Refusing to homeschool

[SonicTheSorryRabbit]

Curious about this...

How many parents have simply decided that they're not doing homeschooling? Either because they're wfh and can't balance that with homeschooling or because it's too much for their kids and making them miserable?

If you're not homeschooling, (i) are you getting a hard time from the school?; and (ii) what are your kids doing instead?

YABU - we're homeschooling.

YANBU - we never started/we've given up.

I'm doing work with them but I've eased up on it. I do it at a more relaxed pace and if they don't want to do it I don't force them, we'll do it the next day. I make sure my eldest does his online lessons as he is in secondary, but my younger kids I am more relaxed with. One has autism and it is hard to understand why she's getting school work to do at home without her kicking off, which disrupts my other kids, so their quality of homeschooling isn't great.

[quote SonicTheSorryRabbit]@LucyLockdown. No, I'm just interested in what happens if parents decide homeschooling really isn't working for their children and their family and so give it a miss.

Also wfh parents don't tend to finish at 5pm. If they're looking after multiple children during the day, their working hours tend to go into the early hours of the morning. There is no down time in the schedule for many.[/quote]
Not sure what to say.
The obvious consequence of not homeschooling is that your child falls behind and gets out of the habit of learning which will impact greatly when your child does, eventually, go back to school.

You could tell your headteacher and she/he might be able to find a place for your child but , if every parent just gave up, then all children would be back in school which is what the current situation does not need.

Up to you really.

An EHCP doesn’t automatically qualify a child for a school place, my 6 year old hasn’t been given one (and he’s at a special school).
I have to have two zoom meetings a day with the school, even though he’s non-verbal and sits down for a minute at the most. Seems pretty pointless.

but I was whatsapping a friend who says she's given up for her Y1 boy since she has work deadlines to meet and can't do both.

Well she can't, can she? She is being paid to do a job 9-5 or whatever. She cannot be doing that AND sitting with a 5 year old doing their sums.

It's impossible.

the current law

@ReginaPhalangee

No personal judgment from me at all because I know how hard it is but as a professional, I should tell you that failure to engage with remote learning is not an option. Learning remains statutory even at home so anybody not engaging will find there are consequences. We just had a full staff meeting about exactly this issue.

Well that was a waste of a meeting. Let me refer you to the Education Act 1996:

"The parent of every child of compulsory school age shall cause him to receive efficient full-time education....either by regular attendance at school or otherwise"

Even in normal times, there is absolutely no statutory duty to engage with schools in order to educate a child. And anyone trying to take legal action against a parent for not engaging with school in a pandemic when the school has asked parents not to send children in will be laughed out of court.

Great news. All I have to do is refuse to home school and my kids will be offered a place? Hooray.

[sinking feeling this is not in fact true. Because it wasn't last time. And because school have already written to say they want less pupils taking places.]

PS I voted YABU because we have been doing the work sent by school so far. But I'm not sure how long I can carry on because it is so impossible. I spent last lockdown figuring out the best way to kill myself and I just don't want to be in that position again.

Now my DS is threatening the same. Our lives are more important to us than pointless worksheets or someone else's metrics.

@arethereanyleftatall I’m impressed by your year 5. I have year 5 twins and homework alone always has one in tears! Mine are in school as I’m a critical worker - actually quite relieved despite spending 2 hours on icu today.

Last lockdown we scrapped doing homeschooling with most of stuff from school. We did maths sheet, english sheet, read together and watch educational tv programme. Kept things ticking over without too much stress.

Some of you say do it as and when but we have been told that our schools 3 meetings are compulsory 8:30, 11:00 and 1. The teachers need an email if a child cannot attend. This is working well for us as I am at home and my work is craft so I can just about make my orders and deal with enquiries while supervising dd (10) but if I had a more taxing job I think we would really struggle. I didn't realise the situation was so strict about following what the school sends

At the moment I've one with SN who needs full-time 1 to 1 to do from home and 1 year 10 trying to do GCSEs from home. I've had to not work since March to try and give the SN one an education but I can't survive with no income indefinitely and we don't qualify for help from school or for income as was newly self-employed.

He just screams, cries, whines, kicks , refuses and we have no school place and almost no savings and its not sustainable. School finally promised him a place from Tuesday but then withdrew it Monday night. So we are back to surviving with no money and no help from anyone but we will have to get more income soon. It's pointless me logging on pretending to be him. I was doing that but what is the point? It just hides the problem.

It's quite ironic that pre Covid if anyone on MNet asked if it was a good idea to WFH & not put their baby/child in nursery/pre school on those working from home days, the consensus was a big fat no.
Posters would say it's not professional as how can you get your work done from home if you are having to supervise a child.

Obviously we need to do what we need to do during this pandemic but it just seems that all the reasons why it's not a good idea to WFH & school or care for children at the same time has been forgotten.
Luckily my DC are older & are getting on with their work this time round as the school is now organised & doing virtual classrooms/online learning.
Plus we have the luxury of quiet spaces to learn & all the technology needed. Not all kids are lucky in that respect.
Last year it was hopeless as there was no online learning at all just worksheets emailed out.
School found the many children got bored with the lack of teacher/class interaction.

It really annoys me when posters say home learning & WFH is a piss of piss & berates anyone who is struggling.
I have it easy but I can see that other people do not.
It really annoys me that there are some posters on MN threads that are not intelligent or empathetic enough to realise that life isn't uniform & people's experiences wildly differ.

