Homeschooling - Thoughts as a parent or child with experience?

I was home educated, there's many different ways of doing it. In my area we had a newsletter which had regular events where we'd go and meet up, around 100 families. So work in the mornings then going off to the outside world in the afternoon. Now the issue I saw with this method is that it's a close-knit group. You get parents who have a child that doesn't fit in at school so they think "ah, home education, the alternative, that's where my kid belongs" but it doesn't always work like that. In fact it may be even harder because it's a small group who spends a lot of time together.

If I were to go through it with my own child though, I'd probably sign them up to different classes which would expose them to various different social groups plus they'll be learning something whether it's a martial art, literature, dancing, but teach them myself in the mornings using text books. I can't stand the thought of my kid going to some government school, my experience with other kids who went to the local school was quite dire, they were idiots always trying to fit in and the parents even more so, plus the schools give you all the busy work to take home, what a waste of a kid's precious years. If I had enough money I'd probably send them to a private school, but I'd teach them at home without a doubt to avoid government schools.

With the internet, you can learn all sorts of subjects online, at your own pace, without having to spend 7 hours in a class room. It's going to change the way education is looked at for sure.
 
Last edited:
Agree with all comments about the social aspect. I went to University with a lad who was home-schooled, and although he did brilliantly academically (he got amazing marks at uni too) his social capacity was poor. He could hold conversations and did get engaged but rarely if ever left the house and was always a little, not odd, but "different", to everybody else.
 
physichull said:
Agree with all comments about the social aspect. I went to University with a lad who was home-schooled, and although he did brilliantly academically (he got amazing marks at uni too) his social capacity was poor. He could hold conversations and did get engaged but rarely if ever left the house and was always a little, not odd, but "different", to everybody else.
Click to expand...

Someone educated differently will act differently surely?
 
I'd never dream of home schooling. A child should be given some freedom to develop beyond the shadow of their parents. Sending them to a few different clubs a week is never going to recreate this. They need to cut and thrust of the social jungle which is school.
 
LateX'Dog said:
I know exactly what you mean.

If you are concerned about your ability to home school, have you looked into montessori and stiener schools? They provide great alternative education that is based more around independent learning, creativity, passion for learning and empathy, which i feel is much more important then rote learning and 9-5 schooling.
Click to expand...

There's a stiener school just up the road from me, I really like their approach and Know a good few people who went to them. I would highly recommend them.

boxman2000 said:
Absolutely but another point I was going to make is that my office manager has a 7 year old who comes home with 2 hours homework a night... sorry but that's crazy at 7 years old. If they can't get a lot done during the day then the teaching methods must be wrong IMO. (This is all the children in the year group, not just him).

Of course homework is important but it does seem that school education relies on parents involvement more than ever, not necessarily a bad thing at all, but from what I've seen it is sometimes left up to the parents to teach rather than reinforce what has been taught.

Just to qualify this and my previous statement, I'm 50/50 about this subject and if I had to decide tomorrow I would probably say that state school would be our choice but I do think some of the points raised in this thread so far are ill-informed.
Click to expand...

2 hours is insane, I'm not on the side of EVERY state school, there are a lot that are bad news, But I'm just meaning that there are a lot of things to be said with right school selection and active parent involvement without going to such lengths as home schooling
 
Thompson_NCL said:
I'd never dream of home schooling. A child should be given some freedom to develop beyond the shadow of their parents. Sending them to a few different clubs a week is never going to recreate this. They need to cut and thrust of the social jungle which is school.
Click to expand...

Exactly. They need to be bullied, they need to be the bully, they need to gain that social savvy that will help them in later life. I'd imagine that somebody who is schooled at home will not develop those day-in-day-out relationships that go with seeing your schoolfriends every day. They will, in effect, be wrapped up in cotton wool by their parents, never allowed to fail at anything or learn what failing feels like when amongst your peers. All valuable life experiences.
 
physichull said:
Yes, but I'm not quite sure what you are getting at here?
Click to expand...

Not personal implications with this statement.

If a person educated in empathy, individual learning and creativity, they might find your (generic you) way as anti social and weird.

Your claiming he acted differently then normal people, but what is a normal person? Is a normal person, a person who follows the herd? He could be thinking your not normal because you don't act like his normal friends from home schooling groups.

What I'm trying to get at is, look at things from his perspective. Life is more then just a horizontal road.
 
LateX'Dog said:
Not personal implications with this statement.

If a person educated in empathy, individual learning and creativity, they might find your (generic you) way as anti social and weird.

Your claiming he acted differently then normal people, but what is a normal person? Is a normal person, a person who follows the herd? He could be thinking your not normal because you don't act like his normal friends from home schooling groups.

