To wonder how people who homeschool acquire the knowledge to do so?

[Homeschooll]

Just as the title really. I don’t have strong feelings on homeschooling, I don’t think it would be my choice mainly as I have little patience and I don’t feel I know enough about science or maths.

If you do it how do you know what you’re doing is right? What about the pastoral side? How do you make sure there’s a routine?

Just interested really. I’ve found more and more people are doing it.

Fines for non attendance of what? Their kitchen? 😊

Going on holiday during term time is a great highlight. Not the reason we home educate, but it’s definitely a perk 🙂

And anyone can enter their kids for exams, you just have to find a private exam centre usually.

They wont learn about sexuality properly at home.

@Homeschooll same way i teach myself different skills, you have youtube, wikipedia, books, etc

You don't have to read much about school on MN to realise that other parents than us can see a big difference between the school our eldest two children went to and our youngest's schooling. Our eldest children have both graduated from university now.

As I said we are happy with our decision to leave the English schools. Both the child as a pupil and her father as an employee.

I have seen state school pupils not leaving their rooms because of school refusal and very little has been done for them. There is not necessarily that much difference.

for the group that I know, one of the mums didn’t really have a subject she was confident enough to teach, so she organises ‘field day Fridays’ which I am very jealous of for my kids. So every single Friday they go on a field trip somewhere educational - eg the zoo. They pick an animal, She finds out loads of facts about it, the art ‘teacher’ helps them draw it etc. Or another Friday she’ll print off ten maps and they have to find their way somewhere.
homeschooling done well for primary is quite a winner. I imagine it gets harder for secondary.

You know nothing about that do you?

I'd like to know where people get the skill to homeschool effectively rather than the knowledge. The primary curriculum can be easy to grasp for an adult, and i could pretty much always have given my DC the correct answers to their maths homework but what I struggled with was explaining a different way to work it out themselves if they struggled, or re-explaining the teacher's instructions in a slightly different way. Knowing when a child has definitely understood a maths concept rather than just copying what the adult has told them can be tricky to work out.

I had little choice, DD was 13 and about to be excluded from a second school following a managed move. Her stress levels (and mine in truth) were making life unbearable (she had a late diagnosis at 11 of ADHD) and the support to keep her in mainstream was non existent. I took her out of the system mainly for a reset break, and we had a tutor for 2 mornings a week for English/History. We also used a local Kip McGrath centre for Maths. I joined the NT, we went to libraries, museums, art galleries. I did my utter best whilst at times feeling I'd done something really bad in a past life.

Luckily we had great support from the local Ed dept, and DD was given a year 11 course run by a local college where she had 3 teachers along with a small group of similar pupils and they were hot housed through some GCSE's. She nearly lost her place there on 2 occasions but thankfully got through to the end.

I imagine there are as many different ways of home schooling , as there are different types of more formal schooling.

There’s online school, forest school, local groups, individual and small group tuition, social groups and tutoring. Probably lots more too. It depends on motivation, from the child and the parent. It depends on structure. It depends on ability, willingness to learn and participate and work independently.

I think some people think it will be an easy option, some do it on a whim, some think very carefully and plan extensively and some, unfortunately, do very little.

There’s no doubt it works well for some children and parents, but it’s worrying that some are not giving their children what they need.

There are some fantastic online resources available for parents. I home educate my daughter, and she is truly thriving.

With 1-to-1 learning, there are no interruptions, no waiting for others, and no need to slow down or hold back—she can learn at her own pace.

It wasn’t something I originally planned, but we reached a point where it felt like the only option. So I stepped up, as any parent would for their child.

My friend, who is a teacher and still works part time, uses tutors to homeschool her DC’s. Luckily they are twins so learning the same age relevant topics

I find lots of parents follow the curriculum in maths & English to the best of their ability- this definitely varies! The children often get the facts but really lack the breadth & depth of school- so lots of difficultly following rules/boundaries/figures of authority/social situations- often doesn't show until late secondary age.

