To think Home Education should be made illegal

[Viviennemary]

I would like to see a ban on HE except perhaps in a very very few cases and with good reason and under strict supervision.

Hmm how strange
No sign of the OP 🤔

How is your life enrichwn by being by like-minded people? Surely entichment comes from being exposed to many different things and people, not being on an echo chamber.
I actually think this is the bad thing about home educating, even if parents are loveing and do it well...you are likely to be with people just like you, and that's not good bevause life is not like that

"Home educated children are being educated (or ought to be, anyway)".

Except there's no one checking that they are being educated or the quality of their education. I have a child with sen and I can see why people home school but in most cases they are getting an inferior education. In some cases they are not being educated at all

I think there should be safety checks
Not to tell the vast majority of HE-ers what do with their own children; when they have reasons for HE, but to try and protect the small minority

Most parents work and work around each other (both work part time, one does evenings and weekends, opposite shifts) and use some childcare.

Not true!! Sara's school reported concerns to SS on three separate occasions.

What's next? Sterilize anyone who can't afford a David Lloyd gym membership?

@GenAvocadoOnToast It has always been legal to HE for any reason, but the numbers used to be very small. This was partly because few parents knew you could HE will no real oversight. The assumption amongst many parents was that either HE is illegal, or there would be lots of hoops to jump through.
The internet changed that view as more and more parents realised they could HE in whatever way they want to.
In terms of subjects like physics either:

• their HE does not cover this subject, or only at a very basic level.
• parents sign their children up to an online school that teaches through a virtual classroom
• parents buy textbooks and let the child get on with it alone
• parents have money and pay for a private tutor.
• they send them to college once they hit 14 years of age

But the most common response is not to teach physics and say if their children are interested, they can learn at college when they are older.

Erm? Don't take on logic teaching for your child please

How expensive would it be to have someone physically see 100,000 children every month?
At the moment LAs only have to make contact in writing annually and lots don't even manage that.

There are many different ways to HE.

Some families follow the national curriculum and use the same online resources as schools do - some excellent sites - and a lot of them.

Some families use guided discovery so where ever the child’s interest goes at that time that’s what they study - some excellent sites for this. Some families get their kids to read the morning news to encourage reading and awareness of world news - away from the tv

Some families focus on what their child is good at and eager to learn/talented and focus on that.

I know some families who’s kids are already writing computer programs and they are 8/9

My friends kids go to a Stiener school. It’s bonkers and costs a lot. They do not follow the curriculum and don’t have set English and maths. Kids age range in a class can be from 5-18

People are just so used to the norm of state education they really can’t see that there is other ways to do it.

YABU to think that home education is to blame for Sara's death. Have you read how many times issues were flagged before she got taken out of school?

Until there are sufficient strategies in place to give the utmost support to children who have suffered tremendous anxiety from being bullied & the same for SEN children, home education will continue to be a vital part of society.

456 children in the UK alone or in the world?

As an experienced teacher in mainstream, SEN and I’m now in a PRU. I have worked with many vulnerable, differently able kids over the years. I am now a mum as well and wouldn’t hesitate to pull my kids out and homeschool if I felt the education they were receiving wasn’t suitable. I have seen first hand the damage that some schools can do to kids and it’s really not a perfect system.

What happened to Sara wouldn’t have been prevented by banning home ed, kids avoid school for weeks on end and all we can do is send letters and threaten fines. You can’t force a family to send their children into school just so we can get a good look at them. Abusive parents will keep kids off if it suits them without using home education as an excuse.

Disclaimer: not including special needs here

Most parents want to send their kids to the best school in an area to the extent they will lie about religion and/or move. They assume the teachers are qualified to teach their children in relation to knowledge and socialisation.
So why do some feel they are far more qualified to teach a a range of subjects, socialiation and discipline? It's ridiculous unless a parent is a qualified teacher.
Home schooling by morons or abusers should be illegal, yes.

Perhaps they can try home abdominal surgery, or brain surgery...
Or home bus driving around the garden

What a strange thing to say.

Children's welfare is important. This applies to physical needs, psychological needs and of course educational development.

I don't think HE should be illegal but their attainment, development and welfare should be closely monitored. Isn't it? Do kids literally stay at home and no checks or assessments are made?

An average of 1 child a week killed in uk typically by parent or step parent

So that's around 52 in the uk not over 400

Primary School is about socialisation. Yes, you expect them to leave Yr6 able to read and write and to reach a certain level in maths but a lot of it is about learning how to be a person, independent from your family. You have to get along with people - including teachers - that you don’t like, you learn empathy and how to make and keep friends, you work through distractions and learn to be responsible for yourself and your things.

I’m sure that most able children, given one to one teaching, could learn faster and cover a much broader range of subjects than they manage to do in school. Then what? They’re ahead of their peer group academically but behind socially. If they do go to school the work is boring because they’ve already studied it. It makes me think of those 14 year olds you see in newspapers who’ve already done A Levels. They’re so isolated - they don’t fit in with children their own age and they can’t fit in with the students they’re in classes with. If you send DC to school you can still provide educational enrichment after school and in the holidays.

It's interesting to me to see how many posters view schools as the ideal/only acceptable way to teach children. In mainstream they're crammed in 30+ to a room, desks all facing the teacher, having to sit still and quiet, moving at the government-decided pace, no time to spend more time on things if you haven't quite understood and if you already understand and you're bored you can do some busy work while you wait for everyone else. Not to mention bad teachers, bullying, classroom disruption due to behaviour of other children - it's clearly not ideal!

Some children obviously manage well, but we now know much better ways for children to learn but the education system is seriously underfunded and there's no way to implement many changes because resources are so stretched already.

Yes there are issues with homeschooling but it's just interesting to me that so many people think that all children should be placed into this system when it's clearly so flawed and unsuitable for so many.

There are some excellent HE families. But all of those I know who do it very well are also intelligent, and have money to buy in extra resources, pay for clubs, or tutors as needed.
The worst HE families I see are those who are already struggling to manage day to day life. Either one or both the parents have mental health difficulties and/or a significant chronic health problem. These are the families who already struggled to get their children to school, and to meet their school requests e,g. kit on PE day, baking ingredients, etc. HE is a disaster for these families with the kids nearly always spending nearly all day playing video games or even spending many many hours in bed.

I don't know. But it's certainly cheaper than educating those 100,000 chidlren in full time education.

There are multiple reasons why parents think they are better placed to educate the children

Some will be rational - many schools are failing some or all children

And sone will be arrogance - what I think of as the trump mentality that assumes the person knows better than anyone else in yen whole world no matter what subject - this attitude is growing in general

Because she has an article deadline