What I'm trying to get at is, look at things from his perspective. Life is more then just a horizontal road.
Click to expand...

That's a fair point.

Its difficult to quantify or put your finger on exactly what was odd about him, especially when trying to put it down in words here, but as soon as you met him you knew something was not quite "right", so to speak.

You could also argue that it had nothing to do with his homeschooling at all...but, personnally, I suspect that homeschooling had more than something to do with it.
 
Last edited:
physichull said:
Agree with all comments about the social aspect. I went to University with a lad who was home-schooled, and although he did brilliantly academically (he got amazing marks at uni too) his social capacity was poor. He could hold conversations and did get engaged but rarely if ever left the house and was always a little, not odd, but "different", to everybody else.
Click to expand...

I get your point but I know people that sound very similar to that guy, who went to school all their life through to university and were also 'socially awkward'.

I went to school with a guy that should have definitely passed 11+ to get into private collage but didn’t, he was a genius, particularly in science, educated in state schools his whole life and could be described as ‘socially awkward’ as well. Possibly more a trait of some extremely intelligent people than home schooled children... possibly.

It may well have been down to his education but personally I wouldn’t use that one example to dismiss the whole thing.
 
My wife and I have home-schooled our two children, both from the age of five. The elder is now seventeen and has just entered sixth-form in order to do A-levels and the younger one is thirteen and just starting GCSE work.

I could probably write screeds on the subject of home-schooling but I'll (for the moment) just summarize a few points that come randomly to mind:

(i) Most of "what you hear" as common opinion about home-schooling and home-schooled children is incorrect. For examples: (a) Socialization, discipline, getting prepared for the "real world" and all the such like are in many ways easier to achieve in the home-schooled setting than in regular school; (b) academic achievement tend to be higher amongst the home-schooled.

(ii) It's not for everyone: some children do thrive better away from the home environment. But for many children it is a superb environment for learning.

(iii) Children are little learning machines; they absolutely want to learn about the world. If you are able to provide the resources and the environment for them to learn they will learn. All they need are little nudges to "go and look at this" and off they go.

(iv) The home-schooled environment is a much more efficient learning environment than formal school. You can cover in three hours at home what takes a full school day to cover. That leaves an awful lot of time and energy for socializing!

(v) The home schooled environment is much more flexible than formal school. We found with our children (and this experience accords with that of friends) that they would go off for weeks at a time concentrating on one particular subject in depth before moving on to the next.

(vi) Only a minority of parents will be able to supply the complete range of academic subjects that a child needs to cover; my wife and I are fortunate in that respect. But by clubbing together with other home-schoolers and by accessing resources that are available (especially on-line) it's perfectly possible to supply a rounded curriculum.

That's enough for now; happy to take specific questions about the what, how and why...
 
physichull said:
Exactly. They need to be bullied, they need to be the bully, they need to gain that social savvy that will help them in later life. I'd imagine that somebody who is schooled at home will not develop those day-in-day-out relationships that go with seeing your schoolfriends every day. They will, in effect, be wrapped up in cotton wool by their parents, never allowed to fail at anything or learn what failing feels like when amongst your peers. All valuable life experiences.
Click to expand...
That's only looking at one side of the coin.

What about all the children who fail in life because of a poor experience at school?, become disenfranchised with education?, develop personality disorders due to depression?, the complete collapse of self-esteem due to the lack of involvement in schools regarding pupil behaviour again from bullying (in some schools?).

School isn't even always a net positive experience on a social level for some.
 
Gimpymoo said:
Which is something state schools do not explore as much as they should in my opinion.

My experiences so far of State education in different schools, it is all very "cookie cutter".
Click to expand...

What you have to remember is state schooling is like carpet bombing, the idea is to provide it to everyone, so it needs to provide enough to do the job.

Now if the parents don't reinforce schooling at home and support their children, you will end up IMO with a very poorly educated child. They might get a 9-5 job as a Air Conditioning sales man, but at least they have a 9-5 job.

Now take the same kid and have his parents care about his schooling and support them, he could become a Professor in Astrophysics.

But what they both will lack IMO is creativity and individual learning ability. State schools see anything other then the 5 subjects as pointless, the Arts are pointless you wont get a job in it, sports you wont get a job in it and so on.

This is where the alternative schools excel, they provide you with the ability to learn your self, so instead of being told how to build a basic electric circuit, they give you the bits you need to make one and tell you to make it your self. And they also have a huge passion for the Arts. While the Arts admittedly wont get you a job, what it does teach you is something you don't learn from anywhere else, things like creativity, imagination and sportsmanship to name a few.

