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

Do I have the inner resources to HE?

2 replies

emmaagain · 13/01/2008 12:35

Quoting from another thread

"do i have enough resources within me to give my dcs the full attention they deserve? I know they will get more attention from me than they do at school, but what if I feel so emotionally drained after a few weeks months that I cannot manage? is this stupid? what if i really mess it up and miss something that i should share with my dcs, what if i fail them?"

I think everyone worries about this beforehand.

Here's some other things to throw into the melting pot.

HE groups and email lists are your way of recharging - of chatting with other HE families, asking for advice, getting inspiration and, at the HE meet ups, having the children haring around with other children while you get to sit (metaphorically) at the feet of HE parents with lots more experience than you. Really reassuring. You will not be alone.

Yes, educating your children would be, very starkly, your responsbility. Actually, legally, nothing has changed. In law, parents of schooled children are responsible for their children's education - so if a school completely c*cked up and didn't manage to teach a child to read, even, the parents have no legal redress. You can't sue a school for providing a terrible education.

Now, let's see. What sort of track record do you have, hmm? hmm? Teaching qualifications? hmmm? hmmm? Wait a sec... your children learned to sit. They learned to walk. They learned to talk. They learned to run and jump and turn the pages in a book. They learned to climb on the monkey bars and they learned to throw stones in puddles. They learned to wield a crayon and to stir a bowl of cake mixture. You used your instinct, didn't you, to offer a helping hand when it was wanted or needed, to back off and remain quiet when your child got that little furrow in their brown which shows they are concentrating hard. You provided materials you thought they'd enjoy. HE is just a continuation of the glories of toddlerdom. As you child has developed interests so far, you have found ways consistent with your values and your budget of nurturing and helping them to develop those interests. That just continues.

What they need, they'll demand. It might well be on a different schedule from school children - so school children might be doing fractions already, and you might be biting your nails slightly because your children are showing no interest at all in that, but actually, they are also doing advanced circuitry with one of their uncles on a Saturday afternoon, which the school children won't get to till they are in year 12. Don't worry about missing something. There is no golden moment when something must be learned and it's impossible after that (although I know that's the impression the educational establishment often gives, but it's really more to do with the practicalities of looking after lots of children at once - you really need to know that all 30 children have "done" fractions before you starting trying to "do" long division with them all, say).

You will need to watch out for getting emotionally drained. You may well need a break. If you are full time SAHM, then Saturdays maybe need to be your time, when your Dh is in charge of everyone and you head off to a coffee shop with a novel for a few hours. As you get to know other HE families, you'll start having playdates, and as the children become confident with each other, you'll be able to juggle with the other mothers so that one of you pops off and puts her feet up for an hour while the others are in charge of the flock. As more and more people are turning to HE, there is more and more possibility of community.

Does that help with any of the anxieties?

Other things to think about from your other post:

  1. it's not for ever. You can take a child out of school and then put them back in next year. Of course the teachers are resistant because your child will have been doing different things from the others - in some aspects they'd be playing catch up, in others they'd be cruising. but teachers have to cope with that all the time with children of different abilities anyway.

  2. If your child is not happy at school NOW, might it be worth taking them out of school NOW rather than waiting till the end of the school year? What is gained by waiting? The procedure is: you write an official letter (template at the Education Otherwise site), hand it in at the school office and get a receipt... and remove your child from the premises. You don't have to give notice. You don't have to ask permission (unless you are in Scotland).

OP posts:
ilove8pm · 13/01/2008 14:02

hello emmagain. Thank you so much, I have only read this through once and there is a lot to take from it so I will be returning to it later today to give me some encouragement!!
Firstly, it is all definitely making more sense now about ways I can avoid becoming drained physically and emotionally. And you are of course right, I have taught my dcs thus far and we have managed ok, so I can imagine us carrying on and still being ok! We do also have family with gifts/talents etc they can share with the dcs. I dont think i could get my dcs back into the same school once they were removed TBH! not that thats a bad thing necessarily, but it worries me. I dont know why I dont remove him now, except that I am still anxious about the idea and have questions. I also would need my dhs support and he is less keen than me to HE.

discoverlife · 13/01/2008 20:15

Concerning the different speed that children learn things, DS can't do fractions or the 6 times table. But 4 days ago he was building a computer from scratch under his big brothers supervision. Now hows that for a DS 10yo with Special needs.
One childs NEEDS are definatly not anothers, as HE'ing mums on here will tell you.

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