Home education

[loodledoo]

My DH is really keen for me to home educate our DD, she’s currently only 18 months so we’re a way off but I’d be really interested in others experiences of home educating their children in the UK. I’d love to know what a typical day looks like and what resources are available to you in your local area to help with home educating, such as groups with other home educated children, and what made you decide home educate your children/ what you think the benefits are, please. I’m looking into this now because if we do decide to home educate I’d like to do some sort of home preschool prior to her being primary school age. Thank you so much in advance.

This is such a common misunderstanding of HE and totally false. There is masses of socialising with HE groups. HE children learn to socialise with different ages, older and younger unlike school where children are essentially forced into socialising only with children the same age. HE children learn to care for younger children and learn from older children. My DD had plenty if friends in her HE groups snd classes as well as at her extra curricular activities and hobbies.

@DontGoJasonWaterfallswhat an aggressive, weird response! Clearly you and @friskeryare so absolute in your derision and disdain - I wish you both well, sincerely 🙏🏼

@Iamthemoom not all children go to home education social group though..

*sighs

Having homeschooled for 7 years (age 9-16) I never heard of anyone who didn’t attend groups and/or tutoring, classes etc. I had conversations with the HE officers about this too. I think it’s a myth that HE kids are isolated at home other than in exceptional circumstances.

I'm laughing because you said "afford respect to those who actually teach", as though home ed is an affront to you in some way.

In one of the UK's biggest home ed Facebook groups, a quick search for "ex teacher" turns up hundreds of results.

Then you've negated to consider the wider context of my contributions, in your haste to attack.
FWIW, BTECs are a better fit for FE for HE'd candidates - less pressure, more in line with study style, pre FE -and generate tariff points

HTH

Our area has a home Ed centre where children can study in small groups with a tutor or do classes for GCSE’s and they organise the exams. DD got 8 GCSE’s at top grades, taking 6 via the HE centre, one with another group and one via one to one tutoring. The same centre did primary level learning too in small groups and lots of trips and activities. Another local centre did forest school and creative groups. DD attended dance and drama classes and two sports activities that were after school type activities. As a result ste made friends in the He community and kids who went to school. We did it from 9-16 then she went to 6th form at school. If we could go back in time we would have done it from the start and never sent her to school. HE was way better for us - better teaching, better socialisation, more diverse community, better opportunities and no bullying. But we were blessed with lots of great groups in our county.

This is so interesting.

Look, you've said multiple times that home education has bad outcomes and the young people can't do A Levels and all that jazz - so why are you so bothered by the opinions of home educators? Your posts on this thread are pure projection - talk of "affording respect" and "being a first aider doesn't mean I'm a doctor" - where are these insecurities about your role as an educator coming from?

Ignore everything else in my post if you like, but I'd love for you to answer just this one question - why do you feel that respect isn't being afforded to you?

I wish I'd done a BTEC at college to be honest, they definitely had more fun on their course than I had in my A Levels. DD currently wants to be a florist and cafe owner by day and a sociology researcher and actress by night (🤷‍♀️) so who knows what she'll do post-16?! 😅

In my experience (7 years HE from 9-16) this is rubbish. DD has just been predicted 3 A stars at A level based on her mocks and got top grades in her GCSE’s. Most of her HE friends did equally well at gcse. Why wouldn’t they do well with tiny groups and/or one to one tuition as opposed to classes of 30+?

Well, aside from the HUGE poetic licence you've employed...
Your takeaways are very much in the territory of Freudian Slip
I would not have spent 20 years in a classroom if I did not care about young people and their progression/outcomes. The fact you frame this as my position is frankly, odd. Why are you so intrepid in your pursuit of what you assume is my anti HE?
Read my posts - and responses to others - your solipsistic view is really rather weakening - and, I'm sorry to say, all too familiar
Why are you so adversarial?

My post referred to HEd joining A Levels in large FE setting - post 16

It's such a simple question.

Why do you feel like home educators aren't affording you respect, and why do you feel they should afford you any more respect than they would anyone else?

You should look at online schools as well. They are just like a normal school except the kids are at home instead of in a classroom.

LOL - as was mine?
Honestly, neither me or my colleagues are spending their days feeling/contemplating what you assume as a slur in their daily practice - it's all in your head...
Why are you so angry, to the point you're fixated on a contextual point?
Up post, I advocating employing a tutor for reading comprehension and critical thinking skills - kindly, sincerely, consider

All best in your pursuits

I couldn’t imagine anything worse! Why is your husband so keen? Why can’t he do it if he thinks it’s such a great idea?

