Home schooling

[DCLane]

If the rest of the curriculum is as defective as this then you have done your children a large favour:

Probably - I didn't get as far as looking at the specifics in the curriculum. Having gone on their training course I quickly realised it focused on learning from one particular style together with rote learning. That convinced me although we did do some of the pre-school aspects mixed with other areas. In the end it was a mixture of several sources not just ACE.

 

[XRHYSX]

Hi Rhys other half here, I respect these opinions but homeschooled doesn't mean we do all the teaching at home. My son already attends Spanish lessons, Motion Dance classes and other activities outside of school. If there is something we don't think we can provide there are tutors and other knowledgeable people to ask. There is no reason the children will not still get formal qualifications, sitting GCSEs as an external applicant isn't an issue but that said I've been educated to university level and am yet to find employment that required me having such a huge loan burden, however Rhys hasn't even sat any GCSEs and manages to provide for us. Ultimately I want the children to decide their future and if that is by taking exams they will and if they don't want to I will guide them into whatever career path they hope to follow.

 

[surfdude]

i work for a charity and one of our aims is to help young people be more confident in social situation and a lot of the kids are home schooled so have a lack of social skills . as one poster said make sure they join some clubs . also some of the older kids find it hard to get jobs because employers want to see a school name on the cv .

 

[slowmotion]

I think that it's possibly a very good way for kids to pass exams, but an absolute horror show as regards their "personal development". One of the great lessons to be learned at school is that life is most certainly unfair, and that you have to do things that you dislike, including rubbing along with people who you rather not be with. You may as well learn that at an early age at school.

 

[Crackle]

I see nothing wrong with it besides the pitfalls others have pointed out as opposed to the pitfalls of state schooling. The point about learning other people are shoots can be a lesson learned at a later stage in life when you are better able to deal with it or just get them to read an internet form, even a fun and friendly one.

Examine carefully why you want to do it. I've seen a few parents not equipped to cope with life who've engendered the same philosophy to their children with home schooling. Consider also the alternatives, like a different school, suit the school to the child, don't just take the one on your doorstep.

 

[Dan B]

What about teaching them the laws of the jungle in the school of hard knocks?

So, "life is shoot, and we send you to school so you can internalise that asap and most effectively perpetuate that state of affairs"?

I have come across a few home schooled kids in my time and they have all seemed to be precocious, arrogant and spiteful. They could all done with "a good hiding" from their peers at a young age.

I suspect you've met others who weren't any of those things, and because they weren't, you never thought to ask if they were home-schooled or not.

FWIW I respond much the same way when I learn that any particular precocious brat has been to Eton, but I'm fairly sure that this is at least partly my own prejudice

 

[Dave 123]

So, "life is s***, and we send you to school so you can internalise that asap and most effectively perpetuate that state of affairs"?



I suspect you've met others who weren't any of those things, and because they weren't, you never thought to ask if they were home-schooled or not.

FWIW I respond much the same way when I learn that any particular precocious brat has been to Eton, but I'm fairly sure that this is at least partly my own prejudice

Funny that, as the ones I've met remind me of the public school brats.

I was aware that my tuppence may be quite offish. I suppose that's what happens when you put your head above the parapet on the internet

 

[swee'pea99]

I only ever came across two home-schooled kids, and they were so utterly bereft of social skills they were actually quite sinister. Mind you, their mum was clearly as mad as a bucketful of frogs - always going on about the great benefits of home-schooling in a way that just reeked of 'protest too much'...maybe they would have been just as spooky if they'd gone to school. I appreciate this is anecdotal, and I certainly wouldn't suggest extrapolation to some universal truth from one specific case, but they left a deep impression on both me and my wife, which came back sharply from over a decade ago when I read the OP.

 

[vernon]

Hi Rhys other half here, I respect these opinions but homeschooled doesn't mean we do all the teaching at home. My son already attends Spanish lessons, Motion Dance classes and other activities outside of school. If there is something we don't think we can provide there are tutors and other knowledgeable people to ask. There is no reason the children will not still get formal qualifications, sitting GCSEs as an external applicant isn't an issue but that said I've been educated to university level and am yet to find employment that required me having such a huge loan burden, however Rhys hasn't even sat any GCSEs and manages to provide for us. Ultimately I want the children to decide their future and if that is by taking exams they will and if they don't want to I will guide them into whatever career path they hope to follow.

I'd do some research to see how you can satisfy the coursework requirements for Science and Technology subjects.

Rhys might well be providing for you but the present and future for the current generation of youngsters is very much qualification driven and low incomes are increasingly the norm rather than the exception for unqualified youngsters. Be prepared to have a full nest for the foreseeable future......

 

[slowmotion]

The point about learning other people are s***s can be a lesson learned at a later stage in life when you are better able to deal with it or just get them to read an internet form, even a fun and friendly one.

I'm afraid I completely disagree. I have no scientific evidence to prove it, but I strongly believe that social skills are learned at an early age....empathy, sympathy, kindness, that sort of stuff. The people who I grew up with who were shoots when they were eighteen remain that way until today. I think your brain gets "wired" early. Picking up those "skills", aged twenty-five, by a twenty minute briefing with your employer's H&R expert seems a bit optimistic.

As I said, that's just a suspicion, not fact.

 

[I like Skol]

We looked at it but ended up sending them to school and choosing to support their learning. It seems to have worked.

This^^^^^^^^ x10bzillion.

Use the system and then supplement this with every ounce of effort you can spare. So many kids are failing because their parents just don't give a sh!t or can't drag themselves away from their chronic self-interest to worry about nurturing their offspring. It sounds as though you are definitely not that kind of parent so providing you take the time to pick the right schools I am sure you will give your child/ren the support required for them to excel. Don't just rely on the school to provide the education, make sure the teachers do what they are paid to do (but don't be a pain and get your child marked as a 'problem') and then it is over to you to make sure you support your kids in every way possible. Encourage them, help them, show them enthusiasm, guide them, chastise them, listen to them, nourish them.... I could go on!

IMO the best way for our kids to succeed in the current society is to develop as part of that society with the best support they can get. I would be vey sceptical of any one that expected to buck the trend and would go as far as to say that anyone that succeeded that way would be the exception rather than the rule.

 

[YahudaMoon]

We always get negative comments from people

I put down to a few things, could be the fact that we can, not a lot of people can do it due to work,

Anyway, dont most dysfunctional people come from state run schools

 

[The Jogger]

My daughter who is now 22 was home educated. Socially there is no holding her,she is a very social person who can strike up a conversation with just about anybody. We belonged to a group in Sussex which organised lots of events. Their PE consisted of things like mountain boarding, ice skating and swimming. They were taught creative writing by Kate Mosse's husband as their son was part of the group. Daughter is doing her final year at uni, she got grade A maths at 14. She had suffered anxiety brought on by bullying at school, were the teachers were so far up their own ass they seemed to ignore it. The best thing we ever did for her. While home eding my daughter my wife took her OU degree. Go for it and ignore the comments from some on here who have no experience of home ed. Also do look at Education Otherwise.

 

[vernon]

We always get negative comments from people

I put down to a few things, could be the fact that we can, not a lot of people can do it due to work,

Anyway, dont most dysfunctional people come from state run schools

But they represent a disproportionate amount of the home schooled cohort......

 

[Dan B]

But they represent a disproportionate amount of the home schooled cohort......

I'm not currently anticipating home-schooling my kids, but if I do I shall be sure not to forget to cover confirmation bias when i teach them statistics.