home ed as an alternative to private school

[thornberet]

I did some maths and worked out that, by the time my kids are year 7 and year 4, the cost of the local (v good) private school would eat the whole take home of a 60k salary. Thats before extras (music lessons, uniform, fuel to and from etc).

Now 60k doesn't seem like a bad salary for a homeschooling mum (assuming i'd be saving us 60k so could claim it as my 'salary'). I know that a bespoke education would academically equivalent or better than private school (I have a couple of degrees and would hire tutors too). Socially its a bit of a minefield but at least they won't be bullied or traumatised.

Are normal professional upper middle class people considering this? Why is this not a no-brainer?

Just send them to normal school, supplement with anything you think is lacking, keep your job AND the best part of the “£60k” you spend.

One thing I think home schooled dc miss out on is school fun. Everyone sharing a joke. The class entertainer. Events like carol services and plays. Doing these things with your friends you see every day. Of course you can do activities out of school and chat to those dc once a week but the school camaraderie is missing. It’s not able to be replicated. My DDs always enjoyed being with a variety of dc and laughing.

We're the kind of family you describe, with two Oxbridge degree-educated parents, one of whom is a teacher, the other of whom spent many years at home while the kids were little, and could have done so for longer if desired. We wouldn't have considered home ed for a nanosecond. Teaching your kids a full primary school curriculum is utterly different from teaching them to read and count. The social and general lifestyle skills they learn at primary school are hugely valuable, as are the relationships they develop with all the teachers, TAs etc they encounter. My kids are in private secondary now, but they went to a perfectly normal state primary, with all the usual issues (including a really quite challenging cohort in one case). Their primary years absolutely set them up for life. I wouldn't do it unless you have a very pressing reason as to why a school environment isn't right for your child.

I have a professional career and home edded my children from start to 16 - when they went to 6th forms.
The major problem is you are potentially giving up your career forever unless you can keep it going so that you can take it up again when home ed is done. I managed to but it and pension contributions have obviously taken a hit. We used some childcare and some tutors so I could work part time.

I think the other potential disadvantage comes at exam years. One of my three children didn’t really ‘get’ the importance of exams and so didn’t get as good GCSE results as he was capable of and might have done at school. He did ok though - enough to proceed to the course he wanted to do. I think it was maybe to do with not having the pressure of being tested from primary school level and that not all his friends were doing GCSEs.

Also I found the GCSE years pretty tough. It’s hard parenting a teenager but harder when you’re also nagging them to finish their syllabus and start revising.

That said, we got through it and I have a pretty good relationship with them all and they all say they don’t regret being home ed. One of my sons told me he thought bullying was a fictional thing until recently because he’d just not come across it in home ed.

They had a good amount of home ed friends and they used to see many of them frequently during each week as they’d go to the same social/sports home ed groups. When they were under about 13 we did a lot of being out and about - at home ed groups/sports/educational trips. After that we were in more - to get through GCSE curriculum.

We did sports days, nativity plays, concerts, group trips away and I don’t feel that there was much about the school experience that they really missed out on. They mixed with people from lots of different backgrounds - far more than if they’d been at private schools. They’ve had a lot of space/time to develop independence - my eldest did different trips abroad by himself to stay with home ed families before he was 16. They all seem to be fairly self- sufficient and sociable young adults.

You definitely don’t need to be a teacher. There are loads of resources online. We mostly used video/live online courses for GCSEs and I didn’t find it too difficult to get up to speed to support them with any subject.

I have always said that if I were to HE my children, it’d end in bloodshed. From both sides. And I normally have a pretty good relationship with my dc. Just not when I try to teach them (we’re still traumatised by 11+ practice)

£60k saved isn’t nearly enough to put myself through that.

Thank God my youngest dc was in Year 8 by lockdown.

How do you homeschooling whilst working?

For goodness sake send them to the local school. You can always send them privately at secondary.

You won’t get a ‘salary’ of £60k. You’ll also put a dent in your CV and you’ll lose pension contributions.

Teaching a child to read isn’t really the same as teaching them to pass common entrance which presumably they’d need to do at 13.

HE is a valid choice and worth thinking about. It's certainly not all roses and isn't nearly as easy as it's sometimes presented! There is a whole section and many threads on this site about it that are worth reading.

Suggesting that it's a valid alternative to private school specifically is, frankly, daft.

No bloody way. School is about more than the formal education part.

The poor poppets will be fine in state if you can't afford private. In fact that's really the whole point isn't it. If ALL "upper middle class" parents sent their kids to state the state provision would likely improve.

But I doubt that's what you want.

Because I want to teach my kids how to be kind, loving, individuals. Teach them how to have fun, prepare a meal, look after animals, and hopefully be all round great kids. I do NOT want to teach them how to grasp algebra, how to prepare for exams, how to work out the scientific formula for some shite I have no clue or interest in. They also wouldn't want me to be the one teaching them that. Lockdown proved to me that we all need our own space away from eachother, and for them to grow separately to me, not joined at the hip with their mother watching over them 24/7 as they age and become more independent. My fave part of the day is collecting them from school, and them retelling interesting and hilarious, stories about what happened. That alone is worth it's weight in golf, they thrive in school, and I know I couldn't replicate their experience there not with all the time and money in the world.

No, if I don't send them to school at all it is very unlikely they will be bullied or traumatised.
Are you hoping the'll go to uni? Have a job of their own when they've finished school? How will they cope when they haven't been socialised? Learning to deal with difficult people is an important life lesson.

Not all sunshine and rainbows obviously but super rewarding and bonding.
I find the idea of HE a bit controlling and stifling, SEN and serious mental health problems aside obviously.

