Hi can I please have some home schooling advice

[Bgmt2014]

Hi all,I'm looking for some advice as thinking of home schooling my 4 year old can anyone advise me firstly on your own reasons for home schooling at what you wrote to the school/education department when choosing to home school and where do you get your resources from,any tips

tbh I find it worrying and wrong that no education plan is needed.
imo the child(ren) should do sats (or other appropriate assessment) to show that they do get an adequate education.

home educate if you want to and are able to give your dc a rounded education but don't be pissed off if the la wants to check up on the wellbeing and education of the child(ren).

BluePitchFork how long do you think the plan should hold for? What if the child's educational interests and needs change significantly within the duration of the plan? What if splendid educational opportunities arise that were not in the plan?

Re: SATS. To what extent do teachers appreciate and celebrate SATS as a holistic means of measuring children's progress? To what extent would teachers say they can avoid teaching to the test, or having the SATS interfere with children's self confidence? Where SATS are optional (private schools) do a lot of see their value and adopt them anyway?

BluePitchFork, if I had access to a fantastic tailor who was ready and able to create clothes which fit my unique shape in colours which suited me, would you insist that she must instead sew a dress which conforms to the measurements of an average size-16 woman, in whichever colour is popular on the catwalks this season?

You are missing the point of home education.

that why I add 'appropriate assessment' I know that sats are not always seen as a good thing but imo home educators have to somehow show that they are receiving an age and ability apropriate education.

*that their children are receiving an age and ability appropriate efucation

which you can only do if you know the child well. And that is why it is left to the parent to determine what the child needs.

No, we do not "have to" demonstrate this. The law is quite clear on the matter.

What is an age and ability appropriate education? Would all or even the majority of parents/teachers/government ministers agree on that? Who decides if an education is age/ability appropriate?

What if a home educated child fails this assessment? Do they return to school? What if a school attending child fails the assessment are their parents obliged to home educate? Should every parent whose child attends a 'failing' school (and how many have a choice?) be prosecuted for failing to provide an age and ability appropriate education?

Who decides what is 'appropriate'? The bunch of fuckwits up top who have screwed up the UK education system to the point that more and more people are withdrawing their kids in the first place?

Blue - it's worrying that you think assessment prove that a child is getting an education.

This doesn't really correlate with the insane number of children who do not achieve the 'required' number of GCSE's each and every year. Where are the consequences for the teachers that have wasted 14 years of these poor lives to have them leave with nothing but mental health problems to say the least?

Hmm, I wonder why many HE'rs don't bother following the national curriculum

Sats would not work as HE are not required to follow a curriculum. We teach what we feel is appropriate and what they need. My 14 yo dd1 is going to college 2 days a week to complete Gcse English and maths as we feel it is needed. I am teaching cooking and gardening, she has guitar lessons and work experience once a week. Plus kickboxing. Next year she is looking to get on a hairdressing course and art. Along with the maths and English.

No bluepitchfork. HE don't have to prove anything of the sort. Education is required..the law says..does not say we have to follow anything or what we must teach. The La has no rights to do anything of the sort. We don't have to agree to any checks. We decide what is appropriate. I think some people have an extremely blinkered view of HE. It's legal to do this without any reason or checks or plans..That's the beauty of HE is we don't have to be confined to a classroom. We are out and about more than we are home.

Mumstheword. Exactly why I took my 14 yo dd1 out she was making herself poorly with stress over tests..pressure from teachers over exams..all concern is on targets and grades..and she just felt like her best was never good enough. That can not be good for kids.

Yes, I was thinking that too about the pressure of testing. It's bad enough in some schools where teachers feel the need to boost scores by endless SATs drills. At least in theory it is the whole cohort being tested and it could be argued that the results of one individual child don't matter so very much. Parents try to reassure children that their performance on this test does not affect the child but only the school, though that is a difficult message to impart when school staff are so stressed about it.

But now picture the effect on the child if SATs really did determine her own future. Her own score now means everything. Failure results in being sent to school, presumably. Many kids end up in home education because they'd been desperately unhappy at school for one reason or another. The prospect of going back if they can't pass a test is horrible.

Such a proposal reminds me of certain cruel children I once knew, who would use a magnifying glass to focus the sun's rays on an ant.