to tell teacher friends to stop with the negativity over our decision to home educate?

[teaandaflorentineplease]

We’ve made the decision to home educate our child. Fulltime school isn’t right for our family, and I genuinely believe that play based, informal learning suits early childhood far better than sitting at desks from age five. I’d have been open to flexi-schooling if our local school allowed it, but they don’t so we’ve chosen home education.

What’s surprised me is the strength of the negative reaction from our teacher friends. These are people who regularly describe the state of education as dire. Dreadful behaviour, no funding, days spent on crowd control rather than actual teaching, children falling through the cracks, classrooms falling apart, pressure to hit their academies’ targets rather than do what’s best for the kids, they can’t even afford gluesticks. This insight into education from a teacher’s perspective has also informed my decision to home ed.

However when I said I was going to home educate, suddenly schools are wonderful and I’m making a terrible mistake. It started a few weeks ago when a teacher friend mentioned our children will be in the same class and since then the comments about how awful home ed is have kept coming. I’ve been shrugging it off to avoid an argument, but I’m getting increasingly frustrated. I’ve spent years validating how broken the system is, for both teachers and children, and yet the moment I choose to opt out of it, it becomes the only way to educate a child.

For context, my husband and I are both well-educated and take our child’s learning seriously. I feel comfortable teaching the early foundations like reading, writing and maths, and we plan to build projects around history, geography, science and whatever else our child shows an interest in. Beyond that, we haven’t planned anything because our child is still one. As we go through it, we’ll learn about what works for our family, and we’ll have seen how other home ed families approach things as children get older. We haven’t ruled out school further down the line either; it might turn out to be the right fit at some stage.

I’m not looking to convince anyone or get into a debate about home ed vs school. We’ve made our decision and we’re comfortable with it. I just find the contradiction so confusing and a bit hurtful. These are people who in some cases we’ve know for years, know how seriously we take our child’s wellbeing, and have spent years telling us the system is broken. I want to say firmly we’ve made a decision and we don’t want to hear anything else about it, but I also don’t want to lose long standing friends over it.

Some of my favourite memories of life come from primary school days. I can’t imagine not having silly memories of childhood best friends, school plays, school fetes, history projects and rounders in summer.

Argh, the reasons are many and complicated, and hard to summarise without telling my whole life story (which I'm not keen to do!). The main reason however was the experience of social isolation. I didn't have friends, and I didn't learn how to make friends, so when I left home and tried to form friendships, it was difficult. It's had a lifelong effect on my mental health. I also think it's healthy for children to have a variety of different adult role models as they are growing up, apart from just their parents.

Of course home educated children can make friends, but in my experience, if you don't go to school, you don't have that ready made peer group. You miss out on so much. I stuck out like a sore thumb for years. I was so 'different', I would always end up having to explain to everyone I met in the first few minutes that I was home educated, because I was so socially awkward. The other thing is, I really wanted to go to school. I thought it sounded great. My parents said no. They were convinced that socialisation was a myth and that I needed to be protected from the horrors of formal education.

I have a lot of sympathy for parents who decide to home educate because their DC aren't flourishing in school (whether because of bullying or SEND or neurodivergence or any other reason). I don't understand, however, why parents decide to home educate their DC from the get go, without even seeing how their DC cope in school. To me, those parents are not doing it for the children's sake. They're doing it primarily for their own sake, as part of some philosophical agenda.

For families who do decide to home educate, I feel very strongly that these families should be monitored, not just for academic reasons but for safeguarding reasons. I've seen case after case of extreme child abuse where one element of the story is that the children are home educated, or have been pulled out of school. If home educating families are doing a decent job, then they have nothing to fear from regular checks; and if children are being let down, then regular checks could save their lives.

Every family is different, and every home-educating family is different, so I wouldn't issue a blanket ban on home education. But if you are contemplating home educating your one-year-old, well no, I'm not very sympathetic, given my own personal history.

It has been very rewarding for me as a parent to see my DC grow up having sleepovers and friendship groups and other very ordinary experiences I never had as a child.

I personally know 4 people who home schooled - 2 families; dc have autism and it was absolutely right for them and both are now 20 and 19 and working, and generally awesome human beings. 1 family; dc was totally failed by his poor excuse for a mother who was basically trying to force ex husband to pay for private school but he refused. She home schooled despite having no qualifications to her name. He lives off benefits. Other family, mum was a primary teacher and dc are doing well but my god they are smug and superior, horrified that I as a mother work (my poor dc).

people will always judge parenting so as long as you are happy with your decisions and can stand by them then go for it.

