Are you going to have a generation of Home Educated kids by parents who are not up to it?

[Thegrinchshorriblesister]

I’ve been on Home Education sites for a few years as was momentarily considering it but decided against it. The crowd was great, informative, inclusive and lots of resources were shared.

I noticed at the beginning of lockdown the member counts shot up as obviously people wanted help during lockdown. Then September came and there have been a noticeable rise in those parents deregistering their kids and asking for help regarding issues with stubborn LA or meeting resistance from their families. Or posters saying they have no access to laptops or printers and what phone apps can they use for online materials.

However - a lot of these posts are written in really poor grammar. A lot of people are clearly not set up for the huge commitment that HE is.

There is a very different feel on the site now, very much ‘us against the system’, lots of memes about having children and farming them out to be drones or robots, or not loving your children because you have teachers raise them.

It’s making me wonder will there be a generation of kids that never sit any exams and go in to adulthood with no real kind of education or children who are stuck with adults that have these views making their world very small.

@Thesearmsofmine

One of the things that has struck me about the influx of people deregistering recently is that they need to be spoon fed information via Facebook strangers instead of doing some research themselves. We have all this information available to us but instead of finding for example the legal implications of home educating on the governments website. they ask people on a Facebook group. Often there are several incorrect replies(usually then an admin comes along and states the facts).

This is a very important point. Parents who can’t find the basics for themselves are not going to impart intellectual curiosity or rigorous research skills to their child.

no. because education outside school is illegal where I am.
dc are having distance lesson atm (last day before holidays) and were able to link in to lessons during self isolation during the last few months.

I think home educationis hard work to do well and definitely not an easy or cheap option.

One of the things that has struck me about the influx of people deregistering recently is that they need to be spoon fed information via Facebook strangers instead of doing some research themselves. We have all this information available to us but instead of finding for example the legal implications of home educating on the governments website. they ask people on a Facebook group. Often there are several incorrect replies(usually then an admin comes along and states the facts)
This is a very important point. Parents who can’t find the basics for themselves are not going to impart intellectual curiosity or rigorous research skills to their child

All of this

I have a friend who is homeschooling her DS because of a row with school places. She’s working from home so he’s just been left to his own devices. He is doing some work but mostly on BBC bitesize.
He won’t do any work he isn’t interested in and more importantly he’s hardly seen anyone his own age since March.
He had no real relationships before (apart from DD) and he won’t message anyone anyway. He already had issues with socialising so I expect these to be much worse by the time this is over.

However - a lot of these posts are written in really poor grammar.

Does it not concern you that this is the outcome after 12 years or so of schooling?

There was a family on TV who'd had to home ed since September because they had an elderly relative living with them who could die if the child brought covid home from school. Probably applies to a lot of people with a clinically vulnerable family member in the home.

@OrigamiPenguinArmy

I’m not a home educator, and never will be, but I think it’s very important that people have the right to home educate if they so wish. If there really is currently a large number of children being pulled out of school, given scant education and essentially being radicalised by parents with strongly held conspiracy theory type views (the type of people who probably think they’re much cleverer than they are, see the Dunning-Kruger effect) then the whole future of home education is surely going to be put at risk?

Yes I think it will.

I also think it’s a very basic human right to not be forced to send your children to school. However all children has the right to education. I don’t believe some of this new wave can deliver it.

To be honest the government ought to have stopped all fines for absences this term. From what I've heard from a friend who is an EWO they are enforcing them more rigorously than ever.

If people have someone in the house who is particularly vulnerable their hands may have been forced into deregistering.

A more flexible/ blended approach could have been adopted by the government last term which may have resulted in less knee jerk deregistrations.

@30mph

However - a lot of these posts are written in really poor grammar.

Does it not concern you that this is the outcome after 12 years or so of schooling?

I don’t think it’s as simple as that.

You can’t blame everything on schools. A lot rides on the engagement of parents which is a sociological issue. I did some time working as a TA. The teacher was fantastic and she has good resources, the class was large but the biggest factor in development was what was going on at home.

I only know of two Home Ed parents but they had been doing this years before the pandemic and are really dedicated (one is a former teacher). Before this year, they used to meet up with their local network of home ed parents to go on trips, do science experiments etc. Their kids are most definitely bright and they both have a dedicated room in the home which basically looks like a classroom. I couldn't be arsed with doing any of that tbh, Home education is definitely not for me but I've seen how great it can be - if you're dedicated.

