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?

Op the kids I know being homeschooled were bullied, moved school, then bullied again. Mercilessly bullied, three of them moved again then bullied again. Sometimes honestly people have no choice. They’re not thinking they’re better than teachers, they’re out for the best for their kids

Because they were ready to take that particular GCSE at 12? You can do multiple things at once.
It was only ‘gloaty’ because it was in response to an OP basically saying that home educating leads to failure. I can see why that PP gloated!

Actually I think if you are polite, reasonable and don't find too many things to be hills you'll die on, you can make your way through life with relatively little conflict. I agree that resources can help that but you can largely choose what to care about and stress over. My dd will have the skills to navigate adult life and I don't think anyone needs to endure a brutal boot camp (which school can be for some people) to do that.

You are right to think you don't know more than your child's teachers. I would hope they're familiar with the word 'utmost'.

Your sister's assumption that all children should be learning according to the national curriculum timeline is ridiculous. Many countries have a completely different approach. She should not be in that job if her attitude is negative from the outset, nor should she be speaking disparagingly of parents she is meant to support.

I'm surprised your sister isn't conscious that many home educated children had a difficult time in school and were failing there as well due to inadequate support for additional needs.

Home educating parents do not think they know how to teach a class of children. They know how to teach one child and they know that child inside out. Classroom teachers require different skills and home education should not try to replicate a classroom experience. There are a wealth of resources professionally developed by specialist educators online at heavily subsidised prices for home educated children. Many of these resources are used in a more formal context in schools. Surely your sister is not critical of this as well.

By the way, I pulled my child out of school at the age of 8. She was in the bottom sets for everything. School were insistent she had no additional needs. My child felt stupid. I sent her back at the age of ten having benefited from the interventions appropriate for her diagnoses, acquired through assessments I had paid for privately. It was extremely demanding to step in where school had failed her but I had no choice. She has now sat comfortably in the top sets for everything except languages for some years and is on track to achieve her lifelong dream of becoming a vet.

Tell your sister I didn't know more than her teachers. I knew differently. I knew my kid and I used what was available within the supportive and growing home education community.

Incidentally, no one ever checked up on my daughter after she was deregistered. Should I assume that is the fault of someone like your sister?

Aren’t you a goady fucker?!

Regardless they gave a gloaty post about something which isn't particularly impressive. Most schools aim for 9 or 10 and that's without starting at 12....

Why would it have devastated your life to be home educated? We home educate our child in large part because we want her to receive a rigorous education which she simply wouldn't be getting at the local state school.

Exactly the same as schools. Should we shut down schools where some children fail to get average grades at the end of year 6 / year 11? Hang on, wouldn't that be all state schools...

Home educating generally doesn’t mean trying to replicate what happens in schools though, so that’s irrelevant.

I’m very academic, I thrive with rules, structure and examination. I’m extremely competitive and driven by a want to be the best. I would not have got that by homeschooling. A built a lot of soft skills by finishing my state school work first in the class and then helping my peers with their work. I was at an extremely underperforming state school that I think would have only been bettered at a private school.

I was better educated/more knowledgeable/more clever than my parents before I was 10 years old. There’s no way they could have given me even half of what I needed in an education.

Even as an adult, I seek out classroom learning and exam based qualifications - I’m studying for a gcse now in my 30s for example.

Sounds like you would have enjoyed the sort of home education my daughter is getting 😉

Then why gloat about how many GCSEs your child has? If you aren't trying to replicate it shouldn't matter.

Home educating is very different from classroom teaching. Many, many families successfully educate their children at home and would not be able to educate a classroom of 30 teenagers. Many teachers who successfully educate classes of 30 teenagers would struggle to home educate their own children.

It’s really apples and oranges, totally different skill sets. People (adults and children alike!) thrive in different environments.

As a teacher I have a lot of respect for families who identify that school doesn’t work for their child and move heaven and earth to find an alternative that does. It’s an extremely difficult undertaking that takes immense dedication. Because some families do it poorly absolutely does not mean it should be banned!

Most home educators who do GCSEs start early so as to spread the load and the cost.
Home education is deemed to be in the independent sector (by virtue of not having taken up the state-funded option of state school).
Therefore the family has to fund that (and GCSEs are usually over £100 per subject) unless they live in one of the small minority of areas where the LA will fund some GCSEs.

It would be great if schooled children passed most of their GCSEs as a starting point then. Also, the moment the government insist on home ed kids taking the standard 9 GCSEs (unnecessary), then they will incur the costs. At this time, home ed families pay for them at a considerable cost.

