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Home ed

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Decision to Home Ed or not?

3 replies

Sezza123123 · 30/05/2025 16:50

Hi, I just wanted any advice my daughter will be going into year 10 in September she struggles a lot academically and also with the school environment, she is on the ASD pathway and struggles with social cues etc I feel that if she stayed in school for the next 2 years she would be find it extremely difficult and to be honest would really struggle to get anything like a grade 4 pass and feel her mental health would be low where if she was at home she could do functional skills level 2 and prob be a lot happier. I am just really torn with the social side of things she won't do groups etc which I feel is ok we have large family etc it's more understanding emotions and cues etc has anyone any advice please? ☺️

OP posts:
Saracen · 30/05/2025 18:34

My teenager has a learning disability (not autism) and I feel that home education has given her the opportunity to develop better social skills than if she were at school. In the wider world, outside of school, there is less jockeying for social position, less meanness, less exclusion. So she hasn't been subjected to that. Though some people will tell you that you can't wrap kids in cotton wool and they have to learn to stick up for themselves, I don't think they learn that by being chucked into an overwhelming situation with no one to guide them. Besides, it's doubtful that they will need to deal with such unpleasant behaviour as adults. Adults have more options, such as the choice to leave.

So my daughter has high self esteem. She knows that she is just as good as anyone else, and that her worth doesn't depend on passing GCSEs or behaving like a cool kid. She has friends of all ages and abilities who like her for who she is. I am able to give her a lot of coaching on social situations. For example, she recently asked a teenaged male friend to go see a play with her, as a friend, and I gave her tips on how to ensure he knew it wasn't meant as a date. Somebody made some offensive jokes on a social media group chat, and I helped her come up with the words to shut it down assertively. We talk about money, who should pay for what, when and how to offer. If I notice that one of her friends is sad or annoyed with her, I take her aside and point it out and suggest how she could respond.

It isn't just me; she has a good community of helpful people to teach her. I expect your daughter does too, what with your large family. This is a fine place to socialise and learn adult skills, with people who love her and are in it for the long run. Maybe someday when she has recovered from her school experiences, she will have the energy and desire to make other friends, or maybe she won't feel the need for that. My daughter's best friend, who has autism, was perfectly content to spend lockdown with his mum and chat with friends on social media. I think it was over a year before he said he missed his friends and asked his mum whether he could meet my daughter in the park! But eventually he did. Now at 16 he is increasingly sociable and has friends round several times a week; my daughter is going round to his house later this evening for a film night. His mum keeps a very close eye out because he occasionally says or does rash things which might land him in trouble, and she's ready to intervene before it gets out of hand.

They're getting there, these kids. They won't be "finished" learning how to be adults by 16 or 18. That's okay. There is no rush. They get there in their own time.

Sezza123123 · 30/05/2025 19:35

Saracen · 30/05/2025 18:34

My teenager has a learning disability (not autism) and I feel that home education has given her the opportunity to develop better social skills than if she were at school. In the wider world, outside of school, there is less jockeying for social position, less meanness, less exclusion. So she hasn't been subjected to that. Though some people will tell you that you can't wrap kids in cotton wool and they have to learn to stick up for themselves, I don't think they learn that by being chucked into an overwhelming situation with no one to guide them. Besides, it's doubtful that they will need to deal with such unpleasant behaviour as adults. Adults have more options, such as the choice to leave.

So my daughter has high self esteem. She knows that she is just as good as anyone else, and that her worth doesn't depend on passing GCSEs or behaving like a cool kid. She has friends of all ages and abilities who like her for who she is. I am able to give her a lot of coaching on social situations. For example, she recently asked a teenaged male friend to go see a play with her, as a friend, and I gave her tips on how to ensure he knew it wasn't meant as a date. Somebody made some offensive jokes on a social media group chat, and I helped her come up with the words to shut it down assertively. We talk about money, who should pay for what, when and how to offer. If I notice that one of her friends is sad or annoyed with her, I take her aside and point it out and suggest how she could respond.

It isn't just me; she has a good community of helpful people to teach her. I expect your daughter does too, what with your large family. This is a fine place to socialise and learn adult skills, with people who love her and are in it for the long run. Maybe someday when she has recovered from her school experiences, she will have the energy and desire to make other friends, or maybe she won't feel the need for that. My daughter's best friend, who has autism, was perfectly content to spend lockdown with his mum and chat with friends on social media. I think it was over a year before he said he missed his friends and asked his mum whether he could meet my daughter in the park! But eventually he did. Now at 16 he is increasingly sociable and has friends round several times a week; my daughter is going round to his house later this evening for a film night. His mum keeps a very close eye out because he occasionally says or does rash things which might land him in trouble, and she's ready to intervene before it gets out of hand.

They're getting there, these kids. They won't be "finished" learning how to be adults by 16 or 18. That's okay. There is no rush. They get there in their own time.

Thank you so much for your reply it has given me positivity around being home educated, yes she will have lots of chances to be social with different people we see family and she has 1 or 2 good friends that she could still see etc. My son is current year 11 and is academic so even though he doesn't particularly enjoy school he has got through it but my daughter just isn't suited to school academically or emotionally, I think school just doesn't suit everyone. Thank you 😊

OP posts:
Saracen · 30/05/2025 20:17

You're welcome!

Yes, I think we have become accustomed to thinking the school environment is a good place to make friends and learn social skills for later life. But there are aspects to it which are very different from what you get in most adult environments. It's true that some jobs involved being crowded together with lots of people all day long, but that's rare. I once worked in a big bureaucracy where most of us had offices with three or four people sharing. Then there was one huge open-plan office had 20 desks. It was about twice the size of a typical secondary classroom, so they had more space than schoolchildren. Everyone hated it and went to great lengths to avoid getting transferred there. Its nickname was "Hell". Even sociable neurotypical people can find such a loud crowded environment overstimulating. Heaven help the introverts and people with noise sensitivity! Most of us can choose to avoid work environments which resemble school.

Something else I realised long after leaving school was the lack of privacy, which meant all social interactions were public. If a girl chatted with a boy, everyone said she fancied him. Anyone who was nice to an unpopular kid lost social standing. If you were interested in a lesson, you mustn't talk to the teacher for fear of being called a swot. This meant that genuine trusting relationships were risky, and teens couldn't afford to be open.

Being free of that fear, my kids have been able to develop good relationships more easily than I ever did at school. If someone at their sports group took a dislike to them and made them unhappy, they could go elsewhere and associate with other friends. That one sports group doesn't dominate their social life in the way that school does. So I overhear my teens and their friends openly mentioning being afraid of dogs, or going to bed far earlier than everyone else, or not having a smartphone, or being unable to read or ride a bike or understand some innuendo. They don't feel shame about it. None of these things diminishes them in their friends' eyes.

That's how it should be. People say, "Teens can be mean," as if it were some universal truth. But I don't agree. I think teens can become mean when they are cooped up together in a stressful place from which they can't escape. We no longer think that zoo animals kept together in small cages show the same natural social behaviour they would in the wild. Why would teenagers be any different?

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