Are there any benefits of Primary school that HE can't usually provide?

[carolinecordery]

Hello all, I haven't registered my DD for Reception, which she would be eligible to start in September.
I was just wondering if you thought there were any benefits of primary school that HE can't provide. What things are good about primary school that are only available through attending?
I'm planning to HE and am convinced of the benefits of doing so, but want a rounded picture. It's easy to think of loads of things that would be, relatively, a bit crap about primary school, but is there ANY really good reason to go? DD's non-resident dad would rather she went.
Thanks, Caroline

There are indeed many qualified teachers who home educate. Some say up to a quarter of all home educators are teachers.

The ones who I know personally say that it is not much help as teacher training is to help with classroom control

There's an interesting study in Canada about HE parents who didn't graduate from High School improving their children's chances by home educating

"Poorly educated parents who choose to teach their children at home produce better academic results for their children than public schools do. One study we reviewed found that students taught at home by mothers who never finished high school scored a full 55 percentage points higher than public school students from families with comparable education levels."

I don't know, my dd's teachers are amazing, and I have huge respect for what they do, how they put the curriculum together etc. I have an Oxbridge degree, a fairly broad general knowledge and experience of working with children & young people etc but there's no way I could provide the kind of teaching my dd has benefitted from at school.

That's not to say that others couldn't, but I think anyone who HEs probably has to buy in some other expertise at times - it would be pure arrogance to think that you could provide everything that your dc might need.

I am a qualified teacher in FE and I don't see what my dd would gain from my qualification if I were to teach her A levels. I teacher training I was taught to do the things that are increasingly making me more determined to leave schooled education. I feel as though I have to de-school my attitude and move to one of support and nurture.

Time away from parents.

"Poorly educated parents who choose to teach their children at home produce better academic results for their children than public schools do. One study we reviewed found that students taught at home by mothers who never finished high school scored a full 55 percentage points higher than public school students from families with comparable education levels."

Hardly surprising that poorly educated parents who are sufficiently interested in their kids' education to have made the commitment to home educate are bound to do better than the children of parents who might not have made such considered choices. What this doesn't tell us is how HE'd children from such backgrounds perform in comparison to schooled children of similarly interested and committed parents from the same type of backgrounds. I imagine that parental support makes all the difference.

i don't think any of us set out knowing what our children will need Jinsei. But a great many of us don't teach our children at all. Mine did no formal work until they chose to go into FE college/do an OU course, instead we just facilitated what ever they were interested in.

IMO experience very few families employ tutors-most of us would find it difficult to fund them, as we HE on a limited budget.
Mostly we learned together, through every day life. Or they learned from other people they met or stayed with.
It didn't look like any thing resembling a formal schooled education, so no we didn't need tutors generally-we only employed a music teacher as DD2 needed to catch up with music theory quickly, she'd missed out covering it earlier herself because of her dyslexia difficulties.

All three of ours have far, far outstripped what their schools had predicted for them though.

"I imagine that parental support makes all the difference."

You are right, parental support makes all the difference, however the child is educated.

Having the school hours to work in instead of needing to continue using informal or paid for childcare would be the biggest benefit to me - but not that massive a benefit really as school isn't flexible so wouldn't suit my work/us as a family.

The only other thing I think that I would find easier if we used school is that dd would have more opportunity to just dip into new things like trying out different musical instruments, or types of sports etc. without there being a cost to me just for her to try something new. Again, that's not an insurmountable challenge - it just means that we have to be proactive in seeking opportunities for her to see what different things are available - and it's swings and roundabouts anyway, as she's certainly experienced other things at home ed groups and camps that I doubt she'd have come across by this age in a school setting. And I think that to continue most of those things to a decent level there needs to be parental involvement anyway (eg. music or gym lessons or whatever the interest is) once they've had a go and decided they might enjoy it.

I find the above quite revealing. Of course parental support makes all the difference, it also shows that HE'd children aren't worse off if their parents were poorly educated.
I was poorly educated in fact it was horrific, I kid you not. Several years of therapy needed in fact, plus help from peers during teacher training. I left school with nothing and now have a PGCE. This is not an issue with dd because thank God things are different now, for the majority I hope.

This thread is really good as I am increasingly becoming aware that for us there is absolutely nothing that school can offer that would be enough to make us stay in the system.

"This thread is really good as I am increasingly becoming aware that for us there is absolutely nothing that school can offer that would be enough to make us stay in the system"

Really? I thought people had listed loads!

"This thread is really good as I am increasingly becoming aware that for us there is absolutely nothing that school can offer that would be enough to make us stay in the system"

That depends on if those benefits outweigh the benefits of home ed to morethanpotatoprints family though seeker? And if they're even perceived as benefits, I mean, socialisation at school wouldn't be a benefit for us because the relaxed full day play times we have with different home ed friends several days each week suit my dd far more than school based socialising would. And even the things that I do think might be have some benefit to us aren't enough to make us stay in the system because the benefits of HE are greater for our family.

it doesn't have to be all or nothing. my dc attends state primary and i home educate as well... it's perfectly possible to do both.