I've home educated for 15 years taken one child through exams. Youngest is now yr 10 and 3 GCSEs down.
I think the vibe is verse the system has always existed on some groups. I avoid those ones.
My concern is those deregistering during the exam years who have done very little research into the practicalities of sitting exams as a private candidate. It is very possible to do so BUT some subjects/syllabus options are very difficult to access from home, there are usually alternatives but require thought and planning. There has also been a growth in tutor services etc but there is a difference in supporting children who are sitting exams in school and genuine home educators who often need to do different exam options. I worry about parents trusting tutors because they are experts, but while they may be subject experts if they aren't also aware of the practicalities of arrangements for exams for home educators then they may not be giving the right information/covering the right syllabus.
Add in the problems with even finding an exam centre able to accommodate external candidates this year and the changes to the specifications that need keeping up with and it is worrying.
I think there is a case of the grass being greener. I don't think people realise how badly home education has been affected by Covid. The exam cancellations were a disaster, only about 10% of private candidates registered in the summer were able to get grades and for many who did there were extra costs.
Home education has always been very social but that has gone by the wayside as people struggle to work out how to run things with constantly changing guidelines and many venues like church halls have shut doors.
I love home education, I have seen what it's done for my kids and their friends but 2020 has been a hard year to home educate and 2021 isn't looking all that rosy at the moment.

Oh, and one last point, studies show that children home educated by parents with little or no formal educational qualifications still out perform their peers who are at school.

Admittedly this is a while back, but a government study in 2009 found that home-educated children were twice as likely to be known to social services and four times as likely to be out of work and in no form of education or training as young adults, compared with their school-attending peers. Maybe things had improved between then and more recent years, but I doubt that a new massive increase in home education now will do anything but worsen those kinds of stats.

This thread does smack a bit of "I home educated before it was cool and all these new pretenders are changing the vibe".

I will be part of the "new Homeschoolers" cohort, OP.

DS has possible ASD and/or ADHD (we're awaiting assesment) and he seems to be capable of behaving appropraitely in a classroom or learning to read and write. But not both at the same time.

He did much better over lockdown because he was able to learn in a quiet environment, with one to one attention from me.

I have some mild dyslexia and will cheerfully admit that my spelling and grammer are not the best.
But even with that drawback- he does better at home. No amount of teaching expertise will help him if he's too stressed and distracted to learn.

Last week I wrote to his school asking is he could do a reduced timetable in the new year. The Nicola Sturgeon announced school closures and honestly, I'm not sorry.

I very much suspect this will end with us homeschooling.

Then Nicola Sturgeon...

Home education is a bonkers idea. Eventually those children will have to face the world.

I keep deleting my post but I know what you mean OP. I’ve been home educating for almost six years now though and there were already a lot of home ed kids whose learning was not being engaged with at all. I don’t post about the structured approach we take now because I feel look down on for it, like I’m not giving DS any freedom. That might just be our local community although I do see structured learning criticised on bigger groups sometimes. My DD1 got sick of having no peers to learn with (plenty to socialise with, there was always loads to do before covid) and prefers being back in a classroom for lessons (I am not one to say home ed is right for every child - it isn’t!)

I have no idea what the home ed community will be like after all this, it’s been a huge change.

My concern is those deregistering during the exam years who have done very little research into the practicalities of sitting exams as a private candidate. It is very possible to do so BUT some subjects/syllabus options are very difficult to access from home, there are usually alternatives but require thought and planning.

I also agree with this, and when people realise that they have to pay for GCSEs.

It isn’t that at all @nanbread I am concerned that these people are going to destroy home ed is this country and then merrily send their dc back to school leaving those of us who are in it long term to pick up the pieces.

overall I think it is better for most kids than school.

I really, really don't think this is true.

A high proportion of children enjoy school and have really missed being their this year. Many many children thrive in a school environment.

Of course a minority don't, and as is often the case, that minority are often really not well served by the school system so of course do better in home education.

The reality is high quality HE requires either a SAHM or incredibly flexible employment that enables one of both parents to invest a huge amount of time. This simply isn't attainable for most families on a normal income. Mistlewoe, shelling out for private school & tutors, clearly is a little removed from the financial pressures many parents face.

missed being there

Good thing I don't HE

I’m not a teacher and don’t really know many teachers, but from the ones I do know, it’s fairly evident that teaching is a vocation. A vocation that I certainly don’t have. I wouldn’t even know where to start!

There’s a reason why people study/train for several years to be teachers and we don’t just employ parents/carers etc to teach in our schools.
I understand that mainstream schooling simply does not work for a small group of children but I get the impression some parents (albeit with the best intentions) really think they’re up for the role of home teacher when they aren’t.

Eventually those children will have to face the world

This in a softer way. HE can be very nurturing, very tailored to a child's needs and wants. Real life won't be like that, and school does prepare children well for learning how to operate in a group of their peers. They need to learn how to cope. There's a lot of resilience that is gained through the school years in managing socially.

I'm a primary teacher and hate home schooling but at least did a decent job of it. My DCs didn't fall behind although none of us enjoyed home learning in Lockdown! I'm much happier teaching my own class. I think it must be hard to start home schooling with no experience. Also, real HE in normal tines includes loads of real life experiences like visiting museums, farms, historical sites, meeting up with other HE families etc which isn't possible at the moment.

Looked*