Regretting taking kids out of school.

[apocketfulofposy]

Posting here for traffic,sorry.

I have 5 children ranging from aged 6 to 10 weeks old.

We always planned to home educate after reading a book about it when ds1 and 2 were toddlers,then when ds1 was about 4 and a half,and i was pregnant with baby number 4,i decided to give our local primary a go,partly because it was just that time where he would of been going and partly because i was finding it hard with them all at home (no family on either side for 3 hours,husband who works away monday to friday,rural ish area,i cant even drive!).

Anyway reception was ok,he liked it,made plenty of friends,dc2 and 3 went to the pre school and liked it,except dc2 had lots of issues with hitting other children and just general destructive behaviour.

When ds1 started yr1 last year he hated it from the word go,he still liked seeing his friends but he really noticed the change between mostly play to mostly lessons,plus his teacher left after a term and the new one was very strict and spoke to the children like she was some kind of prison officer.

Ds2 started reception and seemed to enjoy it but after a few weeks i was called in a few times about his hitting and destroying things,they said he just physically wasnt ready to be at schoolt hat much so put him down to half days,which was a bit of a faff for me as i was in and out all day but it was fine.It didnt seem to help though and he was behaving worse and worse at school,especially at lunchtime,but strangely his behaviour at home was getting better.

Add to this the fact i was finding it hard carting them all around everywhere and i felt crap because i kept forgetting to reply to things and i kept hearing all this micheal gove stuff,i just decided to pull them out,id been thinking about it on and off for a while and just thought do it,and id id it almost on a bit of a whim.

The first few weeks were great and we all loved the novelty of not rushing around in mornings and the kids have been playing all day,and actually one good point is that they have been getting on so much better.

But apart from that i am starting to regret taking them out,i miss the routine,i miss being able to take the babies to their groups and talking to my "mummy friends"(cringe) i miss being able to go to the shop quickly with just the double buggy,i also just dont know what to do with them,and the house is just such a mess!

I know these are'nt huge things but its starting to feel chaotic and i can feel it going back to the way it used to be,before school,and it hink i underestimated how much it did for all of us.I just dont know what to do!

Help and advice please!xxxxx

I think you mean 'deschooling' there, Tamer.

No I didn't! It was a direct quote from OP who said 'Well i want them to learn naturally from the world around them,its called learning autonomously or unschooling.

I think she is in danger of a 'a little knowledge........'

If she wants to be told the things that she wants to hear then she would be better off in HE. Everyone is quite happy to say there are excellent schools and dire schools with everything in between. Home Educators will never admit that they have the same mix. They will never come out and say that someone is doing it badly and failing their children.
I suppose that if OP is really up for people explaining terms and what they mean and good ways to go about it then HE might be useful, but not if she is just told that she can manage 5 children, including a new baby, a husband who works away, no family nearby, a rural location with no local groups and she has to use public transport-then it is no use at all.

Although the LEA don't have to see the children you do actually have to give them a report of what you are doing and prove you are not just keeping them off school.

Cerisier I thought exactly the same. This thread has to be a wind up surely.

If done well autonomous education can produce good results. Plenty of examples of early/excellent exam results, careers in medicine and so on on the home ed board. I'm sure they would also advise a school return if necessary, too. It's not unheard of.

Sorry Tamer. I thought you were confusing unschooling with deschooling.

Ooops-I fall for them every time! It has to be a wind up-it is so extreme.

Surely you could pop them all back in, except for the child who can't cope? Keep him out, and HE him. Much more manageable for you, and better for him, whilst letting the others enjoy their friends etc at school?

Except that from the OP it seems that it's DC2 who didn't adjust well to school in YR. So presumably there will be DCs 3-5 still at home.

What's the difference between playing truant and unschooling? Why do some poor sods get fines if their kid is up the park/on the XBox and someone else can claim they are being "unschooled"?

I know I'm not cut out to home educate and don't really agree with it on the basis that there are more lessons to be learned at school than just academic ones. However, I know someone who took their child out of school because they were being bullied (something I wouldn't hesitate to do) and home educated for a while with pressure on her for her to return her to school. According to her, when she ageed, at the beginning of year 7, she had her pick of schools because they were so keen to get her back in the system. Don't really know how true this is, but it could be that if the school didn't suit, then you might be in a better situation to look round other schools that might and then discuss getting them all in. Good luck :-)

Is there no law to stop this? I thought children had to have an education?

Op, with all due respect, your grammar is awful. If you do continue on this path, please get them an English tutor.

"I wasn't ever planning on doing lessons or anything really, unless they want to or they need to when they are older if they decide to take exams."

I hope you aren't being serious here. Without some kind of evidence that your children have received an education how are they going to get on in life?

I take my hat off to those who can home educate successfully. I think it is extremely hard.

It sounds like it is going pear shaped for you, but there is nothing wrong in admitting defeat. An acquaintance of mine tried "home educating" and it just didn't work out. One of the reasons being that she didn't have the skills to realise that two of her children were dyslexic (the other being that she never actually taught her children anything). She realised that she had completely underestimated how hard it would be and now her children go to school, and it was the best thing for all of them.

Are there any other schools you could look at for your children?

Going forward you need to look at a) Getting the school age children back into school b) Looking at contraception options (if you don't want any more children) c) Learning to drive

No, WTF, they will absorb correct grammar from occasionally being taken into a library!