Thanks for advocating tutors; I am one and it's always nice to see people recommending them.

As for everything else... maybe just avoid the home ed board if it feels like such an affront to your profession.

LOLZ - course you are!
And yes, I will avoid your echo chamber - thanks for advocating 🙌🏼

It might not suit your "home educators don't respect teachers" agenda or whatever garbled point you were trying to make, but I am a former English teacher and a tutor in English and literacy. Oh, and a home educating parent.

We home ed our youngest due to SEND, school just wasn't a good fit. I feel guilty because our older 2 didn't have that experience.

Home ed is not as hard as people would like youbto believe. We loosely follow the national curriculum which is available online and add in areas of interes.

There are loads of home ed groups on facebook, it is a case of join them all and show up to groups. Some will fit and some won't.

The stereotype of home ed kids aren't properly socialised is nonsense. When I send my home ed son in a shop I have had the shopkeeper coming out to tell me how polite he was. We go to home ed meet ups where there are older siblings tagging along, they can hold a decent conversation with adults in a way that most teenagers can't.

I was home educated from age 9 to 16, doing my GCSEs at home before going to sixth form college for my A levels and then on to university. There were plenty of groups for socialising and activities, and I went to quite a few. I also did the same kind of extracurricular activities that kids at school did, like Guides and youth theatre. That was about ten years ago and there are a lot more opportunities now. Socially, I found it much better than being at school. I'd be happy to answer any questions about home ed if I can be of help.🙂

More hyperbole, projection and conjecture. You clearly do have little respect for educators, and your aggression is plainly obvious - the reasons, however, are none of my business.
But may I ask, given your derision and disdain, why are you willing to hand over at L3?
*this is genuine question, asked in good faith

Edited to say:
If it were my child, I'd wait until 19, and enrol on an Access to HE Diploma. This would suit as it's course work: heavy self study (provided lectures, which are typically small groups, are attended), assignment briefs are clear and could be studied for, at home. The qual generates the same UCAS points as A Levels/BTECs and universities love Access candidates as hits their WP quotas.
For a young person who hasn't experienced the secondary socialisation which school provides, it's a great option! In addition, a HE'dr still gets to lead - which seems to be key for you?

You love to accuse me of hyperbole and then suggest that I have little respect for educators 🤣 all of my friends are either working or qualified teachers or lecturers, as am I.

I'm willing to hand over at whatever point DD says she wants to try school/college, because that's something we've told her from the start. If at any point we or she feel it's no longer working or she wants to try something different, we try it. We can always deregister her again if it's not the right fit. At the moment, she talks about college after her GCSEs, so I'm working under the assumption that's something she'd like to try.

I knew it wouldn't be long until the secondary socialisation was wheeled out 🤣 oh yes, that sounds like a good idea because like all home ed children, my child is kept in a cupboard at all times and never ever sees other children 😉

Thanks for the suggestion of the Access to HE diploma though, will keep that in mind. Once she's got her GCSEs, she's got all the options at her disposal.

What often seems to get missed is that just because something looks different when a child is school or home educated, doesn't mean the thing isn't there at all - it just looks different. Eg socialisation at school is generally with a group of 30 children (more at secondary obviously) of a similar age, giving several options for friend groups especially if there is mixing of year groups and a range of after school clubs. Socialisation for home educated children looks different (eg extra curricular clubs, meetups arranged by parents, centered around interests or academic goals) and might be with children from a wider geographic area of different ages. Neither way automatically produces a happier / more sociable child. What matters is parental effort and support and how we encourage our DCs to build friendships.

We don’t HE our child, aged 9 - she’s in a Gaelic Medium Education school and while it’s not perfect we’re very happy with it.

What I came here to say is that (in Scotland at least) there are only 190 days of school in a year. That leaves over 170 days in which as an engaged and time-rich parent you can stealthily smuggle in all sorts of learning - reading, National Trust visits, museums, nature walks, theatre, science through baking together, etc, etc, etc.

Yes, kids need downtime but there’s still a huge amount you can provide.

It’s been interesting to read all the views on HE here, as it’s something we’ve genuinely never considered. I think if our child weren’t in GME we’d consider forest school one day a week but that’s a different issue.

The other thing that puzzles me is that if a family has enough resources for one parent to homeschool, then they could afford private education if that parent went out to work - at least with only one child. So are some HE families - setting aside the ones doing it for reasons of SEN etc - rejecting both state and private education?