Petition regarding home education on Downing Street website

My comments are based on the fact that homeschoolers generally have an "agenda".

Despite this frequently being said to me, of the hundreds of home educating parents I have met, the only common agenda is one of caring fo their children and wanting to give them the best start in life.

Notwithstanding the obvious issue over building social relationships; remember when kids leave the home school environment and go to work or uni they will enter that big world. No choice there over who you work or learn with there.

What is this obvious issue over building social relationships? How ever did people go on up to 150 years ago, before compulsory education? I firmly believe that my child who meets up with groups of 20 - 30 children on 4 days out of each week, has more opportunity for socialising than she would in the few minutes break at school. How many times have you heard a teacher tell a child to be quiet with the words "You are not here to socialise!"? My daughter also gets to know all ages, rather than being in the rather strange situation of only being with 30 others all within 6 months of her age. How do they learn to socialise with adults when their only relationship with one is a powerless one? No wonder so many children leaving school appear to speak in grunts and have no idea of how to talk to people.

My son has never had any problems with the big world - he has been out and about in it for most of his life on a daily basis. He also had no problems whatsoever at college or uni, one teacher at college commenting to me that she had forgotten he was 2 years younger than the others, as he was the one they looked to for the answers and help with their problems.

I think homeschooling is a reaction against modernity, social obligation and is desire to control what kids learn (or dont learn).

Research has shown that home educated children are far more likely as adults to be making a positive contribution to their community. For many of us it is due to the exact opposite reason to yours, a desire not to limit our children to the narrow constraints of the NC, but to allow them the freedom to direct their own learning.

Parents need to accept that at some point in their children’s lives, they must learn to react to the world on their own

Indeed, and we believe that our children who have been out and about in society all their lives, instead of being shut away in a strange social grouping, are the better equipped to do so. Certainly my children do not have any problem with reacting to the world on their own terms.

I'm sure there are some good homeschoolers, but US research has shown time and time again that homeschoolers are often those who believe that their children should not be exposed to ideas they diagree with - like science, secularism or "lower orders"

Home schooling in America and home education in Britain are two very different things to be honest. There are a lot of strange things in America, not just the home schooling population. Like anything else you are going to hear of the oddities, not the ones where it all works out fine. Harvard and Yale both actively recruit home schooled children as they have found them to be better students.

If you have a problem over what is taught don't you think the best approach is for parents to get involved in their schools?

In an ideal world yes. And very many home educators have done so, and have seen for themselves how their children are suffering and so have taken them out. Over a third of home educators are teachers themselves - not because they believe that makes them more able to home educate (many say that what they learned in teacher training was more about crowd control than anything else) but because they have seen what happened to children in schools. One teacher I spoke to today said that she had a medium ability student who was quite and pleasant and got on with her work. One day she realised that she had not spoken to ot given any attention to that child at all that whole week! This was the defining moment that led her to home educate her own child

Also - kids are only at school for a minority of the time. You have more than enough hours outside to school time to teach them what I assume you actually do during homeschool AS WELL

And with homework which takes up the remaining time between home time and bedtime? Such a lot of school time is spent on make work, ie, work to do while the teacher is busy attending to a more demanding child's needs. Such a lot is repetative, and not necessary. We would rather free our children and let them learn all the hours of the day, build up their confidence and self esteem and let them have their childhood to play and enjoy, rather than spending their time in day prison. We are one of the very few countries to start our children in full time education so young, it is tragic to see the poor little mites sitting still when they should be out playing. Children in countries where they do not start until 6 or 7 have much better outcomes.

I'm sure there are some good homeschoolers, but US research has shown time and time again that homeschoolers are often those who believe that their children should not be exposed to ideas they diagree with - like science, secularism or "lower orders"

If you have a problem over what is taught don't you think the best approach is for parents to get involved in their schools?

 

Also - kids are only at school for a minority of the time. You have more than enough hours outside to school time to teach them what I assume you actually do during homeschool AS WELL

 

Honk

This isn't the US. There are church schools galore here for those who want that for their kids, even for some who have no choice - one local secondary has been taken over by an Evangelist organisation - I most certainly would not want that influence on a child.

Many kids end up at completely unsuitable schools - different attitudes of kids, different atmospheres, no facilities for special talents such as music etc. Why should their parents feel obliged to send them there if they are prepared to give up their time to educate at home. The state system struggles with gifted children - many HE parents are doing their best for highly talented kids who would fail in the 'system'. Likewise parents of kids with dyslexia and other learning differences realise there is not enough attention given to individuals in a class of 30 kids of wildly varying abilities where the teacher can only deal with 'average' children.