There’s a FB group called Flexischooling Families UK that has a map iirc of all the schools they know of that accept flexischooling. It might be worth joining that and having a look in case any of your local schools are on it. That way you could get the benefits of school while also having some time to HE and maybe avoid having to be binary about it.

It works so well for us, we love our Fridays to pursue out of school learning opportunities but DD1 still gets all the benefits of attending school Monday-Thursday. Our LA has embraced it in the last few years and I think it’s becoming more popular. Basically our LA policy is to default say yes unless there are safeguarding risks, child on child protection register, etc. It was a very easy process for us. We are in Scotland but there seems to be a up and coming flexischooling movement in England too.

Steiner school?

theturtleswims - I could have written this myself, I totally relate to your experience of mainstream.

Our local primary school is one form entry with 28 ish kids per class, per year. This means the children have the same couple of dozen children to mix with from reception to year six (with the exception of one
or two leaving and more coming to take their place). How socially limiting is that?

My daughter had a terrible time there and was academically basic. She was so bullied she started having panic attacks - aged ten. Total
shambles on both a social and educational level.

We removed her in year 5, started home ed and couldn’t believe what we had been missing.

The home ed community is warm, friendly and welcoming. We mix with people from all walks of life - all socio-economic backgrounds, colours and creeds. We have met the most amazing people. The children of different ages mix, rather than a select amount thrown together by chance from the same area and of a certain age, as happens in school.

Surely mixing with different people of various ages is better preparation for the real world than how samey, limited and restricted school is?

My child has come on in leaps and bounds this year. I have sent her to tutors, group based learning, hands on learning (farm school), social (play based) meet ups for home ed kids, as well as science workshops, art classes etc.

She has done masses of sports: swimming, rowing, gymnastics, climbing, hiking etc and made more friends this year than in the previous decade put together. She is so much more confident and passionate about her own education. I am so glad I followed my instinct on this and took her away from mainstreman.

All the people harping on about you not being able to teach your child everything…what a load of nonsense because if I recall, primary schools have one teacher for the entire year and they are also unable to know everything!

I went to one of the best universities in the country. I probably have a higher IQ than most of the primary teachers in our local school. Yet, I do not know everything - alas. Which is why the home Ed community branches out with group learning. We don’t lock our kids in one room and stand there reciting material for them to memorise 🤣

Also, unless you’re totally simple I think a mother is more than capable of teaching a solitary pre schooler the basics. In fact, I think they’d learn faster and then have more time to play and follow other learning interests.

I certainly found my tribe with the home ed community and I suggest you do you and ignore your ignorant friends. It’s usually a case of ‘thou dost protest too much‘ when people get overly opinionated on your
life - seems you’ve hit a nerve and they’ve no choice but to shout at how wrong you are as they stand on their sinking ship!

Best of luck with your journey and well
done for holding your own against the anti home ed brigade of mumsnet x

Very interesting insight, thank you for sharing and sorry that your home schooling experience was a negative one. I must say when I look back on my school days I don’t really remember the education more the friends I had so I can totally see your point.
I am considering home educating my eldest not because I want to, or can even afford to , but because he is autistic and at age 8 the bullying is starting to creep in. He doesn’t have any friends at school so he certainly wouldn’t miss the social side. Your post has put me at ease in that respect.
i also totally agree that home educated children should be monitored for safe guarding reasons, however, i guess that so many children are being home educated now and they simply wouldn’t have the resources to monitor all of them.

If you're well enough off not to work, then go for it. The quiet, hardworking child in a class wastes so much time while the teacher deals with inappropriate behaviour from others. I would definitely keep my children at home if they were school age now. There are so many resources online, and it's easy to find local clubs and activities where your child can socialise. You can polish off the school work in the morning and go out to enjoy nature, museums etc. in the afternoon.

I think it's so worrying that you aren't more concerned about this. I hope your child doesn't suffer.

But as a few people have said, it's not necessarily the Home Ed people are against, it's the judgy, superior and holier than thou attitude that Home Ed parents seem to have against anyone who isn't. Firstly you label a Parent who feels they wouldn't have the ability to Home Ed as "simple" and you declare yourself far more educated and capable than any Primary School Teacher because you went to an amazing University. That just sounds rather arrogant sorry. And as a school parent, it's not for you to tell me I'm standing on a "sinking ship" again just arrogance, and from personal experience, the Home Ed Community is not always the warm fluffy friendly experience you proclaim it to be, and a lot of that is evident in your comment as well. Just because someone disagrees with you doesn't mean you've hit a nerve. Home Ed is a great path and the right one for many, but it's being alongside people like you that would put me off, sorry.

I can't help but wonder when it comes to "Child lead" how many of these Child lead Home Ed Parents would truly hand in heart send their Child to School if their Child asked to go?

I am not a fan of home schooling for a variety of reasons, but at the end of the day, it's legal to do so, and it's your decision. I personally might say something about it once to a potential homeschooler, but then I would leave it. It's a matter of personal choice, and only you know your kids well enough to make that decision.

There's another thread here about a woman wanting to ban a child from play dates with her kid, because her mum pushes a (higher) education tax! My flabber was gasted. I have a good friend who sent their kids to grammar schools (of which I am a fervent opponent) but I am not going to push this issue, ever (unless asked - which is highly unlikely).

When was the last time you were in a school?

Firstly you label a Parent who feels they wouldn't have the ability to Home Ed as "simple" and you declare yourself far more educated and capable than any Primary School Teacher because you went to an amazing University.

This bit made me laugh. My STEM degree and PhD are both from Oxbridge, and I am a primary teacher.

The art of teaching primary age is not about imparting your wonderful knowledge, or leaning down from your vast intelligence to inspire a child. It’s what to do when a child doesn’t understand; isn’t necessarily ‘naturally enthusiastic’; has a barrier to learning ; finds something that you find really obvious hard; needs to learn a skill or rather than acquire facts. Breaking down ‘how to spell’, ‘how to throw a ball with accuracy and speed’; ‘how to tell the time’; ‘what is exchange in the context of written arithmetical procedures’ - that’s teaching.

The fact I can do 3 of the tasks well and one of them badly myself is neither here nor there - can I teach them? Can I teach them to a child who is dyslexic or dyspraxic or simply unwilling? Can I find enough different and engaging ways to practice each micro skill within the task to ensure fluency and automaticity, onto which further skills can be built? Can I identify the precise point of difficulty and devise ways to overcome it?

Absolutely nothing to do with my degree. Everything to do with teaching.

I think a lot of ambitious, middle-class parents send their children to school even though they understand that a lot of schools aren’t brilliant, nor are they what they’d wish for their dc in a perfect world.

From my own observations, this sort of family I’ve just described send their children off to school not really at all for the learning and education, but tor the socialisation, the vivid memories made, the laughs, the (often) good and positive relationships formed with the better teachers. They send their dc for the experience, in other words. The seven child-free hours a day are also welcomed.

Such families then do a lot of home educating around the child’s attendance at school, a little bit in evenings and weekends. It’s easy to ask the school for the programme of study, week to week, so parents know which topics are being covered. The parents then take a keen interest and also cover these (or similar, age-appropriate) topics with their children when the children are not at school.

It’s not as though home educating and attending school are mutually exclusive. It doesn’t have to be strictly one or the other, it can be both at once. It’s certainly what I’d do if I had primary-age children.

Sending your dc to school does not mean you are abdicating all interest and responsibility for their attainment, progress and development. You wouldn’t be handing all this over to schools, you would still educate and play and learn at home.

it’s when parents take no interest and play no part whatsoever, simply ‘because the kids go to school’, that problems arise.

But anyhow, you’ve made your decision so that’s that. I hope it’s all you expect it will be.

Everyone is allowed an opinion. We home educate and not one but 2 in the last six months teachers have just taken there own kids out of the local school to home educate because one said one to one is nearly impossible and the other said they spend more time wandering from class to class, having days off because school is closed for this and that etc than being taught...our kids love it and there's a few in our town doing it now

It’s a bit like taking your car to the mechanic after it breaks down and then ignoring their opinion on how you get it back on the road.
this is their job knowing what works. Ignore at your peril.