You can't just decide that compulsory education isn't working for your family, it is a legal requirement and, more importantly, to not persevere is to do your children a huge disservice

It is a legal obligation to provide your child with a suitable education. It is not a legal obligation to engage with a school to do so.

So parents do need to homeschool children, but they are under no obligation whatsoever to use materials sent by the school or to report back to the school. Lots of schools basically abandoned kids in the first lockdown (despite some heroic work by individual teachers). They can fuck right off with threats of legal action now.

@queenofarles

I just feel unless the child has SN, then there is absolutely no way they can’t sit and join Live lessons, they were attending up till a few weeks ago so it’s not something completely new to them, they are familiar with the teachers and subjects.

DD1 attends her lessons and unfinished work we complete later in the day.

Have you ever had a child who is supposed to be doing live lessons refuse to get out of bed? Be violent towards you? Threaten to kill themselves? Cry and cry? Just lie on the floor with their head in their hands and refuse to respond to you?

No? Lucky you. Try and be a bit less judgmental. And grateful you have a DD who does do the work.

I think you should talk specifically to other parents of infant school children. Most (but not all) Y5/Y6s will manage something with a laptop and parent helping out when they can, but 5 year olds are a different kettle of fish. It's so easy for people to judge and say "try harder" but they have walked zero miles in your shoes.

I've spoken to a few parents some of who have said they are giving up. It's not that they don't want to homeschool as such but the expectation from schools are too much.

Parents are told to teach their dcs about adjectives etc... when they have no idea what it is. One of them told me about the work set for her nursery child that involved reading a story and then making some complex craft with the child and sending a photo. Very good if you are in class and know how to do that stuff. Not so good when you have no art stuff and can't buy any.
I know there is no way I could have taught my dcs the phonics (Im not british and cant pronouce those sounds properly)
etc....

It often feels that the teachers are basically hoping that a parent will replace them and will do all the teaching for them. Whih a lot of parets cant do.

So they give up. Who would blame them?

Working in a demanding role with confidentiality and safeguarding issues. However not classed as a key worker. I am supervising my SEN year 1, ignoring my speech delayed two year old who I am watching deteriorate. Is all the work getting done? No.

@MissLucyEyelesbarrow

You can't just decide that compulsory education isn't working for your family, it is a legal requirement and, more importantly, to not persevere is to do your children a huge disservice

It is a legal obligation to provide your child with a suitable education. It is not a legal obligation to engage with a school to do so.

So parents do need to homeschool children, but they are under no obligation whatsoever to use materials sent by the school or to report back to the school. Lots of schools basically abandoned kids in the first lockdown (despite some heroic work by individual teachers). They can fuck right off with threats of legal action now.

They can only do that if they deregister the child and forfeit the school place. You cannot remain registered with a school and not engage with their education attempts.

But is it the same lesson? The problem many parents have is that they can't both be on a work call in one room and supervising live lessons in another room. Since it's impossible to be in two places at once.

Not necessarily... but my role requires me to do both. Yes it's an impossible situation and pretty exhausting. My lessons are adapted for home learners, the children in my classroom have the same objectives but obviously we have the resources to support. We try to provide this for home use but we fully understand the difficulties.

To the PP who said we could 'fuck right off' No school wants to take anybody to court, I can promise that. We pride ourselves at my school on the family-feel relationships with our parents and children. We have to prove our children are engaging with the learning. They're enrolled on our register so we have no choice. If a parent doesn't show they are engaging we have no choice but to try to engage them. It's not our decision.

@Awalkintime

So they're simultaneously teaching online lessons and teaching lessons in the classroom?

Yes lots of us are.

Good job you're qualified teachers able to differentiate then.

How about parents doing a totally different job, which requires them to be online at all times, with children of very different ability who can't/won't work on their own.

Oh, and not enough tech to go round.

Schools should not have closed, many are over half full anyway.
All we have done is shunted lots of problems onto other areas of society. The mental health consequences are considerable.

DC has some SN and has a busy schedule of online lessons. DH and I also have full time jobs with calls throughout the day.

It's really tough, but we can't just not do any schoolwork with him.

We take it in turns to sit with him when he has lessons, and if we all have calls at the same time then we sit outside his room so that we get some privacy and can be there if he needs us.

Homework is done sitting at the table with us, either at lunchtimes or after work, or if it's something straightforward, whilst we're working.

I've cried this week with tiredness, but there is no other option - we just have to get on with it.

I saw someone on an FB group last week saying that they'd given up on online learning and instead had decided to teach their son life skills like being a good partner . It just sounded like they couldn't be bothered with lessons tbh, which is so unfair to their child.

Have you ever had a child who is supposed to be doing live lessons refuse to get out of bed? Be violent towards you? yes

Just lie on the floor with their head in their hands and refuse to respond to you? yes.

It’s not easy and it’s so stressful to all my 3dcs, but there is just no other option , they know it needs to be done, not to mention just how exhausted and burnt out I am!

Just this morning my eldest 14yr decided to nap at 10,30 which resulted in him missing two lessons and the school messaging me to inform of that.

Why would you just give up? This could be going on for months.

Some of you say do it as and when but we have been told that our schools 3 meetings are compulsory 8:30, 11:00 and 1

They can say what they like but doesn’t make it true. You are not legally obliged to do those.