In my personal life, me and my wife looked at loads of nurseries for our 2 and a half year old son, we looked at Ofsted outstanding nurseries that only had certain things there so they could bring them out when they are due an inspection, like allowing them outside, we also visited some amazing ones.

But then we found a Montessori nursery that upon entering had an Art room, where the kids at any point could just run over and start being creative, a music room, life skills IIRC is what they call it, like pouring liquid from 1 shaped container to another, different sized spoons hold different volumes, they had the outside permanently accessible to all children regardless of weather and the main thing, the adults not only where creative and supportive, but they loved the children. (I'm not implying the other nurseries didn't love their children) And if you want to build a child who has empathy, creativity and a passion for self learning/learning in general, then you need to provide these avenues.

If your the parent who sends their kid off to school 8-4 Monday - Friday, where the Arts are suppressed and the big 5 and rammed down their throat, ask your self 2 things:

1. Who is bringing your child up when they are spending 40 hours a week (See how that matches the average working week, because they are training you at a young age to accept that) at school and without your family values being upheld.

2. Are they being TOLD how to learn or are they LEARNING. There is a HUGE difference between the 2.
 
LateX'Dog said:
I know exactly what you mean.

If you are concerned about your ability to home school, have you looked into montessori and stiener schools? They provide great alternative education that is based more around independent learning, creativity, passion for learning and empathy, which i feel is much more important then rote learning and 9-5 schooling.
Click to expand...

until they want to go to FE/HE education or get a half decent job....Congratulations on stifling your child's future on the expense of your personal beliefs.
Waldorf Schools are an absolute joke; more about toeing the party line and less about actually learning anything of worth for modern times.

Home schooling is passable providing the child sits exams according to Edexcel, OCR etc...
 
Last edited:
LateX'Dog said:
If your the parent who sends their kid off to school 8-4 Monday - Friday, where the Arts are suppressed and the big 5 and rammed down their throat, ask your self 2 things:

1. Who is bringing your child up when they are spending 40 hours a week (See how that matches the average working week, because they are training you at a young age to accept that) at school and without your family values being upheld.

2. Are they being TOLD how to learn or are they LEARNING. There is a HUGE difference between the 2.
Click to expand...

Questions I have asked myself again and again.

They spend soo much time at school yet parents accept that they need to push the little ones harder and harder themselves outside of school to get a "decent" education.

If I am with them for 7 hours a day, I would expect more.
 
LateX'Dog said:
If your the parent who sends their kid off to school 8-4 Monday - Friday, where the Arts are suppressed and the big 5 and rammed down their throat, ask your self 2 things:

1. Who is bringing your child up when they are spending 40 hours a week (See how that matches the average working week, because they are training you at a young age to accept that) at school and without your family values being upheld.

2. Are they being TOLD how to learn or are they LEARNING. There is a HUGE difference between the 2.
Click to expand...

You seem to rope all state schools in as being like this, which is not true.

But they are in the majority, sadly.

I have found myself having to re-teach things unfortunately, as some teachers will write HOW on the board and tell children to copy and remember, without taking the time to explain WHY, or how the HOW came about. But this hasn't been my experience across the board in all subjects. Just a few narrow minded teachers.
 
iamtheoneneo said:
until they want to go to FE/HE education or get a half decent job....Congratulations on stifling your child's future on the expensive of your personal beliefs.
Waldorf Schools are an absolute joke; more about toeing the party line and less about actually learning anything of worth for modern times.

Home schooling is passable providing the child sits exams according to Edexcel, OCR etc...
Click to expand...

This is exactly what i mean.

"get a half decent job"
"less about actually learning anything of worth for modern times."
"Home schooling is passable providing the child sits exams according to Edexcel, OCR etc..."

See, for me, if my child ends up with Empathy, Creative, Imagination and a passion for learning, i don't care what they do. Because i know they will do what they want to do with the correct tools to do it.
 
Lots of anecdote in here: fine, glad it worked for you. Lots of slating of schools here too - that's also fine, believe what you like.

However, the overwhelming evidence is that mainstream schools work for the vast majority of young people. Where it does not, the local authority intervenes to support in the best way that it can. To suggest that there is a 'carpet bombing' approach (lol) to education is completely false: it might be in some schools, but they are *bad* schools - it comes down to the ethos and values of the school.

There is a reason that Steiner schools and, to a lesser extent, Montessori schools are marginal. I fully respect people's choice - I don't respect the underlying philosophy of Steiner education.

Ultimately, homeschooling is a parental choice: there are pros and cons. To say homeschooling never works is patently false, but to say that it is unquestionable better than school is also untrue.

If you are unhappy with the education being provided by the school, take it up with them, or source a parental advocate group (i.e. parent partnership) to support you in approaching the school.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom