Would your child choose to be home-educated?

[emkana]

I read an article about home ed today and I find the idea in many ways very appealing. Dd1 started school in September and I think she would be horrified if I suggested to her to take her out of school. She is totally in love with her teacher and she likes being with her friends all day.

But if things change and she becomes unhappy I would take her out, I think.

Mozart didn't go to school, he was taught at home and managed to create the most sublime music known to man

Michael Winner went to sodding ETON

Roisin, one of my earlier questions was, for how long do people home ed for. Like you say at primary level it is ok. If you are going to home ed only for a few years and then the children have to go to school, it seems strange.It may be harder for them to get used to school and why not just send them in the first place?

different things are appropriate at different ages too, surely

I have a friend who home educates her three girls and they have a mix of people going in to supplement what she gives them. They also do a lot of extra activities such as dance, drama and art and they design their own education pattern. They have friends from many of their activities and lots of different adults interacting with them.

I think all three of mine would benefit from home educating if I could afford it! They would also all like it. I love teaching so it would be good for me too. In the end it is a personal choice but also a financial one as you get no help at all from the state.

Mozart is not a good enough reason to sway me on this one. He had a natural talent. I wonder how he did in all other subjects?

I do apologise for being shirty, bsg, but your initial posts were really quite brusque and antagonistic.

If you want to find out more about HE there is an interesting article here . I think you are suffering from some of the common misconceptions about home education; hopefully this article esplains more clearly (and less tetchily) than I could.

the very idea that someone might have forced Mozart to run cross country or learn business studies is excatly my (exceptionally flippant)point
just because the formal education system is what we have doesn't mean it is beyond criticism or the gold standard

if you're not swyaed by Mozart, then what about the very compelling Michel Winner argument?

afaik home education is NOT just education by the parent and parent alone. Usually home educating parents get together to offer services to their children, and many buy in expertise - language teaching etc - so the children actually learn either one to one or in small groups - probably learning more effectively that as one in a class of 30+
They also have far more time for 'extra- curricular' activities such as brownies or joining a drama class or doing sports.
As for 'going to school is part of life' - well, it is a very recent part of life. It's hardly a biological necessity, like breathing. It doesn't have to be part of life. School doesn't suit all children - how could one pretty monolithic institution suit every small human being? I am sending my kids to school but if it turns out to be a disaster for ds, I will investigate other schools with home education as a real last resort (I need to work myself). But as for not learning - well my ds is 'home educated' at the moment (he is only four and doesn't start school until September) and he has learned to speak, to read, to appreciate music to a degree, to write, has started to learn French, count, add up, take away and divide, about animals (very interested in sea creatures atm), geography and the names of the planets and much else all without the benefit of a school or a professional teacher. I think we absolutely fetishise formal education, which is NOT the same as learning. My children learn every day.

Gosh yes, can you imagine, 'Oi Mozart, get off that piano and run three times round that field!' ROFL.

look you see I was just playing for time until Aloha came along and said it SO much better
we do fetishise formal education
I don't get it myself

no, Mozart, get off that harpsichord it's your turn to play the chime bar

I am not opposed to schools - lots of children love school and absolutely thrive there - but clearly, not all.

Sorry yes, of course, harpsichord or clavichord, not piano - duh.

Mind you, if we are speaking in contemporary terms, he would be on the piano (if his school even offered the chance to learn an instrument, which would be unlikely at primary level IME.

don't worry I just wanted an excuse to type harpsichord
yes school is a wonderful environment for many children - but not ALL children ALL the time.
and learning of course doesn't have to take place in a room in a row of desks with 30 other children, just bizarre that we should have got into that mindset. lots of children could befeit froma more low key, tailored education, for at least some of the time or part of their school career.
and you don;t have to be a teacher to teach.
I loved school and I think dd1 will too.

I home educated DS2 for 18 months whilst waiting for a suitable placement for him.

I agree that school is part of life but had to question at what cost?

Life is far more important than schooling and had I left my son in the LEA maintained school..well I wouldnt have had a son anymore.

Try explaining to a seven year old that he has to go to a place where he is tortured, tormented and teased by both pupils and staff each and every day.
A place where he is alien to everyone else and they to him.
Holding your son in your arms whilst he is begging you to die sucks big time.

Home educating was the best thing I ever did and even though Ds2 has a placement in a school that is wonderful, if things fall apart again I will have no hesitation in removing him and home edding again.

During the 18 months Ds2 was being educated by myself he learnt more than he did throughout the 3 years that he was being educated by "the professionals", who didnt knew, understand or didnt even want to comprehend the complex needs of my child.

Great article and loads of foodfor thought but how to afford it is still my quesiton?

Exactly - I need to work.

great post aloha (the one a bit further down about fetishising formal education!)

Not read whole thread, so sorry if I'm repeating anything, but I do think that many people misunderstand home ed and think that in order to do it they need to become an expert in all parts of the curriculum. The ethos of home ed is completely different to that of compulsory schooling i.e. subjects are not necessarily compartmentalised in the way they are in formal education. The emphasis is on the process more than the content, and the idea is that home educated children manage their own learning in a way that children in schools cannot do. Even though this may lead to a less broad range of subjects being learned, the idea is that home educated children acquire skills and confidence which enable them to learn what they need and want to, when they need and want to. Thus many home educated children can achieve GCSEs in a subject they haven't covered before in a really short space of time.

The trouble is, who can afford to do it?!

Yes, it is only a possibility for those who can afford to have one parent at home. It would be great to imagine this could change at some point.

The history of education in school is grounded in governmental political and social control and manipulation rather than in education as such. And it is that history which still exerts a poerful influence over the curriculum and organisation of school today, and which the ethos of home education kicks against.

The school environment was seen as a source of discipline and the opportunity to get the lower classes out of the malign influence of their parents. This is why in most countries (especially those where the school system was a product of Colonisation/Empire) there was always provision for "education otherwise" which allowed the rich and influential to educate at home with a tutor or back in an English public school.

I think it is an excellent point about the children learning without necessarily being taught - again they are non synonyms. If you can fire a child's passion and offer them the right resources, children can teach themselves a great deal. And being helped to learn to think, study and investigate is much more important than rote learning (I'm not suggesting here that schools only teach rote learning btw, but some posters seem to think that rote learning is the only way).