To find the homeschooling fad really braggy

[Kudosss]

Am I wrong to think there's something braggy and arrogant about homeschooling?

I'm NOT talking about the parents of SEN children who may not have been able to access a school, or feel it's in the child's best interest. I'm not even talking about the quiet ones who just get on with it. I do acknowledge our school system has it's problems but...

I'm talking about the loudly wholesome parents bragging about their lives and day, how much richer their kids are for being home schooled, outdoors yahdiya.

I mean I would love to be able to homeschool but the reality is I a) can't afford to and b) quite like the little bit of sanity I have left and c) I'm not so arrogant that I think I can undermine qualified teaching professionals with years of experience.

It's almost like these parents are basically announcing their wealth and privilege to the world without announcing their wealth and privilege and making everyone else feel inadequate.

There’s a YouTuber I subscribe to like this. I’ve subscribed / unsubscribed many times!!!
She’s got an only child who is either year 3 or 4 , provides a completely inadequate education but has lots of holidays out of reach to many of us!! Lots of very braggy videos about how great home ed life is. From what I’ve seen she also treats / talks about him like a preschooler or reception aged child emotionally/ developmentally which must be a type of emotional abuse but not enough for SS involvement! They were on a holiday and saw some churches and was saying it was of course all over his head, but he enjoyed it which surprised me because it shouldn’t have really been over his head! Maybe teaching style, or babying him - who knows.
The loudest quite often are trying to mask lack of education and/ or other issues. There are some more home educators in real life who aren’t so braggy and just crack on with it

it's not just the "poor teachers", already over-worked, underpaid and left to deal with too much.

There's a recruitment crisis if you don't know about it, and when you see how many primary school classes , with 30 or 31 don't even have a full time TA, sometimes not even a TA full stop! It's outrageous.

As dedicated as a teacher can be, there are already 30 kids, with different levels, different needs, different issues.

You know why schools are crying for volunteer readers? Because calculate how long it takes if a teacher spends just 5 mn A WEEK reading with each child. And that's less than the basics in primary school, surely.

So no, it's not right to expect a child to go part-time (that's fine) AND expect the whole class to be put on hold to play catch-up. It's only acceptable when parents take responsibility and THEY do the catch-up - like most other parents are doing anyway when a child needs extra help for whatever reason.

This is surely an issue for the school to manage since they are the ones in control of the terms of a part time timetable or flexischooling?
You're behaving as if 'poor teachers' are being forced against their will.

I don’t know where this myth has come from where there are drives of home edders whose entire teaching is sourced ‘in house’. I spent years home edding - I didn’t meet one single family where their teens weren’t involved in part time college/tutors/tutor groups/online schooling/ distance guided curriculums.

and how do you suggest the school manage?

Where do they "manage" to get the budget from exactly?

Teachers are there to teach a CLASS, that's what parents sign for. If you want private tutoring, pay for a private tutor - or find a private school who offers 1/1 classes if that even exists.

We know school is not, and can’t be, one size fits all. Even with changes school will not work for a portion of children. I say this as someone whose DD had issues, school even mentioned HE to me, but I knew she needed to be with others as much as possible. HE would have fixed temporary issues but long term ruined her.
My issue is that the HE I’ve met act as if school is just a terrible choice for your child and why are you sending them. Because different choices work for different children, it’s not that your choice is more valid.
But they were also the ‘baking is maths’ type which means you aren’t really self aware to realise most parents are doing these things around school, you aren’t doing anything unique. The also didn’t believe there were any negatives in their choice, there will always be some, there are things your children miss, maybe the positives outweigh it, but it’s not a perfect choice, nothing can be. One of them did send her DD to school when she got a private school place, so clearly school actually wasn’t the issue, it was the type of school.

It's not always adhd kids that are flexischooled!

I admire their positive attitude. I can't think of anything more annoying than homeschooling.

I will never ever be convinced that HE is in the best interests of the vast majority of children. I accept SEN can have some impact so would never say this is universally true but school gives children so much more than HE can and I don't mean just academically.

Part of this is resilience which involves sticking at something that's hard through difficult times. It's not surprising that most kids have times when they don't like school and would rather quit, in the same way that many of us feel like that about our careers at times. Perseverance often pays off though or potentially moving to another school/workplace but just jacking it all on altogether robs you of so much in the medium/long term.

Friendships that are formed in the unique conditions of school that are never replicated again in quite the same way elsewhere. Sometimes they are forged during adversity but that's all part of it. Most people have friends from their school days soon and it's all part of the rich tapestry of life.

