Homeschooling for 14 year old

[MumAli]

My DS has been finding high school difficult, he wants to homeschool which is something we have done before at the start of covid when schools closed but I don't know where to start here in the UK (we homeschooled in America before). If there are any resources that would help me please let me know.

If you homeschool your teen do you do it online?

This is not the route I wanted us to take but he is so stubborn and he decided to drop out of high school, I have tried everything to try to get him to go back but he isn't having any of it. He didn't even want to homeschool but i've convinced him to do it.

I really am at my wits end so any advice would be much appreciated!

[KateW73]

Hi
I home educated my son from age 10 to 16. He's now at 6th form.

When he was struggling at school, being bullied and the school having no interest in addressing it, I googled 'home education' along with the county I live in - the search came up with a local group of home educators. I emailed and arranged to meet up with a family in person (that being before the pandemic) which was really useful. I think what I wanted most at that time was the reassurance that there would be other families, other kids his age, doing the same thing, and that they wouldn't all be weirdos! The family I met was lovely.

I also found //www.educationotherwise.org useful - they have advise on the legalities of home educating and a template letter if you do decide to go ahead and de-register your son from school.

I did go ahead soon after meeting with the first home ed family, and many others locally were very helpful when we were finding our feet. Facebook is the platform that most home ed groups use, so its the easiest way to find others near you.

I think where our situation differs, is that my son was 10 and fairly compliant at that age (that did subsequently change - like it does for most kids) so I can see that starting home ed at age 10 could be a lot different to starting at age 14.

When we first started, we went out a lot, meeting up for informal groups as well as to exercise, but not many groups that were for formal learning (we did that on our own at home). In his teens, he started at face-to-face lessons for some subjects, but they switched to online groups because of the pandemic. They were with //www.aweclub.co.uk . My son took GCSEs as a private candidate during the pandemic (which was a struggle to organise) and he's now at a 6th form studying A levels.

I've also met families who decided not to bother with exams but concentrate on gaining useful skills and work experience and go straight into applying for jobs. That seemed to work for them.

A 14 year old does need to be 'receiving a full time education' but that doesn't mean it has to look like what he'd been doing in school. The education otherwise website will have some information on what legally you would need to do to remain within the law.

Best of luck x

[MumAli]

Thank you so much for your response, I feel much better now about it. I will have a look at the websites you sent me.

My biggest worry was him not making friends and ending up lonely but he says he will make friends when we move to our new neighborhood but we have no clue who our neighbors will be! Praying it all works out x

[Saracen]

Reading between the lines of your OP, it sounds like you and your son did not particularly enjoy lockdown schooling and that you both expect home education would look similar. Neither of you really likes the idea, but he hates school so much that he has reluctantly agreed to do it, and you feel you have no choice since you can't make him go to school and you want him to have an education. Have I understood that right?

There's a risk the two of you may find yourselves at loggerheads. I suggest reading about different approaches to home education and doing some experimenting to see what works. Don't get too attached to a particular plan. It's important to be flexible and responsive to your son's needs. After all these years in the school system, you and he may need some time to figure out what he does need. It could look radically different from school or tutoring.

For example, my kids (now 22 and 15) followed a method called "unschooling" or "autonomous education", in which they decided for themselves what and when and how to learn. Most of their learning has been informal until the older one went to university, though they did choose to do a few courses here and there. That approach could suit a kid who has become disengaged from learning by being in a setting which isn't right for him.

There are many approaches you could try. Going along to a local home ed group and talking to other parents of teens could give you more ideas.