Insane rise in home schooling?

[whyohwhy246]

Has anyone else noticed a huge increase in home schooling? Someone I follow in IG has just deregistered their child and I just can’t believe how many families are choosing to do this.

Of course it is sometimes the right choice for the child but it seems that more and more children are being allowed to opt out of formal education.

Teenagers need to learn that life is hard and school will throw challenges at them. How they learn to deal with this impacts how they handle things as an adult. What happens when they enter the work place and they can’t just opt out of the difficult things? Where do they learn that resilience?

I have worked in education for 20 years and whilst I agree that some aspects of the system are broken, I don’t think home schooling is the answer to this.

The social aspect alone is impossible to replicate (walking to school together, having your first crush, a detention, school trips I could go on and on…) but I also don’t see how all of these parents can have the skills to teach their children to GCSE. I also find it so insulting to teachers who spend years learning their craft. It’s not just something you can pick up and do effectively.

Has anyone else noticed this?

Like state school tbh.

Not really when the worse school education has resulted in dead children

I think you need to educate yourself on home educating as you don’t appear to know very much about it

I definitely do not disagree with you that some home educated children are being failed by their parents just like there are plenty children in mainstream education being failed by their schools. I do however disagree with your statement that parents are arrogant and deluded to think that they can provide the same standard of education as schools. I did not provide the same standard of education as schools because I provided a better one and my dc’s grades are reflective of that. A subject that my eldest was failing at and struggling with at school she achieved a 9 at GCSE after 2 years of home education without the need for the tutors that I would have had to pay for had she continued in school.

With respect, you clearly know zilch about home education.

Firstly, the local authority do check up on us to see we are providing a “suitable education”. That’s happened forever. If they think it’s not suitable they can place a School Attendance Order on us.

Secondly, when you home educate you don’t replicate school at home. There is no duty at all to teach the school National Curriculum. Our duty is to provide “a suitable education, appropriate to the child’s age, aptitude and any special needs” (that’s the legal duty as a parent).

Your child doesn’t have to learn 9 specific separate subjects all at once. They can pick and choose what they’re interested in at that time. For example, my teen has a sudden, natural interest in history. Up until now he’s shown no interest but this year can’t get enough of learning about the world wars, medieval history and the civil war. He’s taken a deep dive into it all. A couple of years ago he took a very strong interest in a language. He learnt all the basics and more in a short space of time and now just keeps it up a coupe of times a week. Learning happens in a natural and sustainable way. Yes they were taught to read and write when younger and can do functional numeracy needed for everyday life but otherwise my children’s education is all driven by them.

That said, we do put things in their line of sight. We ensure they are exposed to as many different things as possible. Even if I don’t think they’ll be very interested in something I’ll book one workshop, visit etc just to expose them to as much as possible. So things like workshops, museums, talks, planetariums/observatories, different sports, games, different places, different cultures, science fairs, art exhibitions, social events etc etc. Sometimes they don’t think they’ll be that interested but it sparks something in them. Even if it’s not a great passion project, it can be a short interest. Or sometimes it sparks a great interest.

And finally the fact you think home educated kids don’t have the opportunity to hang out with their peers or learn to take turns etc is truly hilarious and tells me you have written this post with knowing anything about HE.

No I'm a single Mum with not much money at all but I managed

I was a teacher in a primary school and it’s insane in schools at the moment. There are unmet SEND needs, quiet children who just don’t get a look in, no support for the identified SEND one adult for 30 students.

the curriculum is just not fit for purpose anymore. The 2014 curriculum was rubbish to begin with.

parents don’t make the decision lightly to remove their child.

There are a lot of assumptions in your posts. The vast majority of which are incorrect. You assume home ed children can't do GCSEs; you assume they can't do multiple subjects nor that their parents are able to teach them; you now assume people can't afford to pay for any tutors etc. Maybe get your head out of the sand, put your prejudices on the back burner and actually do some research before you comment any further. Shocking that you state you are a primary teacher, but state you wouldn't be able to teach your own children. Yet the parents of the children in your class are expecting you to provide a broad, balanced and robust curriculum. Are you failing? Are you just one of the incompetent teachers we hear so much about? Maybe you need to look in the mirror and ask yourself that.

I’m curious, no head in sand.

