So many think they can teach

[Wecandancetillthemorninglight]

My sister works with homeschooling families in London and frequently tells me stories of how they usually are. How they think they know more than the teacher after quickly looking up how to teach a concept online versus 30 plus years of teaching experience and many different methods and ways of doing things.
I have the upmost respect for my Dc’s teachers and wouldn’t dream of thinking I knew more. Dsis tells me the children are often way behind and have very few actual hours of learning and the mums think they’re doing an amazing job

Should this be allowed?

I have a friend who said she was going to home school her son, I honestly struggled to keep a straight face when she told me it's because of all the LGBTQ that's taught in schools! It just took me by surprise, we are both Muslim but I always thought of and her husband as not practising so I don't see where this comes from. Also they barely have a GCSE between them or the finances to support tutoring so I do think her sons gonna suffer as a result. I won't homeschool myself as frankly am not clever enough to do it but i am smart enough to realise that.

I’ve known parents who’ve home schooled. One did it out of principle because she didn’t like the local schools. I thought she was wrong in her assessment of the schools but I have to admit that she did a very good job. She worked full time but her husband was self employed and filled in the gaps. I thought what was key is that they used a broad range of local resources. Their child got into university and has certainly not been disadvantaged.

That was the exception. The other parents that I have come across, and there have been many, who said they were homeschooling,, used it as a cop out when they were unable to get their child to attend school to an acceptable level; in reality often the whole family could not get up in time. Their children have not done well and in some cases the children very much wanted to attend school.

Exactly this, it really is a skill and not just a case of looking up how to teach on the internet. Most great teachers I’ve known were born to teach, something in the delivery, the kindness with children and understanding them. There seems to be so much to it

Bit of a weird take? Don’t think anyone is pretending teaching your own kids is the same as teaching a class of 30?

My DD had a reading age of 9 when she was 3. I taught her to read. I don’t think for a second that makes me as good at teaching as a qualified teacher 🤣 Didn’t need to be one in order to teach her that though, obviously.

It says it all there in your post, the offhand way you speak about teachers and the assumption you can easily do as well as they do, you may think you can-you can’t! It’s so incredibly disrespectful

I work in a free to enter museum which often attracts home schoolers, just as it attracts school visits.

Some home schoolers are woefully inadequate and can barely read the words written on the display panels.

Other home schoolers are knowledgeable and very engaging with their children.

However, I can say exactly the same about some of the school staff who come along on the school trips.

So sad for the kids

I think a lot of jobs suffer from this. I certainly get a lot of advice on how I should run the comms part of my portfolio. It's usually wrong.

Maybe some parents who home school were also born to teach?

No-one is born to do any job.

They see one they like and train to do it.

Some will be good, some will be bad and some will be mediocre, and this goes for every job.

I don’t think that’s true at all. Teaching is a vocation, I’ve seen some teachers who were very clearly born to teach and work with children

I haven't said anything about teachers, offhand or otherwise. Teachers do a vastly different job from teaching one or two children in a home setting. I was talking about whether parents are (or should be) able to home school or not.

DH and I are both teachers - 26 and 27 years … no way could we homeschool our kids. We have the skills but I can teach English and Lit til A-level but I couldn’t teach any other past KS3!

Sorry but you’re showing your ignorance of home education. Not all homeschooled children are educated by their parents. My dd like many other home educated children had qualified teachers tutoring her through her GCSEs. I didn’t educate my daughter at all though I’m educated to PhD level so certainly could have in my specialist subjects.

Maybe you have or maybe your simpering idolization of teachers sometimes clouds your view.

Who knows 🤷‍♂️

What are you asking @Wecandancetillthemorninglight in your op, should what be allowed?

What does your sister do, is she a tutor?

I was talking about the parents who ‘Teach’ their children

I'm a teacher and I wish I could home school. Not because I think I'm experienced or know more. But becayse so much of the curriculum can be taught in such a better way away from school..

Only two hours of their day should be reading, writing and maths. So much of that time is lost due to behaviour, transition times, waiting for others to finish, not really getting something and the teacher not having Time to check yours until the end. So 90 minutes a day is more than enough at home.

80 minutes is just lunch and play, why not do that with a homeschooling group somewhere more interesting like a forest school?

Pe is two hours a week, but this could be done through hikes, sports clubs, swimming etc.

History projects that are actually out in history.

French in France.

Art in art studios and galleries.

The dream!

Simpering idolisation?!

Wow, no, just a respect for the profession and the ones who are good at it

You don't have to be a qualified teacher to teach.

Sports coaches teach, guide leaders teach, grandmas teach, work colleagues teach.

When we share our interests, our passions with others we are teaching them.

Can one person teach someone else everything they need to know? Of course not but I have been around home educators for a long time and very very few try to do it alone -most use their family, their community, external groups and sometimes online learning/schools or tutors.

I agree with @Iamthemoom - May has misinterpreted the original post. As a parent I couldn’t homeschool despite us being a two teacher household, but I don’t disagree with homeschooling.

Some are amazing. Some are absolutely terrible - often for different reasons. We’ve all experienced bad teachers alongside the good ones - whether that’s in your own school experience or in your DCs.

I had a terrible physics teacher - she was really a chemistry teacher but the school was short a physics teacher so they made her teach GCSE physics for two years - she hated it and it showed in every lesson.

Some people don’t have that right temperament for the job or it’s a stop gap for another career.

Equally some parents will be excellent teachers - they’ve just not gone down that career path officially.

The reason we have state schools is that it’s the best way to provide a decent education for the majority of children while also fitting jt in around the main working hours of parents - it suits the commercial working world to have the parents free to work while at the same time getting the next generation of workers used to a Mon-Fri working schedule.

There will also always be outliers who need something different from the standard system.

As long as there are checks and standard goals met then homeschooling will always be the better choice for some kids.

It’s the same with schools tbf.

There are some strange misconceptions about home-ed works.

I have "taught" to GCSE level in a subject that I have no qualifications in and managed to get a group of teens from scratch through to exam standard in less than a year. That's not disrespectful to teachers. And I know plenty of other home educators who have done similar.

It's a totally different scenario and not comparable to teaching in a school at all.
There's no crowd control nor classroom management required, no marking of weekly homework, no lesson plans, there is a much looser timetable/calendar.
It took a textbook, YouTube and a bit of imagination. (I did do a about half an hour of prep in advance every week, though, because some of the teens were not mine).

I would not want to teach in a school (even if I had the qualifications to do so) but I'd "teach" a small group of home ed teens again if anyone asked me (and if I wasn't now working full time).

No honestly, if you read back it definitely comes across as simpering idolization.

I'm pleased for you if it keeps you happy, but I think starting this thread was a bit strange.

From road sweepers to heart surgeons, you'll get people who are good, bad and mediocre.