There's also a lot of bullying and pressure these days in schools and not every child can cope with that and their learning suffers. One of our local schools is a dreadful one, rife with bullying and violence, and I really wouldn't blame any parent for withdrawing their kids from it. Only little thugs would flourish there. No name mentioned...

And if you don't like what is taught you're stuck with it as that's the nature of a national curriculum - there IS no choice.

As long as LEAs check that kids are being educated, then there's nothing wrong with it - its a tough job but people often resort to it as they have little other option than to see their kids suffer.

I think homeschooling is a reaction against modernity, social obligation and is desire to control what kids learn (or dont learn).

Mr Goose,

I'm not sure that home educators are that worried about what is being taught in schools but more how it is being taught. Teachers are not to blame either, for the record.

Education as it stands is purely target driven and not child centred at all. Children = £££

when home educating, at present, don't you have to complete these forms anyway? I haven't read the new proposals fully so I may be getting the wrong end of the stick. As far as I am aware OFSTED can also visit you at home as it stands now. Saying this though it is very difficult for them as they need your agreement to do so which means being registered with them, which means cost to you. So a bit of a no go! Maybe the new proposals are more to do with OFSTED and them being able to check you? Either way, it's all to do with money in the end and probable not much to do with the welfare of children.

 

Guidance notes for Parents/CarersThe intention of these notes is to help you understand what may be involved if you are thinking about, or have decided, to educate your child away from the school system. We do not mean to be prescriptive, we recognise that there is a variety of ways in which education can be provided. We wish to help you think through the issues.

 

Proposed curriculum for Education at home by Parents

Use this to give the CSA an indication of the curriculum you intend to follow in educating your child.

 

Curriculum guidelines

These curriculum guidelines have been written to help parents prepare a curriculum outline for children being educated at home.

 

http://www.sheffield.gov.uk/education/information-for-parentscarers/attendance/home-education

Isn't it amazing. They have no legal basis for any of these guidelines, forms or curriculum demands. The LA's only duty is to make informal enquiries if they have reason to believe a child is NOT receiving an education. The LA makes up the law it would like to have, not the law as it stands! This is exactly what home educators are complaining about.

The DfES has stated that home education is an anomaly, that they want to bring into line. It is one of our last surviving freedoms to bring up our children how parents feel is in their best interests, not the state, and they are busy drawing up new legislation to coral us into their tick boxes as we speak

OFSTED currently does not have any part in home education, but I am sure they will try to bring in some system where not only do we have to be registered, monitored and tested, but we have to pay for the privelidge too.

It sometimes occurs to me it would be interesting to go en mass to Sheffield LA, and ask for school places to be found for the 200 or so home educated children in Sheffield - they would have to build new schools for us - just think how much each of us is saving the government!

Worked for me I was home educated until I was 14, and feel that I owe a lot to the attention that I received during those years.

I don't believe that state education is in any way relevant to the scientific knowledge of education (it matters) or simple common sense and I'm not surprised that it's one of the least productive systems in Europe. What I am surprised at is that the government response to their exceedingly poor performance in league table rankings is to up the hours, amount of homework and years of compulsory education without noticing the extensive trend for freedom and less harsh time commitment in education to produce far better results.

It's symptomatic of this government's entire attitude to democracy. 'The people will be good because we'll force them with laws and controls and we'll know exactly what they're doing all the time and make them do what we want them to do and they'll be happy because we'll make them be'

I have not read all of this thread, but have deep personal knowledge of the subject.

Mass education is one of the deep seated problems with this country.

Teachers do not know any of the children, apart from their favorites, and have a could not careless attitude toward the rest.

Most of them, and I know quite a few, could not see a problem if it smacked them in the face.

Education at home is by far the better way to teach a child.

The modern system was only invented to teach the three 'Rs' so children would be good factory fodder.

That is no longer required, so the education system is being left to rot on the vine.

As we see with the quality of teachers today.

There are schools in existence (and have been for around 100 years) in England that are child centred, the teachers know their children as they commit 8 years to the same class, formal learning is delayed, social and emotional skills are high up on the agenda, parent teacher relationships come as standard, infact parents have a great deal to do with the schools. One of these schools is about to be state funded in the UK (and most are in Northern Europe).

If you want a school like this in Sheffield as I do, and a number of other parents, teachers etc. Then get in touch with me to help make it happen.