Upper middle class to me means wealthy enough to be considering private school.
I suppose my dh and I are upper middle class then. We'd be way too busy doing our UMC jobs to HE breathe down our dc's neck. There are wonderful schools and teachers, let your dc experience the world in full, make friends, find her way around and learn to become independent. Cut those apron strings.

I have line managed a young colleague who had been HE. He did not find it easy to fit in with the team, never having been socialised. He struggled with the structure and professional expectations.

The young person was bright and lovely but unable to get on in a workplace that didn't revolve around their needs, wants and interests at all times.

Because I earn way more than 60k
Because I love my job and value the privilege of being able to go to work
Because I am not a teacher
Because my kids benefit from the social side of school
Because they get easy access to masses of extra curricular activities at school

My kids are both at private school. If we end up not being able to afford it then they will go to a local school and I will supplement this with tutors, extra curricular activities etc. I would only pull them out of school for medical reasons - in my opinion school is necessary to teach the relevant social skills to enable a child to thrive at university, in the workplace etc. Others will disagree and that's fine too!

Agree with @Pottingup . The social side is way easier than people imagine. In fact, one of my kids tried school in Y5 and returned to home ed largely because they felt school inhibited their social life. For some reason the teachers wanted them to be doing something other than playing and chatting in class 😂and of course mass instruction is inefficient compared with one-to-one, meaning schoolchildren have far less time to play.

I know many home ed parents whose rationale is the same as yours, OP. Of those who have looked into the possibility of home ed properly (not just making uninformed assumptions about what it would be like), the main sensible reasons for rejecting it are that the parent simply doesn’t want to as they prefer working, or the child is already in school and loves school, or that the parent isn’t prepared to accept the financial consequences, which are more far-reaching than you may have considered: long-term career prospects will be damaged, and as others have said you won’t be making pension contributions.

But yes, it’s a popular option. Some professionals go part-time and use a childminder to cover the hours when they’re working. Even if you prefer formal learning to entirely play-based learning, that takes relatively few hours with individual attention. So you don’t have to be educating your kids for 30 hours a week, and the issue becomes childcare.

You’ve clarified you’re talking about 5-13 but the behaviour problems you’re looking to avoid are generally secondary level (not all secondaries of course, and can happen in private as well as state).

What will you do at 13 OP? I’d be worried moving straight into secondary from HE would be a hard transition

Obviously not bullying but it’s important to learn how to deal with tricky characters and group dynamics. Yes one of mine has learned the hard way but valuable life lessons. Would worry a home added person would walk wide eyed into a work place viper pit.

“I have line managed a young colleague who had been HE. He did not find it easy to fit in with the team, never having been socialised. He struggled with the structure and professional expectations.” 😂 I had a young colleague who had been to school who had those problems.

I also know many young adults who were home educated who are the exact opposite of what you describe. My eldest had opportunities to do a range of paid and voluntary roles alongside adults, and started adulthood with better skills than most of their schooled peers.

I definitely know some young adults who were home educated and who lack those skills, including my younger daughter. A disproportionate number of home educated kids are neurodiverse or have other learning differences, that being the reason their parents removed them from school. That doesn’t mean home education made them like that!

My eldest is at Uni living away from home. Younger two at 6th form colleges. They really didn’t struggle to adapt. It depends how you want to home ed but I wanted mine to be as independent as possible so looked for lots of opportunities to develop that.
When my eldest went to 6th form he was really surprised at how little most of the pupils there had travelled from their local area by themselves.
As @Saracen says - home ed has a lot more potential time to socialise than school.
I think they are more self confident because they haven’t been bullied or conditioned to just conform to an institution. They can accept parameters where they have chosen to do something and they are part of that.
I think my experience at school held me back in the work place as I felt quite scared by authority and that’s not helpful in a professional job.
All of that said, home ed is a serious financial hit to a parent’s career (or sometimes both parents) and needs to be very carefully thought through.

I know some home-edders who love it and their DCs doing very well. But these are people who are eg writers/artists, travel loads so are really giving their DC a full experience.

I know plenty of properly posh people too like Lord and Lady type who are sending their DC to the local village state school - at least for the first few years. Usually they then move them to prep in like Year 4/5. The private school thing is no longer 4-18. Lots of in and out going on amongst the people I know. So if you want to do private school. 13-16 is when it does the most. Lots of people know this and work around that. If you have an excellent state comp or grammar locally though then state school all the way plus extras and home support is completely fine.

You're right it would be tough. I guess if it was going well I'd carry on home edding. If home ed social life isn't enough, or our relationship is suffering or something, I'd probably already know by 11-12 and be looking into school options (perhaps the private school for 2 years as a softer intro to school). I intend to more than keep up with the academic curriculum (not the exact content but certainly skill level) so that shouldn't be an issue..

I am a writer.. part of the reason to home ed is to spend time in Greece with their Grandma (all of us), and London with DH who lives there mostly during the week. Brick and mortar school ties us to 1 term time location.

Yes I like the model of homeschooling 5-14ish and then private 14-16 for the GCSEs, followed by the sixth form college which is very good.

Academically, I quite like the play-based, gentle intro to learning state primaries, but the pre-gcse years in most schools (age about 9-14) is a bit of a wasteland imo. There's just when kids are beginning to get really exited about the 'real' world and able to understand complex concepts. Social life becomes very important at that age though so perhaps home ed will be too lonely.

Because most people arent qualified to teach.

Respect to anyone that does it but children need to fit into society. Schools aren’t perfect but coming to the end of secondary school now looking back the being around their peers is so hugely important I just cannot imagine opting out of that unless there were SN reasons.

From about 12 onwards their friends are just so so important to them and their development learning to navigate group dynamics etc. Yes it can be challenging and tough but surely essential?