who are not in school but not educated."

Some of these are not home educated - the parents have not said they will home educate. They are simply not being provided for by those that should be providing for them. I think it is important that they are picked up although since it is local authorities that are doing the hiding, I'm not sure they would be picked up in this system.

It is difficult but I don't completely disagree with her.

There are children who do not do well in mainstream school or who have additional needs that are not catered for and they can thrive in home schooling, so I do think it has a place.

I know of one child who was home schooled and taught well, but the child decided to go to mainstream school for years 10 and 11 to do GCSEs and managed okay.

It is too easy for children to be home schooled and fall through the cracks though, not just those who are being abused and neglected who have no-one to watch out for them.

I have a distant family member who is home schooling their two children. There are no additional needs - the parents just believe they should be home schooled as they are quite 'alternative' in their thinking (they were both main stream schooled).

I will sound very judgemental (and I am), but I think that if you home school a child they do need to have some education. Lots of 'learning through play', which is great, but at some point learning to read and learning some maths have to be important.

Some people home school and do a wonderful job, but I do worry about those two as, from the education they are having and the lack of experience of the world they are getting, they are likely to be very limited in what they will be able to do in the future and I just do not think that is fair on them.

I personally feel a little bit that home schooling is a last resort and needs to be monitored so that children are being educated properly in the same way that schools are monitored

I wish pupils in school were individually monitored so that it shows that they are getting educated.

In my experience if your child fails to meet targets then they are abandoned. If I hadn’t HE Ds I have no idea where he would be now because teaching is entirely National Curriculum led and if your child can’t keep up then there is no time or help available.

JSP is basing her opinions on her own school experience and things have changed in the last 50 year

Those of you saying you know of children who aren't getting an education, have you told their LA about your concerns? There are already systems in place to investigate any concerns, but they only work of people contact them. I only know of one HE family where it sounds like the children aren't getting an education, but they're friends of a friend & I don't actually know them/where they live so I can't report it. I've encouraged my friend to raise her concerns with their LA but AFAIK she hasn't yet. I don't understand how people can be worried about a child but not try to do something about it!

Having a register isn't going to solve anything. No-one's going to have an LA person or someone from whatever private company the LA have outsourced the monitoring to turn up at their house & admit that their child isn't getting an education. They'll fake it. Say all the right things & go back to normal the second they leave. The children could've been coerced into playing along. It's not going to stop abuse either - think of how many children attend school every day without anyone knowing they're being abused. How is a once a year/term/month/whatever visit going to pick up on things if it can be missed when a child is seen almost every day in school?!

Also, insisting on home visits would be illegal - everyone has a right to a family life free from state intervention, unless there is reason to believe a crime has been committed.

You do know legally that all parents have to provide is an education suitable for the child, but this can take into account their culture?
So girls of gypsy origin are routinely taken out of school at puberty to learn housework and cooking. Legally this is fine.
The truth is educational neglect is not usually a reason for most LAs to intervene - although I know a few LAs are more proactive. But this is rare. So in most areas reporting will make no difference at all.

Those of you who say you absolutely couldn’t do it and shudder at the thought. You might be surprised what you could do when you’re being called into school to deal with your rampaging autistic child every day and he comes home and self harms - punching himself in the face and stomach and banging his head against walls - because he’s a “bad boy” who knows he isn’t the same as everyone else.

What a register will do, and the only thing it will do, is pick up kids being hidden from SS.

“What a register will do, and the only thing it will do, is pick up kids being hidden from SS.”

You say that like it’s a bad thing.....

Sorry if I made it seem like that. I support the idea of a register for those reasons. I actually support more "interference" though.

Not having kids doesn't mean she can't have an opinion on it

Saying she knows nothing about HE, if she does not, is a good reason to criticise her opinion.
But I have read comments on here from people who run courses aimed at children who have been HE. I have no idea if they have kids or not, but they do have knowledge that informs their opinion.

Carol I completely understand.

I delete LW as soon as I see JSP is on it. She takes over the programme with her opinions and takes that long asking a question, explaining why she's asking then telling an antidote the programme is over and no ones got a word in edgeways. I like Stacey but at one point she was on it everyday so got sick of hearing her opinions. Plus see seems to pick & chose when she speaks sensibly & when she speaks like a child. It's like she does it for attention.

*anecdote

Families that home educate have access to the school nurse team and, at least where I am, are offered the same checks as kids in school. Still have to chase up on teen vaccines normally done in schools though...

Being registered has enables the school nurse team and others to offer resources that my kids might otherwise miss that have been helpful like the secondary school bus cards. It makes it a ton easier to deal with professions to tell them that they're registered, a couple still loudly disapprove, but most move on after that point. Day-to-day being registered has no impact and we've had no oversight for years, but being registered has made quite a few things move more smoothly. I think that could be expanded upon for greater access to the community for home educated kids.

My ds is only 3 but I joined a home Ed Facebook group recently as I'd been thinking very loosely about home schooling him. Was just interested really.

Anyway, some of the people posting on that group can barely spell and I'd be seriously concerned for their children's education.

The issue is with HE, that those who are vociferous about it defend all parents who HE. When in reality some do it well and some are awful at it.
I knew someone through a hobby that HE who would rant at times about people questioning her HE her son, but admitted herself that he spent nearly all of his time playing minecraft. She defended that as educational. Her son was being educationally neglected.