Cost of home ed, and parent downtime

[Skiffle]

I'm not actively considering home ed at the moment but I've been reading the boards a lot here and it's something I'm interested in and would think about if DD doesn't get on well at school (starting reception in September). I've got a couple of questions:

How do you think the cost of home education compares to being at school? I imagine it works out fairly expensive - workbooks, trips out, other resources, clubs/lessons which you might want to utilise more to get socialising time. I know there would be savings made in terms of no school uniform, no school trips, no "bring in a toy for the tombola" type things, but overall do you think it costs a lot more to home educate?

If you are home educating younger children how do you get any downtime for yourself? When they're a bit older I assume there might be an hour here or there while the DC work on their own doing an activity or workbook, but at 5/6 is it pretty full-on? I'm planning to start studying myself next year and am looking forward to having the time when DD1 is at school and DD2 starts part-time nursery, I'm not sure how compatible this would be with home schooling.

As far as cost goes, with HE you get complete choice. It's possible to do it more cheaply than school. On the other hand, if you want to and can afford to, you could enjoy spending quite a lot of money indeed. I was about to say that the savings for us in cheap term-time holidays are immense, but then I realised that if the children were at school we simply wouldn't go on holiday, and we'd almost never see our relatives abroad - we just wouldn't be able to afford it. Does that make home education cheaper, or does it just mean we get to do more stuff? Depends how you look at it, I guess.

My children do lots of free and almost-free activities as well as some we pay for. Paid activities play a totally insignificant role in their social life: generally the most expensive activities are the least sociable. For instance, my teenager's most expensive activities are guitar lessons and a drama group, neither of which involve any hanging around and chatting to speak of. Instead, they socialise by going to friends' houses and to the park and window shopping.

I think the scope for spending more money must be greater for us when home educating. We have more time and energy with which the kids could be doing a million and one paid activities. One could be tempted by the expensive science toys instead of just going to the free local science lectures. One could fill the house with books instead of using the library and internet. But they don't "need" these things for social or educational reasons; they are just fun.

Home educating parents have restricted employment opportunities, hence less money, so home education "costs more" in that sense.

There isn't much me time when children are small.

What's downtime? I think I've forgotten

I think we could afford a (cheap) private school compared to the cost of home ed. Our biggest costs are for extra-curricular classes and activities, this runs into the hundreds per month.

I'm sure it is possible to manage on a budget, however, others seem to. Attend the free, or reasonably priced, home education groups, events and access and print free resources.

A journalist asked me yesterday what advice I'd give to anyone thinking about home education, I said embrace poverty, be aware that you'll probably never feel "ready", and if anyone asks what but how do you know it's going to be OK/what if it all goes wrong and your children blame you for ruining their lives...then all you can say is there's never a scenario where you can be sure your children will applaud you later

These are some examples of our expenses.

In April:
Homeschooling costs
theme park day trip £43 (for 2 adults and 2 children - got the school rate)
new resources £10 (books/art supplies from charity shops/carboots)
Loads free activities £0
paid home ed activities £3
car fuel costs to get to home school activities/events £80

savings by not doing school
bus fares £48
lunch money £56
uniform £6
DT or cooking or other contributions £10
after school sports clubs £20

costs of activities which would have been incured whether at school or home
weekend trips X4 £65 (entry fees )
swim lessons £18 (includes weekly lesson, free swimming and open access to gym)
rangers £0 (youth group)
car fuel costs to get to his/family outings £120

So for us it is more or less equitable. You can spend as much as you like and you could spend thousands.

Downtime: yes, it's hard when they are little! Well, it depends on the child; my younger child was always happy to potter around without much attention but her big sister was another story. It started getting slowly easier after dd1 was five.

But there are options besides school. You can do a childcare swap. i always got more done when my dd had another child round than when I had her on her own, as they disappeared off to play, and of course when she was at the other family's house that was better yet. If you can afford it, you could use a childminder or an after-school club for a few hours every afternoon. Some kids dislike the structure or academic focus of school but are happy enough in large-group childcare for a few hours a day.

By the way, from your phrasing I am guessing that you think your daughter will need to spend hours every day on academic work ("an hour here or there while the DC work on their own doing an activity or workbook"), which really isn't true. With individual attention and the opportunity to go at the child's own pace, home ed is so efficient that it takes very little time compared to school. Getting time for yourself is more a question of how and whether your children will PLAY on their own without much input from you, rather than whether they will WORK on their own. So, for example, you might manage to get an hour or two of studying done at the park if the kids are outgoing enough to go play with other children without requiring your constant attention.

