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Home ed

Find advice from other parents on our Homeschool forum. You may also find our round up of the best online learning resources useful.

Is Home ed the answer?

5 replies

Notjustthecatsmother · 18/02/2018 12:04

Hello, I don’t know anything about Home education so I’d appreciate some advice. My dd is 9 and she’s in Year 4. Her school is very small, only 8 in her year. She has virtually no friends at school. She can maintain friendships outside school but there’s so few children in her Year there’s hardly anyone to be friends with and one, possibly two of the other girls in her year have ASD. ASD isn’t the problem though, my ds aged 13 has ASD but I think dd is simply surrounded but additional needs! She was also assessed for asd but is not. She was such a confident girl before she started school. She was bullied at her first school so I moved her. She was happy at her second school but we had to move because of DHs job so where she is now at her third school where she has been for three years. I’ve put her name on the waiting list for another school. I’ve tried so hard with the current school - to engage them, to talk about dd, emails etc but nothing gets done. The teachers have given out the ‘star’certificate to some children two or three times this year and dd has had it just once. I’m not bothered but dd is. I’ve spoken to the Head and his response was - ‘what do you want me to do? Tear friendships apart?’ He laughed at me. They’re just not interested in her. Other parents have even said how sad dd seems. I know she’s been pinned against a wall but another girl. Another parent told me this, I didn’t hear it from school. I’ve asked School about it but had no response.

Dd is in tears today about the prospect of going back tomorrow after half term. I don’t know what to do, I’m not a teacher and I don’t want dds education to suffer, she’s a bright girl but I really just want her to be happy.

OP posts:
CramptonHodnet · 18/02/2018 13:28

We've just deregistered 8 yr old DS. We're not teachers either. It's scary, but like another poster on my thread said - it need not be forever. We're researching materials and websites for DS and will take it slowly and carefully. I know DS was very unhappy at school - not bullied, just struggling with the work and falling behind, unable to keep up with the fast pace of teaching.

eyeoresancerre · 18/02/2018 13:47

If you're looking for a good place to start there is Twinkl. It's subscription but it will tell you what your child should be learning in each Year group. You have PowerPoints and corresponding worksheets and assessment stuff for the end of each topic. Really worth a look. Lots of teachers use it and it's easy to navigate around too. Good luck, it's going to be a really exciting time.

DarkStuff · 18/02/2018 13:54

Have a look on Facebook for local home ed groups. You will probably be able to find others who have removed their children from school in similar circumstances. Home ed can be daunting, particularly in the early days- making connections with others is therefore incredibly valuable.

You don't need to be a teacher, but you do need to be willing to put in the time and effort to help your child learn, and to learn alongside them if necessary.

crazycrofter · 18/02/2018 23:42

We de-registered ds in May of year 4 - he was unhappy, suffered on-off bullying and the school was in special measures. We home educated until end of year 6 and he’s now at secondary. It really boosted his confidence and he’s had no problems making friends at secondary school. I’d give it a go if I was you!

GingerIvy · 19/02/2018 09:53

We've been home educating for about 3 years now. It takes awhile to get into a good rhythm. We are semi-structured. We loosely follow the curriculum, but allow the dcs to choose some interests to study as well.

Twinkl is good (we have it) but it does cost money. You can also access teacherspayteachers (.com) and search for worksheets and such. It's an American site, so there are occasionally some spelling differences, but we use it a lot. Membership is free, and when you do a search,click on "free" for one of the search options. There are literally thousands of things on there and more added all the time.

I joined a facebook group called PopArtHomeEducation.You can get apps and other resources at a much reduced cost through them. We've been using this for the last two years and it's been brilliant.

It's been great to see my dcs progressing at a much better pace than they did in school, as well as develop friendships with children in various activities. You can find local activities and meetups on FB local home ed groups. Also keep in mind that many places (especially in London) provide a reduced home ed rate or even allow home ed children in free for some things if booked in advance.

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