Best place to homeschool

[avillage]

name changed as this can be very identifying.

My DD currently goes to a private school as the local public schools were not meeting her needs. Not here to debate on the pros and cons of this choice as it was the best choice for us at that time and she is much happier in her current school. Now due to being hit by the raise in fees due to inflation and VAT we are debating whether to keep her there or homeschool her. We cannot send to any of the public schools as honestly they are not that good.

Now we have three choices
1- Keep her in the private school. She is happy there and has friends. It's one of the best schools. Issue is that it is not worth the price now and we have been sacrificing a lot to give her a good education.

2- Homeschool her in London where we live. We will be living in our own place. She will still have access to her network of friends and can meet them up after school. We are more independent here as transport links are very good and we can go any where. I will give up my work initially or reduce the hours to accommodate homeschooling her

3- Take her to my inlaws. her grandmother was a teacher and can teach her. Her grandfather can drive and take her to groups. I can carry on working as I wfh. Issue is that I can't drive and we will have to be dependant on them. We will not have our space. It is a small town and I think has a good homeschooling community but still, I will not be able to get much involved as they will probably take over the whole thing. I will also be isolated because I will not be going out, know no one here and have lived in London for the past 15 years, know my way around London more than here. I do not like the area that much either tbh. DD might get good education, butI will hate it. I have lived on my own for the past 15 years and whenever we have come to visit for a few weeks, we are all done with each other by the end of it. I am not that keen on this idea any more but it is an option we are considering at the moment. if it's worth anything, the place is Rochdale.

What would you recommend?

1- homeschool or keep her in private school.
2- if homeschool, then where would the best place be?

I believe school is the best place for the majority of children, although I don't disapprove of home education I think it is difficult to do well especially as they get older and while for some children it is absolutely the best or even only positive choice, if she had no issues with school I would leave her there or try state school. You can always go into home education at a later date if you think it is necessary or revert to private if you can afford it. Good luck!

Not that we know of. She is exceptionally smart albiet a bit shy. We suspect mild autism but we haven't seen it impacting her as we keep a very close eye on it. At school she was being left to her own devices or being asked to help kids who were struggling. She was bored and not being challenged educationally. She didn't particularly enjoying teaching others as well as she would get frustrated and do it herself and then would be told off for not being patient. You need to keep in mind that her cohort was the one that was impacted the worst due to covid and 80% of the class was struggling. Those who were ahead were way ahead. I was a parent governor at her school. I saw the results. There was only 1 kid who was exceeding the standards...it was her. Rest were meeting or working towards. So there was a huge gap in attainment. And this was after two years of the teachers putting all their efforts. There were only three kids in her class who could read chapter books and that was in year 3. She likes that at her school all the kids are like her and they can discuss shared interests.

Move within London. London secondaries are on the whole pretty good, with outcomes that match private schools. HE, if it means you giving up work, or moving to Rochdale to HE are frankly ridiculous ideas. Use the money you save on private fees/you remaining in work on extra curricular, phenomenal holidays, tutoring if she is weak in one or two areas. Look to the long term.

2 is not an option if you want her to keep her existing friend circle. Private school parents generally don’t encourage friendships with kids who’ve left unless they go to another private school as lifestyles are so different - especially in their teens when kids can be taken advantage of.

So your options are basically keep her in a school she loves and weather the storm with vat or homeschool her and try to get her to make new friends through extracurricular activities.

Whereabouts in London are you? I find it really hard to believe there are no decent schools at all within reach. An in year admission in year 5/6 will be much more straightforward than getting into an oversubscribed school at 4. Where I live, with huge pockets of deprivation, all the local schools are decent and they have a genuine spread of abilities. It sounds like you had a school issue, rather than an entire school sector issue. There isn't a single school I can think of in our borough where just one child would be exceeding expectations. In our primary and others close by it's more than a third of kids, minimum, in each subject.

If it's the cost of the fees that is the reason for withdrawing your daughter from her current school what impact will you reducing your working hours or giving up work have on your family finances? Home schooling will come at a cost especially if you are going to join groups. Is there no way of increasing your income to cover school fees?

So it's only for one school year, year 6?

