If you are against Home Ed, can you tell me why?

[Bodenbabe]

I'm in the very early stages of thinking about HE and want to know all the pros and cons. If you are against HE, can you tell me why?

Whether you would be happy or not, there are people who are. And because you can't see how it could work doesn't mean it's impossible to do. She is very committed to what she does and very organised. As regards seeing the report - no I haven't seen the report but I have no reason to not believe her.

I'm against HE for a multiplicity of reasons

1. Lack of interaction with other children
2. Too child-centred (if that doesn't sound like a contradiction in terms). A part of our lives at school and work and home is spent doing things we don't enjoy but we learn that we have to do them and do them with good grace
3. Likely to be deficient educationally. I wouldn't know (a) how to teach or (b) my knowledge in certain subjects eg physics is inadequate
4. Doesn't give children the relevant opportunities in terms of sporting and musical stuff - eg the opportunity to try hard to get into the school hockey team
5. Doesn't expose children to competition, which is an inadequate preparation for life IMO
6. Lack of facilities
7. Children are not likely to develop the necessary degree of separation or independence from their parents to enable them to mature normally

Hmm... possibly it depends on the numbers and their ages. Do you know how many children she has of her own and how many does she mind? And their ages?

I think clearly HE means different things to different people. To some people, evidently, it simply means that the children are not at school. The children are not being 'educated' any more or less than most people's are at weekends and at holidays.

and after reading Harried's post, I too, will hide this thread.

5C "To some people, evidently, it simply means that the children are not at school. The children are not being 'educated' any more or less than most people's are at weekends and at holidays. "

And that comment is just out and out insulting.

I think it's important not to take your own situation and generalise it out to everyone else.

For instance, just because you yourself don't feel you could educate your chilren to an adequate standard, you cannot assume that no one else could do it.

I don't think that is insulting Juule. It's a fact. The sort of education that is often described by HE IS what many parents do anyway i.e let's research electricity on the Web or lets go and look at some dinosaurs at the National History Museum. Some HE on here have even used the word 'facilitating' on here so it's more like 'What would you like to learn about today?'.

DP and I are both teachers by the way and have most subjects covered between us.

Having had a 9 year old at home for 2 months with a badly broken leg but otherwise well (school didn't want crutches on premises for insurance reasons) I've had a taster of home ed.

It was lovely having him at home

1. very relaxing to potter around together - I got on with lots of jobs, whilst chatting to him, he did a lot of his own thing, music, reading etc.
2. the whole day was ours to follow through (well it would have been except other dcs were coming out of school stressed and badtempered at 3.20 What on earth did the OP mean about visiting castles after 3pm - that does not happen in our family life
3. We needed to do very little "educational work" to follow curriculum ie: one unit of literacy could have been done in 2 hours of work - teacher said that would take a week a school. What was great was being able to just follow an interesting topic where it took us, instead of just doing it in bitesized chunks for inspectors
4. Priority was gettng out and about, seeing the world - certainly we were not cut off from society
5. Clubs like choir, drama, music, scouts could all have given him loads of social opportunities (if he hadn't had a broken leg)
6. We learnt loads of things, just chatting as we were out and about, fractions etc.
7. My child is quite shy, why hasn't school made him really sociable as OP claims it should do?

Cons
I think you need to do it with more than one child, otherwise it could be a bit claustrophic.
You need to factor in SOME childfree time, drama classes etc or hope that your children will entertain themselves OCCASIONALLY - possibly longterm HE children do their own thing a lot, which is brilliant.
You have to work on what you expect from HE, not some perfect schoolroom environment - you do have to go with flow, but have a sense of purpose - what do you enjoy doing, learning with your child or you will find it frustrating almost immediately. When I tried to get my ds to do things he really hated like craft, I was not understanding that we don't all have to be good at EVERYTHING to be well-educated.