If you can't afford the exams you have to ask yourself if you should really be homeschooling? Surely the first requirement is being able to financially provide for all the resources the child needs to gain an education.

Fully appreciate many families don't have the choice (SEN, school refusers etc).
However, in the person I responded to case their child was happy to go to school as they later did for A levels.

I appreciate some home schoolers will be offended by that view. To me it's holding your own child back if you've taken them out of a free school with all the opportunities that come with it and instead making them take GCSEs over 5 years just to save you money.

It doesn't save money to spread them. The same amount of money is being spent overall but for some families, it's easier to spend £300 per year over 4 years rather than £1200 in one year.
Yes, families could start saving when their DC is 12 instead and then spend it all at 16 but either way, they would have still afforded the exams and spent the same amount of money.

Families might also want to spread the load across multiple years for various other reasons.

There's not really any particular requirement to sit GCSEs all in one go.
Schools have to do it because of timetabling and because now only the first attempt counts for league tables, so they are further disincentivised from entering pupils early for GCSEs - whereas previous to that change quite a few schools used to enter pupils early.
Not even Oxbridge are bothered about GCSEs being done all at once, it's A levels that they want to see taken in one go or within a certain timeframe.

Therefore, why wouldn't any family who had the choice also take the opportunity to time GCSEs to what suits them best for whatever reason.

That's all your opinion and that's fine. Like you say anyone with a brain will know they could save the money in earlier years and pay for the GCSEs at once later on. Therefore, the original comment made to say home school families spread out exams so it costs less doesn't add up,

Its really not of interest to me and the original gloaty person has deleted their post now anyway so I won't be replying after this as it feels we are going round in circles talking about nothing.

I literally said "Most home educators who do GCSEs start early so as to spread the load and the cost."

Nowhere in that sentence (or elsewhere in my post) does it say anything about it costing less or even implying that it costs less to sit them early.

Perhaps you are referring to a comment made by soneone else - I can't recall where anyone has said it costs less to take them early but I haven't re-read the entire thread to check, so apologies if that's the case.

Not sure what part you think is my opinion - ppossibly requirement to sit GCSEs all together? Although I have yet to come across such a requirement - and it was sonething I did look into quite a bit before committing to doing things the way we did.)

In any case, what I said about schools/league tables and also Oxbridge is true and can be checked by anyone who might be interested.

There's also 14-16 provisions offered by some colleges that enable kids to access GCSEs while being home educated for free.

'Most home educators who do GCSEs start early so as to spread the load and the cost'

'It doesn't save money to spread them.'

I just think you are arguing with yourself at this point? You told me that home educators do it to spread costs. Then started arguing about whether that's the same thing as saving money.

I agreed with you it's the same cost overall. So why not save the money in a bank account? It doesn't make sense to start at 12 to 'spread costs'. We both agree but you said it was the reason not me.

I can't keep talking about the same thing it's a waste of time.

I think you want to feel validated that your decision to home school is the right one. I don't know anything about you or your child(ren) so I can't give you that validation.

What I do know is that if you are home schooling your kids you probably shouldn't be on mumsnet arguing with strangers in the middle of the day. You should be providing an education.

Oh dear. There's nothing contradictory about the two sentences you've quoted.

I offered two possible reasons as to why home educators (including the PP referred to as "gloaty") opt to spread their GCSEs out, neither of which were to do with saving money.

You then began a strange ramble late last night about how people should not home educate if they can't afford the exams, even though (as you've subsequently agreed) spreading them has no overall cost impact.

As to why people don't just save from age 12 instead, did you miss my first point about there being other reasons, aside from anything financial, as to why home educators (and schools used to, for that matter) opt to spread GCSEs.

Anyway, I am not home educating any more (although even if I was, breaks are allowed!) Mine have all passed their GCSEs and their A Levels and are now either at a good uni or got a good jobs.

Thanks for your faux concern, though.

And no, I don't need my choices on home education validated by you.
I'm really not sure why you would project your thoughts about the need for validation onto a random stranger on the internet.

Has it crossed your mind that correlation is not equal to causation? That maybe these children are "behind" because of characteristics that make them more likely to be home educated?

FWIW my son got 8 x grade 9 and 1 x grade 8 at GCSE whilst being home educated (then went onto a highly competitive sixth form and got 3 x A*).

But that's kind of missing the point. You don't know what the counterfactual is if these kids were in school. Are you telling me that all children in school acheive their potential?