Anastasia, I know you are already doing HE but just noticed your comment on music. My dd is still in school but I contacted the LEA music service and they were really helpful and said dd could continue with her lessons, choir, orchestras and the instrument hire scheme would be an option too, but she has her own. There would be no difference. They also let you try activities for 3 weeks free to see if dcs like it. You do have to pay but its much cheaper than private lessons and you have to pay if you attend school anyway. Could be worth a try if you haven't already.

Seeker, as Anastasia said really. To some the lists will provide advantages but to us there wasn't one I found to be a sticking point or barrier tbh. Some provide food for thought, such as obviously socialisation but we have that covered. I don't mean to sound smug though as there may be something that hasn't been mentioned yet.

I still think that the friendship issue isn't properly covered by a lot of HEers because they really have to work at it.
I have a lot of admiration for the Scouting and Guiding organisations and will always recommend them for friendship, life skills and accepting of all. However - although they are friendly and get all sorts of DCs together it is once a week, possibly a camp and possibly the odd 'play date' for want of a better word.
I think that people have a different definition of friendship to me. Looking back I can't remember the names of DCs in the same dance class etc in the same way that I can school. At school you are with the same people, your mother is not around and it is like a marriage, you weather the good and the bad times and come out stronger with a shared history. It gave me a couple of very deep friendships that have lasted 40 years and we have had our fallings out over that time and sorted it. In HE it is very simple for the parent to say ' never mind, darling, I know that Anna is being horrible, we will make sure that we don't see her for a few weeks'. Their DC never learns to cope with the Anna's of the World and find out that maybe Anna was just having a tough time and that really she was very nice or that Anna is just someone to rub along with and avoid.
Of course HE DCs can forge very deep friendships with groups, or even Scouts but parents have to work at it much more and it is very difficult for over protective parents not to step in and solve problems.
It is the same with adults you don't like. If they are interested in a history group but can't stand the adult taking it all the parent has to do is say 'never mind dear, we can miss the group and do it ourselves'. They never learn for themselves how to cope with the difficult.
The thing that would really worry me is the control over friendships. My HEing friend got the cold shoulder from many in her group because her DCs have always mixed with all and their best friends have been at school - apparently these DCs should not be mixed with! While I appreciate that most HEers don't take this narrow stance a minority do and the can because they have the control.

you are always going to get some people who take a narrow stance, I've been a parent of school educated parent and a home educating parent. There are people like that in all worlds.

and you can think as you like about the friendship issues, it isn't my experience though -my children didn't go to Scouts or Guides (although I did and loved them) because they were too busy having a social life to have time!

I have said elsewhere that it can depend on where you live and you access to transport, but school can be the loneliest place on earth when you don't fit in.

Schools gave my children very poor friendship opportunities-I accept that isn't the same for your children.
Since home educating my children have had a social life that has been the envy of their schooled cousins and peers.

HE isn't right for all children, but neither is school.

So give families accurate information about educational options and allow them to make an informed choice about what is right for their family at any given time.

I disagree with the comments about scouts and guides etc not providing good opportunities to forge proper friendships. I think the nature of a lot of youth organisations means people get the chance to create very good friendships. Some of my closest friendships as an adult have developed from childhood membership of a youth organisation.

Which takes us back to square one julie, families do have very accurate information from the government about their choices so they can make informed decisions. The Govdirect site has just about everything, how to get your pension, financial help for the disabled, student finance, voting, car tax etc etc etc. Before the Internet there might have been some excuse for not knowing - but not now. History and literature are full of people who were educated at home- the Queen for a start- do people imagine her parents were breaking the law?! When do they think it stopped?
I agree that many parents, probably the majority, do it really well but the socialisation does have to be worked at and many parents are not sociable themselves.
As scummymummy says, one of the advantages of school can be time away from parents. - especially if you have the overprotective type. I find it sad that I have worked with 10 year olds in school and it is the first time that they have ever been given a sharp knife to cut vegetables! They are not even allowed to boil the kettle at home!
I digress a bit. Parents need to be aware of all these things and work at them. School gives DCs opportunities that might not have crossed the parents mind- purely because you have the input of far more adults.

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They do indeed Sirzy- but having been very involved in Scouting you need to get very involved- turning up once a week isn't going to do it.

There are loads of opportunities for HE kids to form friendships- it's hard work for parents to provide them, but most, obviously do. The problem is, most people who go on about socialisation being an issue don't go many further than this, because most people don't know very much about HE!

It's not this aspect of socialisation that I mean when I talk about the things that in my view HE children miss out on. I think the issue is more the every day rubbing along with people, the learning how to get along OK with people who you don't necessarily like/don't like you (adults and children). How to work in a group with someone you've fallen out with at break. The experience of discovering that you really like somebody you've been in the same class as for the past 4 years and never rally noticed before.... it's more complicated than just friendships.

It is the fact that the HE parent can just whisk them away from any difficulty that bothers me- they never have to learn to sort out conflicts for themselves.

They never learn that you can have difficulty in relationships and it isn't the end of the world you can sort it out. I appreciate that my friend probably has the really 'odd' HEers in her group but they have this idea that your sibling must be your best friend - some would just like time apart.