Anyway he's back to school this week a big responsibility off my shoulders in one way, but I am almost sad we didn't get more time to really get into the Home edding thing a bit more, go on long trips, do science experiments, not feel constrained by the work the school gave us..

So what would you say differs between what most parents do anyway and what HE parents do Juule? Except that the HE parents do more of it?

Unless they are teaching the NC or GCSE/A/S Level syllabus?

I think we are often in danger of over-estimating school you know.

We are very institutionalised...to our cores, really. I don't HE but I can easily see how fantastic it can be for many and how easily many of people's concerns can be allayed.

Your child gets time to learn more from their parents when you HE. If you have confidence in what you choose to impart, and their ability to find things out themselves, you can't go wrong.
It's odd that we should think we can't possibly be any good at teaching our children important things. Is it because we aren't that interested in those things, historical, geographical, mathematical ourselves and want someone else to do the work for us?
As an OP has said, GSCE and A-level can be taught to HE children by colleges, and they are usually well up to standard to start the more specialised courses.

i don't have children of school age yet but i wouldn't choose to HE unless my child was really struggling at school or we lived very remotely and school wasn't available without living away from home.

the reason is that although i want my children to grow up to share my opinions and values, i don't want them to grow up without exposure to people with other opinions and values. i want them to meet people who are religious (i'm not) and who are right wing (i'm not) and even who are anti-science (i'm a science communicator) and yes, i even want them to meet bigots and racists... because these people will be out their in the adult world and i want my children to be able to engage with them and to have considered their what their own beliefs will be and be able to stand up for them.

in an HE world, i would not be able to expose my children to such a wide range of society as they'd get at school.

p.s. we're in scotland in an area where schools are socially mixed, this might not apply in parts of London where i used to live.

"For instance, just because you yourself don't feel you could educate your chilren to an adequate standard, you cannot assume that no one else could do it."

Oh I think it's a pretty reasonable assumption that most people simply don't have enough academic depth to be able to teach a full range of (say) 12 GCSE subjects.

It's also very possible to underestimate school and what it takes to be a good teacher and the amount of time and trouble it takes to keep on top of curriculum demands. I teach one subject at GCSE and A Level. To get to the level I'm at I did GCSEs, A Levels, a Degree, an MA, a PGCE and 2 diplomas. But much more important than the years I spent doing this, I have to keep learning and preparing to keep on top of my subject and to keep up to date with the curriculum changes. And this is just one subject. I reckon I have the skills and knowledge to teach another 4 or 5 at GCSE and perhaps 3 at A Level but not at once and not without doing a huge amount of research. In order to be able to mark coursework properly teachers have to do a huge amount of training and work with other colleagues to set and maintain a standard. I absolutely accept that parents are central to their children's learning but I think it's insulting to teachers and the work they do to assume that it's possible to teach every subject or even most subjects to GCSE and certainly to A Level even if you are well educated yourself. That is if you want your kids to get good grades in 8 or 9 GCSEs as opposed to just the ones they're interested in. Now if you reject the formal curriculum that's another thing entirely but that is likely to limit what your child can do later on in terms of higher education or careers.

But as I said earlier, this is all such a huge commitment. To HE properly you would really have to give up any sort of life independent of your children. I'm not sure how healthy that is for the individual concerned or for other aspects of family life.

But isn't that just it? Parents who HE tend not to teach in the same way that we teach. So they don't need the same amount of specialised knowledge. But having taught a subject in which I am not a specialist to Higher GCSE level, I wonder just how much in depth knowledge is required before you start anyway. I have no qualifications in this subject at all, but am very well qualified and experienced in a related area. The subject matter I can learn in very little time. My students were, I'm glad to say, very successful in their exam. And if I were just working with my own two children, I'm pretty confident that together we could get through anything at GCSE level at least.

I'm very sympathetic to the idea of HE. I'd love to have a shot at it myself, but my DC's school is very fab, and I think it would be self-indulgent on my part not to make the most of it.

