GCSE

[sarahmole01]

Hi, starting to look for home schooling to do GCSE ,my son will be going into year 9 in September and is very unhappy at school. It is very overwhelming. Would love to hear anyones tips for children who have already done this, sciences would be his thing and he also struggles a little with writing long pages of work as has slight processing issues. Do any of the schools offer the right support to get them through the exams. It is a huge decision !! I see a few are not keen on Cambridge. Thanks

Hi! My 15yr old has been home educated for two years now, and it’s the best decision we have made. She has just sat a couple of IGCSEs, and will work towards a couple more over the next 6-12 months (one positive is that they can sit the exams either all in one go, or spaced out over as long as you wish to). Of course, there is no legal obligation for your child to take exams; there are other paths they may find more suited for them. One piece of advice I have is, if they choose to sit exams, you may wish to save a little each month towards the cost of them, as they aren’t cheap (we paid around £200 per subject).

I highly recommend joining a few home ed Facebook groups, as they have proved invaluable to us. They have all the information you will need. The initial advice is to take your time to sit and read through everything, as it can feel really overwhelming at the start of your home education journey. Your child may require a period of ‘deschooling’, which can be a much needed thing. There are many of members in the Facebook groups with the knowledge and know how to be able to help you further.

Best wishes OP 💐

You don't have to use online schools. Families often use different methods and different providers for the different subjects. For example, your son might do some subjects under his own steam, some with a one-to-one tutor either remotely or in person, and some with a local tutor-led study group alongside other home educated kids.

As @HeartandSeoul said, a popular approach is to spread exams out over several years. Some teens prefer to work intensively on a few subjects, sit the exam, and move on to other subjects the next year. More focus, less juggling. For this reason as well as other logistical reasons, local tutor-led exam preparation groups usually last one year rather than two.

Kids who are quite good at maths often sit that exam early because it is more straightforward than other subjects such as English language. Not easier as such, but clearer in terms of what you have to do to get the marks. English is often done later because people may draw on personal experience when writing their essays. The older you are, the more experience and maturity you have.

Now would be an ideal time to have a trial of home ed for a year and a bit, with a view to sending your son back to school at the start of Y10 if it feels like HE isn't the way to go. Leaving school now really isn't a big deal, because it doesn't represent a commitment to carry on with home education. Just try it. What do you have to lose? He's miserable at school now. It's in your power to relieve his unhappiness immediately.

By contrast, if you were to stick with school for now and then decide to remove your son later, that would become a more serious commitment to home ed for the rest of his secondary education. The GCSE years at school are very rigid, so it wouldn't be viable for him to return to school at (say) the beginning of Y11. School would take him - they have to take him if they have a vacancy - but they wouldn't know what to do with him, because he wouldn't have been doing the same curriculum and he'd be very much on the back foot. What's more, if you wait and take him out of school later, assuming he's eager to complete exams by the "usual" age (though he can sit them at any age), you'll be rushing madly to get to grips with how home ed works in relation to IGCSEs, panicking to find exam centres and meet deadlines to register for exams etc.

Starting home ed now gives you time for a leisurely start. You can network with other HE families and experiment with how your son learns best, well before exams are on the horizon.