Be honest, I want everyone's views......what do you think of home ed???

[3Ddonut]

I suspect this may get nasty, but please try to keep it nice ladies (and gents) I really like the idea of home ed, I would dearly love to home ed my dc but there are some problems, firstly I work 3 nights a week and my dh works 2 full days,my eldest dd is 5 and she really loves school, but some of things that she says about school unsettle me, I always said that it is their choice if they want to go to school or not, which is why she is there and my ds is in nursery but I wish she'd want to stay home and the longer that she's there, the more I feel that we're wasting time...

I've read a lot of the other threads and see that you can do some home-ed stuff alongside school but I don't think that it's enough for me, I want them to remain interested and not be moved on from one thing too quickly or forced to spend time on things they dislike.

We're already a close family because of mine and dh's shifts there is nearly always someone in the house and we get to spend a lot of time with the kids. I suppose I'd just like it to be more of the same.

My main concerns are that the dc would resent us for it in the future (although I would not take a happy child out of school) I also worry about the effect of home ed-ing the children would have on future employers and university places, I do worry about the socialisation aspect although the kids are in a few groups and are very social, they interact well with adults as well as other children, I'm concerned about how much time I'd have to work with them with working full time myself (no opportunity to cut hours)

I'm going round in circles at the min, I think my ds would be more open to the idea and I'm considering not sending dd2 to nursery at all.

The other biggie is that the school they attend is out of area and it's a really good one, they wouldn't get back in there if we deregistered, I've considered flexi-schooling but I feel that would bring more problems than solutions....

OK, Open fire!!!

I don't think GCSEs and As would work with autonomous learning, TBH. But I'm sure someone will be along to say that they do.

Loads of them Bubble !!

I live in Stratford-upon-Avon (but hopefully not forever ).

I have been involved with a choir in recent years and am planning to have singing lessons in the near future.

Ta.

BUT why can't you do both? That's what i don't get.

We have done our family tree, and we have been horse riding. We haven't done an allotment, but we have grown things in pots if that counts. And this half term we went looking for fossils, and ds2 told us all about rocks, and we read books and chatted and we played on the computer and we played with our puppy and we went to a museum, and we do these things ALL YEAR LONG.

AND dd got to dress up in a pinafore and have victorian day to boot.

[flicks tea towel] I am tidying the kitchen, honest.

TM. National Curriculum means that, as you say - every child in the country will be doing X during the second week of term X.

I think it's a sinister plot by the govt to make sure that, if something terrible happens - every 6 ear old in the UK will know about bed-warming pans.

How do you mean they wouldn't work ?

Because they follow a curriculum ?

The thing is though, that most of us let our kids follow their own enthusiasms out of school time.

I've said this on other threads and been told that this isn't the same as HE which leaves me a little tbh

[throwing dishes about]

And then we do all that and yet ds's are offered things I couldn't offer them at school.

Sorry. I really am off now. Thank you for chat.

Sinister indeed...

It has just made me think back to the Steiner threads that have been around lately.

Their curriculum is standard...

'TM. National Curriculum means that, as you say - every child in the country will be doing X during the second week of term X.'

This simply isn't true. and never has been. there is also a degree of choice in the NC at KS2

Sorry and all that. Our kids don't do the same thing, at the same point in the term as each other! Different classes will be doing different things at different times

and for classes of different abilities there are different levels of study 'permitted', the must know, should know, and could know levels

It would be sinister TM if it were true, but it isn't.

DS1's SLD school has to follow the NC. They are incredibly creative whicb means it's all meaningful to him. So for example RE might be used as a an excuse to have a sensory lesson. And its delivered at a level that is appropriate to a class of non-verbal 8 year olds. There's no reason for it to be totally restrictive.

The difference is that if your child doesn't need to be in school for 6 hours a day you are free to go off on whatever tangent the initial 'learning activity' leads you to.