As I said, Fallen, I imagine most teachers could, if pushed, teach a handful or more of subjects related to their main subject e.g. English, History, RS but possibly not simultaneously to the same standard and to the standard that would get their kids to reach their potential in EVERY subject. THis is in keeping with the earlier poster whose research indicated that HE children tend to get fewer qualifications and they are often inconsistent i.e A in one or 2 and D or E in another two.

I would agree with you fluffles-I want my DCs to meet all sorts of people with all sorts of opinions. I am very aware that I mix with very like minded people who share the same beliefs and values-mumsnet always gives me a jolt because I come across opinions that are the complete opposite, which I think is good for me.
I believe that the HEing CM had an excellent OFSTED, juuule-all I said was that it wouldn't do for me. I wouldn't leave my DCs with a CM who was HEing-I would want all her attention on her mindees. If I was HEing I would want my DCs central and if they needed to go to the library or similar I wouldn't want to do it around daytime naps and drag pre school DCs along. I would only HE if it was central to our lifestyle with everything revolving around it-it wouldn't be a side line.
I do think that HEers undervalue teachers-a good teacher, passionate about their subject, able to explain it and inspire others is worth their weight in gold! Many a successful person will say that they owe their success to a particular teacher who inspired and encouraged when they were young. It is almost as if they aren't necessary and all the DC needs is some books and the internet!

And it's not just about subject knowledge; it's about what's on the curriculum and Assessment Objectives and what makes the difference between A* and A and this takes experience and constant interaction with exemplar material and colleagues and exam boards and other students.

But if we did HE then I wouldn't teach as I do in school. I don't think I would anyway. I did a degree by distance learning a couple of years ago, and there was very little teaching involved in it. But I learned a tremendous amount of course. I would imagine there would be a lot of independent learning and also far less in the way of curricula, and less emphasis on public exams, both of which would affect the exam pass rate stats.

Violet, I didn't say 20K, I said 2K!

Clearly, that's likely to be seen as inadequate by plenty of the population - but I suppose I'm trying to say that you really don't have to be in any way well off to HE, certainly many of the people in intentional community circles who do so would be living on way below the 'official poverty line' - although they probably wouldn't consider themselves poor.

I do agree that working outside the system is a con though if it means that you lose people from the school system who might work to change it. Luckily there are plenty of hippies in the school system too round here to cause trouble work for changes

x-post with your last one there fivecandles. And if I were to HE, it would be to get away from all that for my own children. Because blimey, differentiating between an A* and an A is not the be all and end all of an education.

All well and good Fallen but if you are going to teach your kids in an unconventional way and they are going to come out with unconventional exam results or none at all then you can't expect them to necessarily find it easy to fit in with a society and employment system which values these conventional qualifications. And I suppose you have to rely on your dcs to do independent learning even in subjects they don't like. That's an awfully big ask for children.

Of course it's not the be all and end all of an education but it might be the be all and end all of whether they can go on to x university to do x course. So your decision to Home Educate may have far reaching consequences which may limit the opportunities for your dcs later in life.

But TFM, don't you think that degrees are all about independent work and not really about formal teaching?

My degree is in English and my A level subjects are all arts based. Take chemistry. I'd spend all my time learning and preparing a lesson to stay ahead of the DCs and then flounder if they asked me a question that anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of chemistry could deal with instantly. I'd just end up googling constantly ... and I wouldn't know enough about the exams to spoon feed the techniques and key questions etc.

I don't disagree with the proposition that HEing can help you to develop the skills you need but I really don't buy the idea that children are properly equipped with broadbased knowledge.

But maybe, if you HE it's a way of opting out of the mainstream in any event.

What if your child wants to spend all his time doing leaf collages, baking and writing a novel and you encourage this but then decides at age 16 that he wants to be a doctor?? Then, sorry it's the A*s that matter and the leaf collage counts for nothing.