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 couldn't agree more- home educating is not the same as teaching.

Many families do a fantastic job of encouraging a child, and helping him/her to learn. Parents do not 'teach' in a comparable way to a schoolteacher in front of a class- the idea is absurd. It is a different kind of learning, one which suits many students better than school does (a lot of data supports this).

I did say unless in rare exceptional circumstances, but given your reading comprehension you shouldn't be such an exception.

I teach but I've been out of the system for longer than home educating has been popular. I do tuition now. One of my students is home educated. Lower secondary KS3 I'm the only tutor they have. Once a week for less than an hour. Other than that they don't seem to do anything other than a little Maths and English occasionally online I'm not sure what it is but it's not with a tutor. This child, to my knowledge has no special need. There is no structure to their day. I don't know what they do with the rest of the week. As far as I can see there are no checks done

So so many like this…

This is what i came to say.

Parents being forced into home educating their child with SEN due to no suitable school places isn’t a ‘rare, exceptional’ circumstance.

It’s quite easy to teach one child at a time if you’re academic and resourceful. It’s extremely challenging to manage a full class of mixed abilities so that all of the class make progress.

My child is being homeschooled and so many of her homeschooling friends have mums who are ex-teachers.

it’s great for us because they tutor my child alongside theirs.

not sure how this plays into the OP’s “homeschoolers disrespect teachers” narrative 🤔

I can't see anywhere where she gives specifics. No mention of which family or where they live. Just a general comment.

My homeschooled DD (went back to mainstream in Y9 but during covid so not really! Got 9 grade 9s and 2 8s at GCSE. We unschooled too, she’s just bright.

How do you know what to teach them then?

I have known plenty of teachers and some are excellent, some are completely useless. A teaching qualification is not a particularly good indication of ability.

I home educated my own children very sucessfully. I am not a qualified teacher but I am educated to PhD level and have a very broad subject knowledge. Not only have I taught my own children, but I have tutored many other individuals since at Primary, GCSE, A Level,Undergraduate and Masters level in a wide variety of subjects including maths, English, sciences and the humanities.

My teaching tends to be very different from school teaching and it provides a much better learning experience for everyone. Many of those who seek me out have felt let down by their experiences in school. I have no desire to teach in a classroom and a school would probably not want me anyway as my approach is unorthodox.

I think you are being very unfair on home educators, many of whom do a wonderful job of motivating and inspiring their children to follow their dreams into great careers.

Do you mean after covering the main basics in the early primary years?

I think you’d design something similar to most mainstream curriculums starting broad and as they get older becoming more focused on what they are aiming for in life after education.

Then focus on what needs to be achieved to be successful at each stage.

yet in somecases its true, look at the past, greats like da vinci, plato, machivelli, socrates etc they didnt have the education system we have today, yet they all made their mark in history and learned different subjects. ive been taught different skills by many people that were not qualified teachers, so in that reguard theres no difference, the knowledge is taught by x people i learned said knowledge

Home schooling should be allowed because some DC cannot cope in a school. However, it should be regulated. Because too many LAs say kids are “home educated” as an excuse to avoid providing proper teaching / tutoring to those who cannot be in school.

For parents who genuinely choose it I’m quite skeptical tbh. I think it is neglectful to fail to ensure your DC get a decent grounding in the basics. I’d query any parent who actively choose it (absent SEN) if the DC fail to get minimum qualifications (eg En/Ma at 4+).

I do think some homeschooling parents don't realise the extent, breadth or detail of what is expected in schools now.

However, I do think with primary content most well educated professionals can manage it with only 2-3 non SEN kids in a calm well equipped home

The skill in teaching is doing it for 30 all at once with hugely varying levels of aptitude & prior attainment/exposure, dodgy behaviour, kids who are vulnerable/deprived, or have learning difficulties.

I understand ypur annoyance at others and need to prove ypur dd is academic but I think people are trying to explain that sometimes in somecases children can get the facts abd academically achieve but they have missed so much socially and emotionally that its hard to join the workplace. I do hope your dd is in the minority abd also has the resilience, social and emotional skills that school builds when its successful.

The primary curriculum in particular is easy to find information and resources online.