No I work whilst the tutors and the rest work with dd and the LA pay all the costs

I have to agree. I know so many peoples kids who are school refusers and others who don’t go to school at all. The reason is that it gives them anxiety. As a life long anxiety sufferer, I thought to myself good luck getting in with life then. They can’t just opt out of life. Bad stuff is going to happen. But we have to be resilient and get on with it. It’s very troubling how many people can’t seem to manage life anymore. Schools are so much more accommodating than they ever were. The expectations are sky high and un-meetable. It’s good to be ambitious and have high standards but ultimately we all just have to get on with things. Pulling kids out of school because they have worries is absolutely not the answer.

I’m really curious - do you feel you provided a good standard of a broad education for your child? Are they set up for life? I have questioned myself whether I could provide for my children in home educating them and the answer is a flat no. Music, humanities, languages, STEM, team sports, playing in concerts, public speaking, leadership skills, clubs.how can one person make that happen for a child? Even if it was my full time job, there’s no way I could provide all of that.

What I have seen from the various home educators that I’ve seen doesn’t pass for an education. I feel deeply sorry for their children who I think will forever be outsiders in the world, not to mention have a very limited and narrow education.

Yes, because if it didn't happen to you it didn't happen at all. I work closely with school admissions in my day job and these are broadly the categories "homeschoolers" fall into

What a shame. That really saddens me. Education reduced to tutors.

That’s rude. ‘Reduced’. How about people stop shaming parents who are trying to do their best for their individual children?!

I'm an EOTAS Tutor. The mainstream education has failed every single child I've had the privilege of working with.

My daughter is a ND child in a private school. Lately, a few things have not been great and we’ve been faced with the reality that if we had to pull her out, we’d have to HE her because she’s so mentally fragile. But she’s also a bright kid who loves learning. The school seem keen to keep her and correct the issues that we’ve been worried about.

There is absolutely no way she’d cope in a class of 30. It would break her in days.

Well, how some parent. I do not agree it’s how ‘we’ parent. Rules are necessary are they not? Doesn’t the very fabric of society fall apart without all of us following rules? I think it’s all very sad. I’m not sure I agree that school hasn’t changed and is still designed for the industrial period. This statement is trotted out quite frequently now and I don’t think it matches the reality. School has changed massively. Teaching methods are unrecognisable to what went before. Obedience and respect for elders has pretty much disappeared in some parts of society. The role of the teacher is very different. There is a much greater breadth of education now. Even poor schools have clubs now with a range of activities to get involved in. Classrooms, teachers and exams are about all that remains that are the same and even they have evolved. I think if you actually look at that evolution of schools and the education system you’ll see that it is very different to even the 1950s. What do you think education should look like? Are there any examples of this in existence anywhere in the world?

I meant to also say that our friend is HE. She takes her son to different tutors and it costs them half of the school fees we’re paying…

That’s my opinion. Education isn’t making your way through a curriculum with a tutor. It’s so much more than that. I do feel desperately sad about it, sorry.

Well, I'm sorry you feel you couldn't provide those things. I certainly feel I provide all of them 🤷

The curriculum used at school is extremely narrow. The levels of literacy, general knowledge and critical thinking at population level are shockingly bad. The vast majority of "outsiders", weirdos, the socially inept, criminal, rude and lonely people you might come across will, statistically, have attended school.

You can teach a child to follow the rules without being an authoritarian parent.

Yes, it is completely true. It is very different from formal education, more of learning together than being teacher centred.

My sons chose which GCSEs they wanted to do, we worked through textbooks, studied the syllabus for each subject, understood marking schemes and did lots of exam papers.

I also learnt a huge amount, we even studied Chinese at home and one of them did Chinese GCSE, which we had a tutor for in the final year. There are so many resources around and we also got together with other home educating families and studied together for some subjects.

We staggered GCSEs over a few years, deciding to take each subject when they felt ready. My youngest did Computer Science GCSE aged 13 and got a grade 9.

i know several people in our local home ed community whose children made it to Cambridge.

When my sons got to 6th form they were really good at independent learning, which some of their peers struggled with. They also manage their workloads and revision really well at university.

There's a whole different world of home ed families out there who have followed similar paths.

Well the child in this post clearly needs specialist support, hence the part about the LA paying the fees. What exactly is wrong with that? It’s way better than having to take what you’re given in a state school.

As I say, I'm an EOTAS Tutor so paid for by the LA. I think my students do well with me tbf - 10 hrs pw of 1 to 1 / f2f with a qualified teacher of 22 years is pretty good? I work in homes / care homes.
I've been EOTAS for 1.5 years now and as much as I would dearly love to stay (genuinely love my job with a passion) it's not really sustainable financially. No pay throughout any of the many school holidays does not cover my rent.