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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.

Experience of online GCSE providers

5 replies

bluefootedpenguin · 26/08/2023 08:27

Hi all,

The crux of the issue is my daughter has severe anxiety and OCD. Undergoing CBT awaiting further assessment from CAMHS, all suspect ASD.

I can’t see how she will go back to school in September. She is barely coping with no demand in the Summer holidays and is already very anxious about returning. I am unwilling to compromise her mental health further and we have been talking about our options.

I don’t think she will be able to access anything at the moment, but we have talked about possibly using an online school for GCSEs. I wondered if anyone had any direct experience or
recommendations they would share?

TIA

OP posts:
Thatsshallot1967 · 27/08/2023 21:51

Hi. I can't help with personal experience but found this down thread. All the best to your DD.

Online GCSE learning www.mumsnet.com/Talk/home_ed/4822666-online-gcse-learning

bluefootedpenguin · 28/08/2023 07:26

Thanks, much appreciated.x

OP posts:
CroydonMetropolitanCollege · 30/08/2023 11:47

This reply has been deleted

This has been deleted by MNHQ for breaking our Talk Guidelines.

Saracen · 30/08/2023 16:58

My kids haven't had anxiety problems, so I don't have any first-hand experience. I have crossed paths with many teens who have. The standard advice is to give them a complete break from any enforced academic work, encourage them to do whatever makes them happy, focus on mental health, and just let them recover first. There is no particular advantage to doing exams at 16 rather than any other age. Only at school is everyone expected to do a large number of exams all at once at a set age, and labelled "behind" or a failure if they don't.

Given that you say your daughter has been barely coping, she may not be in the right frame of mind to start an online school or make any major decisions. However, once the fear of returning to school has been lifted from her, she might start to be more relaxed and ready to learn. There is no rush. GCSEs are pretty stressful for most kids, and maybe this isn't the right time for your daughter to jump into a formal programme involving deadlines which will pile more demands on her.

You could instead start off with other types of learning which don't involve assessment and producing output, but just learning. Start off with your daughter's favourite subjects to give her a boost to her confidence, and just let her explore. It doesn't have to be the sort of topics which are taught at school, and it doesn't have to lead to a qualification to be educational. Of course qualifications are often useful in the long run, but there's plenty of time for that later. I would get your daughter on an even keel first.

Through their teens, my eldest (who had a different health issue) spent a huge amount of time on self-directed art, plus various other things which interested them. They sat one GCSE at 19 and one at 20 before going to university, having been admitted via portfolio and relevant work experience. Uni is going brilliantly! Though I didn't realise it at the time, looking back, it seems to me that doing the usual number of GCSEs at 16 would have been a very bad decision for my child. Not only is it likely to have wrecked their health, but it would have robbed them of the time to get really good at what they loved.

At no point did my kid say, "I'm never doing GCSEs." It was a case of "I'm not doing them this year. I can always do them later if I decide I need them."

bluefootedpenguin · 30/08/2023 19:40

Thanks for the response, it echoes some of the conversations I’ve had with friends and teachers recently.

I totally agree that she isn’t in the right place to engage with learning at the moment, she needs to concentrate on her well-being.

It’s wonderful to hear your child is doing so well having taken a slightly different route.

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