I'd keep her in her current school unless it's completely unaffordable, and look at state secondary, or possible scholarships if she's clever.

Neither of your homeschool options sound in her interests academically or socially.

So in option 3, you and DD move to his parents in Rochdale while he stays in London?

Sounds bonkers.

When did DD move to private school? There must be somewhere within communting distance for DH that has reasonable secondary option if you either suck up Y6 fees too, or plan to move to a Y6 state school so she makes some friends ready for move to secondary with them.

Or could you look at downsizing, releasing equity, increasing your earnings to keep going with private? Any scholarship options?

You don't seem totally confident about homeschooling her yourself, I suspect friendships would wane and surely if you had to give up your job to be able to homeschool that would offset a big chunk of the school fees you'd be saving on?

I think every year group who was impacted by Covid, would say that they had it worse than others. Reception, because they’d just started school, Year 7 because they’d just started secondary, Year 11 because of teacher assessed GCSEs. And so on.

If you’re going to home school, I think research into what’s available locally for support is essential. As is committing your time to HE.

It sounds as though she enjoys her school, so if there’s any way of continuing there until the end of Year 6, I’d do that.

Certainly wouldn’t opt for living with grandparents.

I don’t understand why you want to take her out of a school where you say she is thriving.

How much can you reduce your work hours and still manage?

I think I would drop a day of work and hire a nanny (or au pair if you have a spare room) for a couple of days a week, and find a forest school or similar one day a week.
Presumably you'll be saving some money from school fees that you could use for home ed art or gym classes that the nanny could take her to, you could pay for an English or maths tutor or group classes. And on your day off and the weekends you and your husband could do any 1:1 teaching you need to.

in your shoes I’d stay in London and go part time. On the three days you work, set her up with home education group activity days, so a forest school day, a city farm day, arts/crafts/cookery session day, enabling you to cover academic topics in the remaining two days at home. Alternatively you may find a small three day home ed group which covers a mix of academic and creative. You can then take full advantage of the many London facilities, science museums, historical sites, home learning on the remaining two days.

For year 6, I would do everything I possibly could to pay the fees and keep here where she is - a second job, no holiday, move savings around — it is one year, it provides stability and you can focus on secondary.

For secondary, I would focus your attention on learning the options. Her and her cohort is going to very different from 3 years ago coming out of covid to now. Secondary school is very different than infants.

If she works best on her own, left to her own devices, and only needs one outside class or activity a day for socialisation, then maybe I’d consider homeschooling. Because she values, peers who are like her, I’d want to have certainty you could find that.

But also look at options: are there selective private with scholarships/grammar schools that would suit her better if she could pass the tests to get in? Would she suit a stem-focused school/curriculum or one with lots of arts/music/sport options? What secondaries nearby have top sets and what are the outcomes for their high performers?

If in the end, you end up home schooling, I’d also reconsider learning to drive. Despite having a base in London with good transport, it could be isolating for both of you if you have to limit activities because they are not easy to get to or would take too long by bus/train.

So it's only for one year? Living with in-laws who like their own space (and from whom you like some space) seems incredibly tough, but aside from that, it strikes me that ANY of these options would probably be tolerable for just a year.

Maybe you should start by choosing the high school where you want your daughter to go. Then it may be evident which is the best solution for the preceding year.

thank you for telling about this option. Researching this now as this seems more feasible for us all around

Me stopping work will have absolutely no impact on our finances. My money is my spending money. Husband earns good enough to support the family and he doesn't want me to pay for household. Although he is ok with me spending on gifts, days out etc.

I never said we cannot afford the fees. We can afford the fees, just think it's ridiculous when primary and secondary school fees are almost three times higher than university fees. We would rather save that money for buying a house.

I would love to be able to spend more time with my daughter and am willing to spend time taking her to activities.

She is academic, more Stem focused. Currently she is using Khan academy program and doing year 6/7 work whilst being in year 5 so she is academically capable of being driven, holding her own and following her interests. Obviously we will have to focus more on socialising as she is very introverted.

She already hates the 30-40 mins commute she has to do each way every day and most of the grammar schools are farther. Funnily enough she hates car rides even more and is ok to travel for an hour and half if it is an activity she likes.

We will look at online schooling as another poster suggested.