My STBXH keeps harping on about home schooling DS and his written English is even worse. Thank fuck, gives me cast-iron grounds not to have a bar of it.

My grammar is fine if i need it to be,i just dont have the time or inclination to check it for mumsnet,plus im breastfeeding at the same time.

I should never of started this thread,i didnt mean half of it,ive had a horrible stressful week,the first like it since i too them out,i do need to sort some things out but i am certain HE is for us.A lot of the comments about unschooling on here are very ignorant by the way.

Today has been great,and has reminded me why i took them out again,we have a few friends who are always asking to help out and i always say no as i think they are saying it to be polite but im going to take them up o the offer more often,and ive booked a driving lesson for the weekend,i did take my test last year but failed sadly!

Thanks to those who were helpful x

and theres no law for reports or contact with anyone,they offer you contact if you are known to the la,as we are as they went to school,but you dont have to accept it.

Most children find the move from reception and all the play, to Y1 and proper learning, a bit challenging. (our school took a very gradual approach in Y1 thankfully) You stick at it until they adjust though.

Deciding the solution to one reception-aged DC hitting other children is to take a whole set of siblings out of school, rather than teaching said child how to behave appropriately towards others is unfathomable to me. I hope this is not a serious thread...

So if you didn't want to help facilitate the school with enabling boundaries, does this mean that there are no boundaries at home.
Are you using autonomous education as a means to allow the children to play all day long, when in fact, although yes, they lead, it isn't meant to be about playing all day.

You still need structure. Children thrive more on structure than on chaotic routines. They need to know what is going to happen so that they feel secure.

Education can happen in a number of places. It doesn't have to be limited to a table and chair. Education happens around children every day through interactions from parents, siblings and peers. It happens walking down the road. Yes some happens through play, but the whole education shouldn't come from one source. A day on the beach talking about the sea. About waves and how they are different. Sand, glass and mixing materials, even talk about moon sand lol.

Do you realise that the la can make informal enquiries about the education and if there is none, and sorry but playing all day long doesn't cut it. And teaching them things in a few years time if they decide to take exams, either doesn't cut it, the la can serve a school attendance order.

And yes I do have experience of HE. My eldest was HE for a number of years.

You sent your kids to school, you took them out, realised it was a mistake, last night so you decided to send them back to school, and this morning you want the take them out again?

Honestly, you REALLY have your hands full. Send them to school, be tough on unacceptable behaviour and have a bloody break!

Grammar fail, OBVIOUSLY...

Juggling five children must be really hard. You will get a lot of judginess from people simply because having more than three children is regarded as transgressive nowadays (I am sympathetic, but it still seems a massive challenge to me!) so whatever you do as a parent, a certain kind of person will act as if you have failed your children simply by having too many of them - can't give them enough attention, can't meet all of their needs yada yada. If you aren't a catholic, convert forthwith so you can get some loving support from other fab mums of big families (only half joking!)

Don't see any particular reason to have school in your lives unless it would be a positive thing for all concerned.

You need to look for everything that is fun and educational to do near you. And, despite what the majority in the conversation are saying, that can simply be the local park/library/swimming pool/ soft play room/ supermarket - whatever environments are interesting and stimulating for your children. And controllable for you as well. do you have a sling and a buggy board and stuff to extend your reach? And then answer their questions, help them learn to move around the world in ways that are socially acceptable (because learning to fake being normal is a key skill for those of us who really aren't at all).

And blah blah blah formal learning schmerning. I have a child who learned to read without ever once, seriously never once having an explicit adult-led conversation about it. This child had access to the Internet, always had closed captions on when watching DVDs, and was read to A Lot. And by the age of 8 was a total apostrophe nazi, having picked up the rules implicitly, in the way that we pick up the rules of our spoken mother tongue explicitly - simply by preferring to spend a huge amount of time around spoken text - and that is without neglecting other areas of learning, it's just a for instance.

I really recommend that you search around for other mums home educating large families. I don't know whether the wonderful flamingobingo posts on mums net nowadays, but I know she autonomously home educates several children all close together in age (more than three, for sure). That's the kind of person you need to be talking to and getting advice from (and we can all form each other's support network when our children fail to become top lawyers because we failed them as parents by removing them from the glories of the conventional school system heh).

So it wasn't a wind up.
I can't believe that you could think this is better for your children than school.

Having 5 children is tough, it is very difficult to give them individual attention- your way makes it much tougher on all concerned.

Mega hugs. Glad you have got together with a friend and are feeling a bit better.

What ommmward says is spot on.

I think you might want to start a new thread now in order to get back on track with respect to discussing your situation rather than getting sidetracked into debating the merits of autonomous home education. That sounds like something which you yourself are clear on, and don't need any input into. It's more how and whether you can manage the practicalities of HE in your situation, right?

I don't' think she has a clue about autonomous education!

ommward thankyou!

I have asked for this thread to be deleted,i was really upset last night after a terrible week,i was worried about my husband,etc etc.

The biggest thing that stands out to me is that since i took them out,they have been so happy and they rarely argue with each other anymore,i think that says a lot.

I just need to find a way to run the house more efficiently and to get a bit of time alone now and then.Usually the mess doesnt bothe rme because we are out for at least half the day most days but we have been stuck in all week so its got to me and i feel a bit out of control of it all.