Thanks for all the replies. So cost wise it looks like the main cost would be the fact that one parent can't work very easily. I'm not working at the moment anyway although am hoping to start part time in a while, but that would mainly be from home (hence needing some time to get on with things). We do a couple of paid activities at the moment, and i guess there are things like brownies/scouts which don't cost very much either. We certainly couldn't afford hundreds per month on activities!

Saracen I see what you mean about the "downtime" options. At the moment it's very limited, but that's because DD2 is 2 and so needs a fair amount of supervision, whereas DD1 will spend quite a bit of time playing on her own.

Being at school costs a lot as well, though. Tot up how much you spend on 'voluntary' contributions to field trips, raffles, charitable collections, school photos and the enormous cost of uniforms. IMO it all balances out in the end, though with HE you can choose how much you spend depending on the resources you use, whereas at school you've no option.

I think it must depend on the school, streakybacon. I was astonished at how cheap it was to kit my dd out in uniform. Luckily plimsolls were worn at all times indoors, so even the shoes were dead cheap. We opted out of school photos because the price was ludicrous, and the other contributions only worked out at a pound or so a week.

Do you know the most unexpected extra cost for me during my dd's brief time at school? I found myself spending money on her simply because I missed her and couldn't show my love more directly. Not huge things - a fancy pencil case, a sparkly shirt, her favourite exotic fruit, a book - but it was stuff she didn't need, and it added up. Whenever I was out, I felt like buying her something, and often I did. Perhaps that was a phase which would have passed if she had stayed at school longer. But I do know other parents who admit that they spend money on their kids because they can't spend as much time with them as they would wish.

I'm sure you're right. There are bound to be some schools that recognise how expensive it works out for some families. I know how costly I found it during ds's time in schools, and there are often similar threads on MN about high costs of trips, uniform etc. At ds's school you had to have proper uniform with embroidered logo etc, which ran very expensive, though I realise that some will accept supermarket equivalents and that can keep costs down.

I'm impressed at plimsolls for school use - ds's last school shoes, five years ago, were over £40 and I'm SO glad we don't have to spend that kind of money any more!

Yes, I thought plimsolls were a good idea too. It was a rural school with a muddy field for a playing area so they needed separate footwear for outdoor and indoor use. They could wear what they liked outdoors: old trainers or wellies were most popular.

At one point the head did try telling me the children were supposed to arrive at school in shiny black shoes but I observed that this was entirely ridiculous if they were going to spend the rest of the day in other shoes!! My case was stronger because I think the school did not actually HAVE a uniform policy and that he was making it up as he went along. I asked on several occasions for a written copy of the uniform policy as approved by the governors, but it was never forthcoming. My next step would have been to play the poverty card, ours being one of the least well-off families at the school, and argue that requiring a separate pair of shoes for the sole purpose of arriving at school imposed an unreasonable financial burden on families like mine. (Not that I think rich families should have to shell out for silly things either, simply because they are able to!!)

Uniform is one of the dafter aspects of school, I think, especially at primary level. There was no uniform when I went to school till you joined 'the seniors'. They're even expected to have the proper sweatshirts at nursery in some places now, which I think is quite sad.

We have been home-edding for a few months now. I am on my own a lot with the DC's and I think my idea of 'downtime' has changed a bit. I get small amount here and there. If I do gardening (which I love) the DC's can play for hours outside without needing much from me.

One of the good things about home ed is that all of the places that you go to are pretty much empty, this makes it much easier imo to keep an eye on smaller DC's (mine are 6, 3 and nearly 2). I get a chance occasionally to put my feet up and have a cup of tea while they play. Some activities feel like down time even with the DC's: beach trips, walks in the woods etc.

Money wise, I found school uniform and shoes a pain, most of my family have birthdays over the summer, add in holidays and it was all quite expensive. Spreading the cost make life much easier. Plus I don't feel obliged to spend money when the school want me to, I can plan trips etc around my finances and not the other way around. Avoiding the August madness in the shoe shops is a bit of a bonus obviously!

I am also discovering that a lot of the free things that we do are enjoyed the most. There are tadpoles in the house and a neighbor has given us tomato plants and onion seeds. The last trip we did was an organised one and we got school prices because there was a large groups of home edders.

The more I read about home ed the more attractive it seems as an option. I don't think I'd notice a difference in terms of getting "downtime" from what happens now, as DD1 only goes to nursery a couple of mornings a week and DD2 doesn't go at all yet. When DD1 starts school I'll have DD2 at home anyway so it's not like I get much opportunity to sit with my feet up with a two year old around.

DD1 is looking forward to starting school, although I think the reality of going every day will be a shock, so we'll go with that and see what happens. I kind of wish I had thought about home educating a long time ago and planned it in. DH is quite against it so I would need more time to change his mind! But I hope that if DD1 doesn't settle he would be open to it.