This tells you all I need to know about schools - that they've go a lot worse since I left. Look for 'ICT with Mr P'. He is very honest about the current situation. The last post of his I saw was about 'the quiet ones' who are missing out.

But on the other side, as someone planning to HE I’ve had a huge amount of judgy, superior comments from those whose children are in school on this thread. I’ve had my intelligence, my parenting ability, and my motivations shredded on this thread, my mental health questioned and so many assumptions from people who don’t know me, my family, my local education provisions, solely because I’ve said I want to HE. I’ve not criticised schools or those who use them. But the kind of reaction I’ve had is what drives these kinds of them vs us as much as anyone in HE. I don’t really care because I didn’t come here looking for a HE vs school debate but I got one anyway and not because of home educators.

Home school really should be used only as a last resort. To be fair, your teacher friends know a lot more about education. Going to school isn't just about learning, it's about socialising. Some children find socialising difficult and end of having to be home schooled. However, it's never desirable.

To be honest, I did not home-educate solely to my child/ren's interests. Mainly because, as you say, you don't actually know if they'll be interested in something if they are unaware of it (whatever "it" might be).
I concentrated on exposing my children to as nuch as humanly possible, obviously English, maths, science, history, geography but also music, art, engineering, logic, politics, astronomy, etc...

(With that said, autonomous home education can work very well, again, if the parent is motivated enough to follow all avenues of enquiry and take the opportunity to introduce tangential topics as the discussion progresses. It is through that tangential process, that child-led home educators can ensure their children are exposed to things they wouldn't have thought of themselves.)

Not to single you out, but the reason I replied is because there is a general misconception that these things are impossible outside a school setting and home educated children are denied these opportunities. They aren't. But it must be acknowledged that they take a lot of effort on the part of the parents to either organise a group themselves or seek out suitable opportunities that others are organising - although there are loads of Facebook groups for this exact purpose.

On the specifics of booking author (and similar) talks - it honestly isn't any more difficult for a parent than a school to book such things. The only thing the author/provider is interested in is are there sufficient numbers and can you pay their fee/expenses. The biggest author one that I organised was attended by about 90 home-ed children, split into 3 key-stage age groups and ran across an entire day. We also got a discount on their books and I think the author made a fair bit of money from those book sales, too.
A friend organised science talks that were attended by similar numbers.

For large, organised day trips to museums, that may include one or more workshops, 30-150 home ed children may be in attendance.
When we were home-ed, it was not unknown for a large group of home-educated children to fill two or three workshops concurrently on the same basis as a school booking.

One home ed group was also one of the test groups for (somewhat ironically) a (then) new educational workshop aimed at schools at a large London museum. We got the workshop for free and in return, we stayed an extra hour giving structured feedback. That wasn't due to having any particular connection - it was due to asking nicely what they had on offer and generally being interested in their offering and accommodating to whatever special conditions they had.

I obviously cannot speak for all home educators but personally, I was never ignored by a museum or a provider possibly because home educators' money is exactly the same as schools' money. Authors etc can be reached via their website, their publisher or agent and all of this information can usually be found on the internet.

What did you want OP?

When my child was 1, some local friends talked about how lovely it was that our children would go to school together. I knew they wouldn’t because I knew we’d probably be at an independent school. I learnt not to say that because I sounded like a wanker.

I think you maybe sounded a bit of a twit when you spoke to your friends. Best to keep this sort of future plan to yourself maybe as so many people will think it doesn’t make much sense (not because they don’t agree with HE but because you have a baby!).

FWIW what I do think is crazy is not prioritising your time with your child now. While they are tiny and need you so much. But there we are.

If my child asked to go to school we’d investigate it. I’d wonder what was causing the desire to go to school. Is it a passing whim, or something which could be fixed in their home education, or is in fact school now the most appropriate setting? I’d act accordingly based on the answer. But I’d make a decision based on a mixture of their wishes and their best interests.

I wonder what would happen if a school educated child said they wanted to be home educated rather than attend school.

I agree. I wouldn't home educate before your child has tried school. They might love it.

@teaandaflorentineplease if a child at school asked to be home educated I think that a lot of parents would have to say no on the grounds of cost more than anything else. It is a luxury to be able to afford to home educate, and not something that’s realistic for most people.

I certainly would explore all those same motivators that you describe before I’d enter into considering whether it was financially possible and the best situation for everyone, including us as the parents.