Several friends home school. They don't do it themselves. They send them to forest school and clubs etc. They're at work earning the money to homeschool, bonkers huh

Home education covers a vast spectrum of approaches so hard to generalise.

I know two families who do it: in the case I know best the dad is a former research scientist who is now a freelance scientific writer who teaches maths and science himself, has a tutor for English and history and the kids do drama and music through clubs and he works after hours. It seems to work pretty well in their case although he must be knackered.

Families who do it properly (as opposed to the ones who leave their kids to doss about on Minecraft) are very committed and organised.

The only people I know who do it are parents of teenage girls who fell apart during yr7 due to undiagnosed SEN. They use tutors for English & Maths and online school for other GCSE subjects. Both girls are thriving, one has already secured a place at agricultural college post 16, the other wants to do an apprenticeship and train to be a blacksmith. They are lovely, capable, practical girls who were totally unsuited to the school system unfortunately.

Home schooling isn't structured. You don't have to sit at a table doing maths/ English etc all day.. Home schooling can be anywhere.. visiting museums and libraries etc.. going to Home education meetings.. being out and about in nature. Visiting wild life parks/ castles .. places like Eureka ..
On line learning too..
You don't have to have any qualifications.. l Home schooled my kids .. they are now 41 and 33.. my four Grandkids were/ are home schooled.. one has been to uni and two in college.
My two gained GCSE'S and A levels.. ( l only had eight O levels and two A levels ).

For your questions:

1. no they don’t
2. if they want to go to university they take nationally accredited exams (A levels, Highers) just like everyone else

I think some people think it will be an easy option, some do it on a whim, some think very carefully and plan extensively and some, unfortunately, do very little

This is right and the problem is that there is so little oversight that the ones where the kids do very little often fall through the cracks.

At its best HE is probably the best education a child can have. A committed parent can provide a hugely life enhancing education in a totally tailored way. And certainly school doesn’t meet the needs of many kids, which no one is really facing up to.

But the fact that you can off roll children at the stroke of an email without any kind of vetting or monitoring is something I think we will come to regret in future generations.

I would not like it for my DC but I have noticed there is a lot about mark schemes at school rather than creating a love of learning and critical thinking skills which is very sad.

I would be horrendous at homeschooling and it would ruin my relationship with my children because I'm a real tiger mother.

Also PE is really important, both my children love it, it's their favourite lesson and I think exercise really helps focus the mind and promotes concentration in more academic subjects.

Apparently my father was homecschooled by my gran for a year because they were travelling and when he returned to school he skipped a year because he was so far ahead.

And why do you assume home educated children don't do p.e?!

Lots of options! Online courses, text books, work books, tutors, online tutorials, trial and error etc. They don’t have to follow a typical curriculum and can literally follow their interests so tend to do quite well because of this!
Mine are home educated and one will be off to uni soon with way more UCAS points than needed.

I think if you’re reasonably well educated yourself then you can learn what your child needs to learn and support them to learn what they need to. Plus there are so so many resources and curriculums online. And then pay for extra tuition if you want to. There are also some places like museums, libraries , leisure centres that offer activities/ discounts for HE families.

I think we are obsessed in the UK with kids doing exams / being tested and gaining certain qualifications that it can be difficult for us to see that education (and home education) can be so much broader than your standard school subjects. I haven’t done HE but I do have a certain appreciation for it, or at least for alternative forms of education and would love to get away from this one size fits all system we have here.

The ones I know just print a few worksheets off Twinkl. Just playing pretend at being a teacher really.

am quite alarmed at the posters here who are implying the primary curriculum is straightforward to manage at home with no training; it is actually hugely complex!
If you take maths for instance, the curriculum is minutely broken down into little incremental steps; if even one of those is missed, it can result in yawning great misconceptions later into KS3. You really need to be trained and engaged in regular CPD to make sure you are able to spot gaps and plug them effectively.
mum sure there are some kids who learn brilliantly at home but I do fear for what will come out in the wash years down the line as all the children who have been taught things badly in good faith start to realise.