A proposal was made to Sheffield Council 18 months ago which was declined in the first instance, the reason being "...so if you create this school in Sheffield we will have parents wishing to move their children to it? This will create a defecit of funding for the schools that children are moved from...". We are still working towards this project though and given that the government have already backed a school of this sort (in fiasability stage) we see no reason why Sheffield LA can refuse forever.

See my signature link for more info.

So out of intrest has anyone signed it?

yes, I have

No, not yet, but I may well do so later, when I've had time to think. Just wanted to say what a brilliant post hennypenny made (yes, the lengthy one!).

My girlfriends son was home educated until the age of seven (?) I think and I've always been impressed with how self assured, confident and brightly inquisitive he is. Hennypenny, I was very taken with your description of your eldest's homeschooling - what a brilliant time he must have had! You must be very proud of him.

Both of mine were/are being conventionally educated, but homeschooling is certainly something I'd consider if I'm lucky enough to be a father again.

I agree that there has been some well argued posts on this thread.

However, my big concern remains that while people argue that homeschool kids come into contact with other children, this is missing the point.

The issue is that they come into contact with the children raised by parents from the same set of values. OK this may be a good thing from your perspective.

The big value of school education is that it brings you into contact with kids from different socioeconomic backgrounds, with different assumptions, beliefs and values.

I regard homeschooling as a retreat from a pluralist society - this is part of the wider move for parents to want their kids to go to specialist schools - such as faith based ones.

The negatives of this - and esp amongst middle class, "well educted" families is a belief that the world actually all *wants* to be like them - if only they had the chance or the lovely ability to see how great middle class values are.

Comparrasons with pre mass school history are generally bumf, we do not live in that sort of world anymore. I regard the homeschool, private school and faith school approaches as part of the individualism vs society argument.

Please dont say "but my home school kids are now well involved in the community. That is part of your class demographic NOT part of the benefits of home schooling.

A final point, without ofsted checking, their is the risk that the more extreme groups will use the homeschool arguement for taking children out of mainstream education and filling their heads with the parents religious rubbish. This clearly happens in the US - where there is a far greater level of homeschooling.

Also - and I hae never had a good answer to this. How do you KNOW that you are able to teach every subject well????

And a note - for those who like using the icon - I find it very crass.

I agree that there has been some well argued posts on this thread.

 

However, my big concern remains that while people argue that homeschool kids come into contact with other children, this is missing the point.

 

The issue is that they come into contact with the children raised by parents from the same set of values. OK this may be a good thing from your perspective.

 

The big value of school education is that it brings you into contact with kids from different socioeconomic backgrounds, with different assumptions, beliefs and values.

 

I regard homeschooling as a retreat from a pluralist society - this is part of the wider move for parents to want their kids to go to specialist schools - such as faith based ones.

 

The negatives of this - and esp amongst middle class, "well educted" families is a belief that the world actually all *wants* to be like them - if only they had the chance or the lovely ability to see how great middle class values are.

 

Comparrasons with pre mass school history are generally bumf, we do not live in that sort of world anymore. I regard the homeschool, private school and faith school approaches as part of the individualism vs society argument.

 

Please dont say "but my home school kids are now well involved in the community. That is part of your class demographic NOT part of the benefits of home schooling.

 

A final point, without ofsted checking, their is the risk that the more extreme groups will use the homeschool arguement for taking children out of mainstream education and filling their heads with the parents religious rubbish. This clearly happens in the US - where there is a far greater level of homeschooling.

 

Also - and I hae never had a good answer to this. How do you KNOW that you are able to teach every subject well????

 

And a note - for those who like using the icon - I find it very crass.

Im really not going to try and argue your points as a believe from your posts that you hold a very stereotypical view of home education and are not prepared to look at it on a wider scale or see the benefits to the children. I do agree that some parents may want to teach their children because of extreme religious values. But i have also seen these values enforced upon children that are at school. I am not religous nor am a middle class. We only have one other home ed family that we meet up with regularly. All the rest of the people we socialise with are long term friends, neighbours, Family and people we meet in our day to day lives. My only extreme views would be that the school system is failing children everyday on a very grand scale. It is my right as a mother to ensure that my children are not failed in the same way.

"Also - and I hae never had a good answer to this. How do you KNOW that you are able to teach every subject well????"

As has been said before. We dont "teach" any subject. We encourage our children to follow their desired subject and help them to learn how to find the information for themselves. May i ask you to think about the things that you have a great knowladge of and how much of that knowladge was learnt from having somebody stand in front of you and write it on a blackboard?