If you did home ed in primary, what about secondary?

[SprigatitoYouAndIKnow]

My children are neurodivergent. Their school has been supportive and made adaptations, but it is still not able to meet their needs. Ds2 in particular needs lots of outdoor time and to be in self directed learning. Ds1 copes better, but has still had a lot of ebsa and anxiety. They are still in primary now and we are seeing how we can home ed them instead of returning in September.

My main concern is whether they would then be able to attend secondary, as I really am not sure I have the skills to teach them gcse's etc. There are also more groups locally for younger home ed kids, but I am worried about the social side as they get older. I can't imagine they would just slot into conforming to strict secondary life when they can't even manage now.

How have people here found home ed as children get older?

The reasons you don't see so many HE groups for older kids are various. Older kids are more selective about who they will socialise with and what they want to do, and often more anxious of rejection, and parents are less able to take them along to groups despite any initial reluctance: they may simply refuse. You can't just chuck them into a park together and tell them to make friends with the other kids like you could when they were younger (not that that works for all young kids!) By that age some of them will feel they already have as many friends as they want, and they just arrange to meet up with them privately. They have rather less time on their hands due to GCSE study - more time than schoolchildren have, but less than when they were younger. Parents of teens are more likely to be working more hours, and have less time to ferry kids around and organise groups for them.

That is hard for kids who start HE at the age of, say, 15. With luck, yours will have found friends by then. It's possible but tricky to set up your own HE activities which suit your teens and hope to attract others to them. Your kids might socialise more outside the HE community via clubs and with old friends etc.

So yes, I do think the social side may be a challenge for HE teens, but less of a challenge for families who started home education when their kids were younger. With luck, your lads will have their feet under the table by then.

I would be concerned about the transition to secondary school without the support of primary school and going from home all the time to a big school. My 12 year old ND DS had a lot of visits to his secondary in advance, with his school, and went up with peers. It would be hard for a child to adjust to that alone I think (and they probably wouldn't know anyone?).

Some ND kids find secondary harder than primary. For some it is the other way round. And of course there are many who find both setting intolerable. It may be that one or both of your kids will like secondary even though it doesn't look that way now.

Regardless, home ed now gives them the opportunity to experiment in a setting where their needs can potentially be well met. For instance, if they like going to a certain museum but it is sometimes overcrowded, they can have the experience of going when it is less crowded. Or perhaps they will discover that they can get reasonable enjoyment from the crowded museum for one hour but no more, provided that the rest of the day is calm. So they learn more about themselves, how to meet their own needs, how to advocate for themselves. By contrast, at school they would just have to suck it up, because the museum trip is when it is regardless of crowds and lasts however long it lasts regardless of whether it's too much for an individual. So, ironically, home education can actually provide a better preparation for secondary school as it will have allowed kids to develop a better awareness of their needs and how to manage them.

If they carry on being home educated at secondary stage, I think you will find it more manageable than you expect. Before then, you'll have time to get settled in and look at slightly older HE kids and see what options there are. You don't have to know it all; you just have to be prepared to help them find the resources they need to learn what they want to learn. The parent's role is often that of researching, networking, and encouraging rather than teaching.

The subjects which my eldest focused on were ones I knew absolutely nothing about: art, music, sports coaching. They learned some of that stuff entirely off their own back, and in some cases I used the tremendously active and helpful home ed network to identify opportunities for them.

There was one subject (maths) which I do know about which they belatedly decided to study. Great, I thought: Finally, something I can help with!!! I have a maths degree and much experience of tutoring the subject. I will instil in my child a deep love for mathematics and at least a basic competence. Did they want my help to learn GCSE maths? Did they, heck 😂😂😂All offers were politely declined. These scenarios often don't pan out as you expect, but they do work out one way or another. They got the mark they wanted. As for me, well, I guess I could go teach maths to somebody else's kid if I feel too thwarted at home 😆

I know a lot of ND home educated kids who have gone to secondary. Some are happy there, some aren't. Some stay, some don't. Knowing that they have the option to leave again if they really need to can help them to tolerate the problems.

What they do have is confidence. They know what it feels like to be in a setting which works for them. If school is a poor fit for them, they realise on a deep level that it isn't because they are failures; it's just not the right place for them. If they do stay on at school despite school being less than perfect for them, they are often able to articulate what the problems are, and sometimes to find solutions.

I found this really helpful. Thanks @SprigatitoYouAndIKnow and @Saracen @WinterV2point0

I home schooled my youngest son until he was 12.
He just woke up one morning in September ( when he would have started secondary school) and said he’d like to go.

I then had to appeal to get him into the school his siblings had gone to.

And, he started on the 5th of November- he settled in well, got on with his peers and fortunately his home schooling was on par with the education of the other pupils so he didn’t struggle and he successfully left school with 9 excellent GCSEs.

With the difficulties your children are facing it could be a mixed bag with home schooling on one hand the safety of you and your understanding of their issues will be a massive bonus, but it might be a huge stress on you and you may not be able to access some of the support network a school can or the specialist training they have - I also found the way home schoolers are perceived a little judgey and this may be harder for you.
iI also don’t know how smooth the transistion to secondary school would be for your children either.
But you have to do what you think best with your children at this point in time.

My 3 children were all EHE and we did not do GCSE at the same time as schooled kids. Ours went to collage at 16 and did English and maths GCSE plus a level 1or 2 b-tec in 1 year and then did their level 3 b-tec the following 2 years. All got places at university - just a year later than 'normal' but lots of others were the same age. Only saying this so you know that you do not need to worry about teaching gcse's as there are other ways of doing things. My oldest grandson is 15 and we are following the same plan for him and expect to for all 7 of my grandkids who are all EHE. None of mine had issues with friends - but again they already had extensive friendship groups before entering the more tricky teenage years.

Thank you to everyone, so many good points. I feel I do need to parent the children we have now rather than a potential issue in years to come. They are already very good at learning for themselves when it comes to their special interests. That does unfortunately mean that the one I to technology is always trying to bypass any parental controls we put on devices! I want them to be able to thrive and this isn't what that looks like. They do also have very different needs and interests, so it might be difficult to give them what they need. Also if we deregister and they want to go back to school, they will have lost their place at the current one. Argh! So much to consider.

So much to consider! It might help to split all the things into two categories:

1. Things that affect our decision at this very moment
2. Things we have to bear in mind, adapt to, or make a plan for in the future

I would probably say the hypothetical 'if they want to go back to the same school' scenario falls into the second category. Possibly not a reason to keep them in school right now, but instead something you might need to handle in the future.

@sleepworkmum that is really useful, thank you. My head is spinning so much that you are right, I need to decide what current things are most important.

Have you thought about Forest school?

Assuming we deregister in September, then yes definitely. There are a couple near us that do home ed days in term time. Could afford to have them do a day a week. They are having a day at each in their holiday club to see which they like best. Both have loved forest school at their school, but they only get a tiny amount every second year there, so not nearly enough.