Whether to home educate (part ii)
I’m trying to decide whether I’ll send my kids to school like the majority of people do or whether I’ll keep them at home and provide their education myself with plenty of visits to interesting places.
Here are some comments from various websites/people who have experience in home educating and extoil the benefits it brings:
Read responses to the post ‘Your Top 3 Reasons for Home-educating‘ on Mumsnet
Non-schooled children often have a confidence and different outlook on life which their schooled counterparts don’t have. This partly results from the fact that they have not been continuously tested to satisfy someone-else’s agenda, not constantly measured against others, not regarded as backward or below-average in any way, been encouraged to follow their interests and have, on the whole, been treated respectfully as regards what they do and don’t want to do in life. They see their future as more under their own control than predetermined by others. Life is seen as something to look forward to - not a chore.
Alan Harris-Reid: PARENTS – TRUST YOUR CHILDREN. LET THEM BE. (Alternative title – “Am I doing the right thing?”) http://www.education-otherwise.org/Links/HE_Adult_St/Harris-Reid.htm
http://www.education-otherwise.org/Links/HE_Adult_St/EO_Member_Story.htm
There are as many reasons for this as there are families doing it. Here are a few of them: children’s ill health; unhappiness, loss of a ‘childhood’, bullying, children turning into unrecognisable aliens! Poor academic achievement despite intelligence; lack of support for learners’ needs; lack of respect for children - their personalities and gifts; the increasing stress of testing and attainment targets; poor interaction with others in schools - both children and teachers alike; narrowing of the curriculum; intense pressure; unreasonable expectation put upon children and teenagers.
In general; miserable, stressed, switched off kids. And the deep inherent feeling in parents that surely there has to be another way.
Surely a successful life in the real world after school years is not dependent on this!
You’ll be glad to know, it isn’t!
To put some other worries at rest; educating out of school is legal, you don’t have to be a teacher, your kids do make friends, there is support, you will not be alone or the only ones, children do learn, and finally home educating does work!
We, like many others, feel that there are many paths to learning. Children are inherently inquisitive people at the start of their young lives and if left to their own devices, with the normal interaction all families have with the world, it would be difficult to stop them learning! Learning is going on in whatever they are doing – playing, painting, shopping, using the computer, chatting with friends, riding their bikes, using the internet, watching Time Team, having a conversation at tea time or bedtime or in the back of the car! They ask questions all the time – unless they’ve been switched off which so often happens in school.
Many Home educators become confident that nearly all activities are ‘educational’, whether they are in the home or out in museums, parks, play centres, places of interest, library, sports centres, clubs, groups, friends’ houses.
And although the children do not follow the completely structured approach they are bright, intelligent people who are developing their skills all the time.
http://www.education-otherwise.org/Links/HE_Adult_St/rmount.htm
September 23rd, 2006 at 2:06 am
It’s a really difficult choice, so good luck to you!
For what it’s worth, I’ve just started helping out at a school that’s co-owned by the parents, and it’s made a couple of things clear(ish) to me. The first is that without any home education, running a school becomes incredibly hard - i.e. if parents don’t chip in, and take responsibility, then the teachers can’t really function. And the second is that education & learning is at least 50% social. For sure, we’re teaching them stuff - and they’re learning a lot - but the best things they’re learning (in my view) are social. Things like the idea that people have wildly different views and approaches, how to get on with people you don’t particularly click with, how to respect each other, why bullying is so horrible etc.
I’m not saying this can’t be done at home, just that if I had kids I would find it incredibly hard to give them that social education. Anyway, good luck with your decision, whichever way you decide to go.