But i worry about the number of home educating parents who:

• struggled academically themselves and as a result had a negative experience of academic education
• fail to see the importance of educating a child to meet basic societal standards and access regular, reliable paid work as an adult (eg literacy, numeracy & writing skills particularly)

-fail to see how limited a young person's career options will be if their "education" is heavily weighted towards "hobby" type activities (sport, music, arts) that many children do in addition to academic learning

I am a retired Sixth Form English teacher and for over a decade used to teach GCSE resits for students who were doing a vocational course, but had failed English GCSE in secondary school. The absolutely best student I ever taught was a home-schooled lad who hadn't failed his GCSEs, but hadn't been entered for them before. He read broadsheet newspapers, listened to Radio 4, had a wide vocabulary and an inquisitive mind. He was much more mature than any of the other GCSE resit students and had a clear focus on how he wanted to continue his education. His mother, despite not having formal teaching qualifications, did a super job of educating him. I'm certain that there may be others who aren't as successful or whose home-educated children have gaps in their knowledge, but so what? There are also school-educated children who don't engage with the learning, despite the quality of the teachers. Your only concern (unless you are some sort of policy-maker in the DoE) is that your children are getting the best education you can provide for them.

The biggest issue that I see on here is that posters are trying to compare two very different metrics using the marking criteria.

Often those that HE don't want the type of education that is available in schools so trying to measure it in the same way is rediculous.

Their are some parents that are excellent at HE and there are some that are poor.

I have known some pupils that were HE'd and it was clear that their knowledge was much higher than it would have been in school, they were effitively there only to learn how to answer exams and get GCSEs.

When they are little, it's reading, writing, maths, loads of stories, history, geography, science, foreign language. Supplement with loads of outings, and groups - both social and more structured/academic (every county will have a home-ed network to tap into for this) and some regular sport and physical activity. Basically, exposing them to as many different things as much as humanly possible.
Then you build on it as their ability grows.

My children spanned three key stages and at least one would have been considered SpLD/SEND in a school setting; there's no way that I could have taught a "school-like" timetable simultaneously to them. We followed themes and arcs from history and science that they all did together but at different levels.

All of mine sat their first GCSE at around 13 (this is not unusual in home-ed because of the need to spread the load and/or the cost) and then we did have to switch a bit to following GCSE syllabi, obviously. However, we still did things that they don't cover in the NC (or are optional or only offered at A level), like politics, finance, world history, law, logic.
Often we would get together with other families to share the load.

We only ever did half a day of "academics" on any given day - which would have seemed lazy to an outsider who was used to a school timetable,

Alongside that, either as a family, a small group of friends or an organised outing, we supplemented this on a weekly basis with visits to loads of museums, education workshops (including the kinds that schools access), talks at places like the RI, author talks, lab work, factory tours, shows like Big Bang and the World Skills.

None of this is unusual, nor did it take a professional to devise. Much of it was common sense and general knowledge. But there also loads of resources online to get ideas from. I used to get my ideas mainly from books, though.

Your daughter started taking GCSEs at 12 but still only got 8? What was she doing all those other years?

Me and siblings were home schooled. Didn't do anywhere near a full day of formal learning ever. Parents not teachers. Achieved two 1sts and a 2:1 at uni with one achieving top grades of the cohort, plus a distinction at masters level. All successful, fully functioning adults. If I could afford not to work I would home school mine.

I'm a primary school teacher and also tutor pupils 1:1.
If your child is a quick learner and has a good learning attitude, then yes anybody reasonably well educated themselves can probably educate their own child.

Where it gets difficult is teaching pupils who don't find learning easy, struggle with retention and have a lot of gaps in their learning. The skill of a teacher is to spot that quickly and adapt their teaching methods. In a class of 30 this is essential because every child will learn differently. The benefit you have as a parent is you know your child better than anyone so you have that on your side.

It also takes skill to teach in a way that properly builds learning up step by step considering the child's needs.

I'll also add that the vast majority of the adult population simply wouldn't have the patience needed either.

So your sister, who earns her living from home educating (EHE?) families, yet breaches their trust, GDPR & confidence by ranting to you? How lovely.
I suspect those querying her methods have very possibly removed their children from school because they have identified that commonly used mainstream methods don’t work for their children & are trying to make helpful suggestions as to which approaches & strategies would work better for their children?
Those children that your sister is you know, being paid a great hourly rate at her convenience to teach?