I also think it's a great social training ground for people. We make mistakes and do some pretty awful things but that's part of growing and maturing. There were absolutely days and weeks that I wanted to avoid going to school because of some social drama or awkward dynamic but I worked my way through it and picked up important skills along the way. Managing conflict, dealing with bitchiness and handling difficult people. It's hard and tough but I feel that these formative experiences are so important.

You simply don't get any of this in HE and I think that's why it's so appealing for adults and children. There is nothing worse as a parent than watching your child struggle and fail at things but it usually isn't the right thing to just whip them out of the situation. As a child or young person you live in the here and now and these things can feel like the end of the world when they're happening. HE can seem like a sanctuary but I think it's a mirage. It can't insulate you from society and life and we all have to cope in the end with challenging people and situations. Don't get me wrong, I don't think kids should stay at schools that aren't working for them and I absolutely think they should try out different schools if necessary. I just think HE is not equivalent to school and you lose so so much in comparison.

What an extraordinary number of posts you've made on this thread for someone who doesn't care and is not obsessing. 😂

It's true that there's a very vocal, very judgmental braggy "home educator" type, who not only lecture you about home education and the ONLY way to do it right (their way) when frankly no one cares,

but also is very judgmental and try to explain that THEY bake/ teach when others parents don't.

What do they actually think? That kids at school are picked up, plonked in front of the tv, and not seen until the next morning or until Monday? 😂
They are confusing home education and parenting.

All the kids I know have very similar bedroom set-ups that vary by age but not by content: they have books on anything and everything, a globe, telescope because they wanted to learn about stars, some random toys and digging bits about dinosaurs, microscope they MUST have , musical instruments, cookery books, reconstruction of roman catapults, building material, wood work tools, legos, and a pile of stuff covering the most random subjects 😂

Kids learn every day, and about everything, but that's just being kids with normal parents. They go to the library, to museums, to parks, nature reserve, historical places, what you do on normal weekends and holidays when you have days off yourself.

That's the part I find highly amusing, the idea that these home "educators" are doing anything special just because they don't send the kids to school.

The most brilliant ones don't need to brag.

I don't care about home education in itself, I am very amused by braggy people.

Sorry I touched a nerve with you 😂

Its the ones who take the kids around in a van claiming nature is their class room that are the most gringy.

Hmm the endless obsessive posts about every aspect of home education suggest otherwise. 😂 I don't home educate (or have any kids yet) but I have friends and extended family who do and their kids are doing great. 🙂 It's a shame you're so insecure in your own choices that you have to spend so much time trying to find fault with people who make a different one. In my experience people who are happy with their own life seldom behave like that.

Oh god, not this old chestnut. It is so tiresome that anyone with an opinion on anything now automatically gets accused of being either jealous or unhappy in their own life. I have loads of opinions about loads of things that aren't fuelled by either motive. I imagine you do too! For example I think private jets should be banned in almost all cases. Not because I'm jealous, not because I'm miserable but because they damage the environment. I also think HE should be restricted and far more regulated for the sake of children.

I've never seen a home schooling parent start a thread to criticise those who send their children to school, but there are constant ones like this with people criticising home schoolers. I think OP and other posters should try to focus on their own lives rather than comparing themselves to others.

Why would it need to be restricted?

Because I think I believe it should only be allowed if it could be proven it was definitely in the child's best interests.

How on earth would that be defined and proven?

I imagine it would be done in the same way that the best interests of anyone without capacity can be determined usually through a checklist of factors and exploration of available options.

you have to spend so much time trying to find fault with people who make a different one. In my experience people who are happy with their own life seldom behave like that.

your understanding skills are outstanding.

Who's posting obsessively here? 😂

How bizarre, that would be incredibly difficult and an inefficient and inappropriate use of resources. Would you apply that to parents sending their child to a particular school such as a independent or faith school too?
Better to just let parents choose, and have inspections to check the children are getting a decent education when needed.

You cannot have been looking very far, there are plenty, about the poor institutionalised children, neglected by their parents 😂

I think with a lot of these things, the majority of parents are getting on with things but the braggers are loud so we hear about them more. It's not just homeschooling either, it's travelling, holidays, meals out, food in general, starting school at CSA, books, films, vaccination etc. Some people will brag about anything and everything.

I completely disagree. I don't think it should be within parents' scope of authority to remove their child from school unilaterally. This can be incredibly risky for a child from a safeguarding perspective as well as the adverse academic and social implications this can have that a child can't even begin to understand. They simply don't have the required capacity to make a such a decision.

Schools are inspected by OFSTED or an equivalent body. Choosing to HE absolutely isn't the same as choosing a school for a child irrespective of whether it's private or religious etc. Extremism, abuse and generally crap educational standards are far more likely to be identified and resolved in a school than in a domestic setting where you would need an insane amount of resource to really audit what is going on.