Although you can follow up these things during free-time (after school/weekends.) That moment of spontaneous interest will have passed.

MB - I know that many schooled kids do all sorts of activities out of school. If school is for them, then they are getting a really good deal, the best of both worlds in a way.

But they still spend a huge chunk of their week doing stuff that has been chosen for them to do by the Govt.

How are these things chosen ?

Why are they essential for all children to learn ?

So they can easily be compared. So that they can be taught in big classes. So not too many of them have very high ambitions (because we need people to do the boring jobs and accept it).

Sound paranoid i'm sure, but....

this is part of the detailed content from the histroy National curriculum for ks1

'During the key stage, pupils should be taught the Knowledge, skills and understanding through the following areas of study:

a) changes in their own lives and the way of life of their family or others around them

b) the way of life of people in the more distant past who lived in the local area or elsewhere in Britain

c) the lives of significant men, women and children drawn from the history of Britain and the wider world [for example, artists, engineers, explorers, inventors, pioneers, rulers, saints, scientists]

d) past events from the history of Britain and the wider world [for example, events such as the Gunpowder Plot, the Olympic Games, other events that are commemorated] .'

all quite vague, and giving the teachers quite a lot of room to chose what they loke. Note that the gunpowder plot isn't compulsory, just a 'for example'

and no-where does it say, On the first monday of term in september they will learn XYZ

MB. The National Primary Strategy should mean that subjects at primary level are taught in a more cross-curricular way. Until this kicks for each year group then yes, at our school, teachers are still teaching one lesson of 'shapes' during one term (as prescribed by the NC) and then revisiting the subject the following term - knowing that the 'taster' lesson will have been forgotten.

I am a parent gov and member of the curriculum committee. I'm also very used to hearing teachers complain that they feel stifled by the NC

KS1. Is that primary ?

Gunpowder plot too complicated for that age if it is.

Just touched on it in Access History and what I was taught in my final and only year at primary was a simplfied version of half of the story.

Not a good idea for history.

Popping to hang washing to dry. Not running away.

ahhh for a) I guess at ds1's school we had to send in photos of them as babies which they worked with- they used it as an opportunity to try and teach about growing up and babies as well.

For literacy they do a story each half term that gets acted out with lots of props. In one class each child had a big book made of the story - photos were then taken on the child dressed up and these were put in their big book with pictures from the story intermingled (the one I saw was Bear Hunt- it was great).

Ds2 has been bird watching at school, which was used in all sorts of teachign areas (maths, art, etc)

Oh I feel stifled by the NC. But what you said was ''TM. National Curriculum means that, as you say - every child in the country will be doing X during the second week of term X.'

which simply isn't true.

I'm teaching my year 7 class sex ed this week. My mate in the lab down the corridor is teaching Solids liquids and gases

primary school often have extra curricular activities , ds is off to a wood for some 'course work' next week. that would put a kibosh on the 'It's Monday the 7th , it Florence Nightingale'

ks1 is primary.

they don't do it to A level standard at that point

Much of the curriculum is spiral, topics are revisited over time. I have some issues with this

My kids took in pictures too, and did family trees for a

I remember doing Gunpowder plot aged 6. We did those crayon pictures where you put loads of different colours on the page then crayon over in black, then scratch off bits to make a picture. Hey presto fireworks pics!

Well. We'll have to agree to differ on that one, MB.

Our school has two weeks of 'curriculum enrichment' at the end of the summer term. We're fortunate to have this as other schools locally don't deviate from work leading to SATs.

I think family trees would have been a bit ambitious for ds1's class but apparently baby photos went down well.

Do you really think that all schools do exactly the same things at the same time?

Because it really, really isn't true, and never has been.

however, with the NC, "everyone" does the Victorians, and Ancient Egypt, and Famous People (in particular Grace Darling and Mary Seacole). DD2 is interested in the Vikings. No school round here (that I know of) covers the Vikings. We can at home (just need ot sort out a long weekend to York ).