Tuesday 4 January 2011

Which home educators do local authorities feel that they need to monitor the most?

A lively debate has been taking place on one of the British Internet lists for home educating parents. The question being mulled over is whether or not 'elective home education' is a satisfactory term for all those who educate their children at home. Some local authorities, Lancashire for example, divide home educating parents into two categories; philosophical and reactionary. The philosophical ones are those who chose to educate their children, while the reactionary ones are those who took their kids from school because they felt they had no choice in the matter. It has been suggested that local authorities might wish to monitor the reactionary types more than they do those who opted to home educate for philosophical reasons.

Some parents never send their children to school and have always wished to take charge of their education. Others, for various reasons, send them to school and then change their mind about it later. These parents typically say that they 'had no choice' but to pull the kid from school. This might be because the child was being bullied, had a special need or disability which the school seemed unable or unwilling to cater for or because the chid simply became distressed at the prospect of going to school. Such parents often feel that they are forced to home educate by circumstances beyond their control. Why should local authorities feel that they need to monitor these parents more closely than those who have chosen to home educate for philosophical reasons? The answer is easy.

Let us draw an analogy with children who are being educated at home. Some home educating parents are very careful not to pressure their children into learning some particular subject. They prefer for the child to choose herself what she wishes to learn. This is called variously autonomous education, unschooling, natural or child-led education; although each phrase has a slightly different connotation. The theory behind this is that in traditional, school based education, children are learning because their motivation is extrinsic. They study history because they are told to and if they do not do so then they will incur sanctions and disapproval from the teacher and perhaps other pupils. This is contrasted with so-called intrinsic motivation, where a child reads about, say, dinosaurs, because she is interested in them and wishes to find out more. Some home educating parents feel that this kind of learning is better for the child and more effective in the long run.

Now here is a question. Which of the two types of education are likely to require somebody to chase up the kid and make sure that she is getting on with it? Will it be the child whose teacher has insisted that she learn the dates of the battles in the Wars of the Roses and the names of the contenders for the throne, even though she has no interest at all in medieval English history, or will it be the child who is passionately keen on learning about dinosaurs? The answer is of course, that there would be no point chasing after the kid who has chosen to read about dinosaurs. She is already doing it, because that is what she wants to do. The one who is studying history because she has to against her wises, on the other hand, might very well need close supervision by a teacher or parent in order to make sure that she is getting on with the task.

This is precisely similar to the situation with philosophical and reactionary home educators. On the one hand is a group who are intrinsically motivated to undertake the task. They have chosen to do this and are doing so because this is what they enjoy. On the other hand are a group who have been forced into doing the job and might not really want to do it at all. Their motivation for home education is purely extrinsic, imposed by outside circumstances, rather than the intrinsic motivation which is operating in those who have freely chosen to do this. It seems reasonable then, that local authorities should wish to check up on the group who have been forced to home educate, more often and with perhaps slightly different criteria than those used for the parents who have decided of their own free will to have their children with them at home. When people are doing something which they have not really chosen to do, they are more likely to shirk the task or skimp on it. Unless an eye is kept on them, the job might not even get done at all. This at least is the perspective of the local authority.

Actually, although Lancashire are unusual in being open about this, many local authorities do divide parents up in this way; paying more attention to those who have deregistered their children from school than they do to those who have never sent them in the first place.

18 comments:

  1. Thanks, this probably explains the condescending attitude we've felt from "philosophical" home educators on deregistering our son from school. Are parents like us not allowed to change our philosophies, then? Having tried it for our child, can we not realise for ourselves that school learning methods can't ever be as effective as intrinsic motivation? Just because we realise this a little later than others, then take action and make amends, we're deemed to be inferior home educators who need regular checking when others don't? If this is really the view of some home educators, I think it will shoot them in the foot.

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  2. Many parents feel as you do. Once they have taken the child from school, they realise that home education is the best move they ever made for their child's welfare. Most would not return the kid to school even if the problems which prompted the deregistration were resolved. Nevertheless, some LAs are still a little sniffy about this type of home education.

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  3. But it's the same kind of home education, once things settle down. It's no different to the kind practiced by parents who never used schools. Why would it be?

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  4. Wrt Lancashire, it's not so much about which set of parents can be trusted to provide an education, it's more to do with which are most likely to be coerced back into the system. Both sets receive the same amount of monitoring.
    The standard report has a box for 'Reasons for HE' and another for 'Identified barriers for returning to school'.
    Tricia

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  5. 'But it's the same kind of home education, once things settle down. It's no different to the kind practiced by parents who never used schools. Why would it be? '

    If I am a DIY fanatic and plan to renovate my kitchen from top to bottom, this is bound to be a little different from the case of a man whose kitchen has been destroyed in a fire, has no insurance and is therefore forced to fit a new kitchen whether he wants to or not. The LA perspective sometimes is that what some call philosophical home educators have planned to do this because they are very keen on the idea and have looked into the business carefully. Some of those who deregister their children following a row with the school, on the other hand, might be rushed into things and not really be that enthusiastic about undertaking their child's education.

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  6. 'Wrt Lancashire, it's not so much about which set of parents can be trusted to provide an education, it's more to do with which are most likely to be coerced back into the system. '

    Why does Lancashire wish to coerce parents into sending their children to school?

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  7. So they make assumptions which could be wrong and then develop prejudices based on those assumptions. Great! Just what you need when you start home educating - not.

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  8. I feel that in many cases, the 'anxiety' of the LA , rather than helping families reach a point of intrinsic motivation, gets in the way of the process.
    The criteria an LA sets as their 'standard' is based on 'general' whereas every family and every child is unique.

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  9. 'The criteria an LA sets as their 'standard' is based on 'general' whereas every family and every child is unique.'

    Which is unarguably true.

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  10. As usual Webb inventions again.

    “Some local authorities, Lancashire for example, divide home educating parents into two categories; philosophical and reactionary.”
    “many local authorities do divide parents up in this way”

    ‘Some’ or ‘many’ Mr. Webb? The truth is you just make things up as usual without research or foundation. So here is some fresh research from this morning, out of 51 English councils telephoned:

    7 = no one available to answer your question
    15 = Do not classify them
    29 = not heard of such a classification

    So although it is only a sampling it is a large sample. The indications so far are that Lancashire has its own system.

    Lancashire reply that their classifications do NOT relate to either “The philosophical ones are those who chose to educate their children, while the reactionary ones are those who took their kids from school because they felt they had no choice in the matter”

    Why don’t you do your homework instead of inventing rubbish?

    And we are not a 'secret group', just three people that have an aversion to your nonsense

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  11. ' So here is some fresh research from this morning, out of 51 English councils telephoned:

    7 = no one available to answer your question
    15 = Do not classify them
    29 = not heard of such a classification'

    Gosh, you have been busy! Which local authorities were these and did you speak specifically to the departments involved with elective home education? I ask, because many are not back at work yet, following the traditional school holidays. Tell us which authorities these were and then we can check for ourselves.

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  12. 'And we are not a 'secret group', just three people that have an aversion to your nonsense'

    Readers may be surprised to hear that only the other day this person in Scotland was claiming to be Finnish or Swedish! Lord knows what new stories tomorrow will bring.

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  13. 'So here is some fresh research from this morning, out of 51 English councils telephoned:'

    Logged on and read this post at a little after ten past eleven and then made this comment fifteen minutes later. This only allows seventeen seconds per phone call to each of the fifty one local authorities. Fast work indeed!

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  14. "If this is really the view of some home educators, I think it will shoot them in the foot. "

    Anonymous, I don't think this is the view of home educators, at least not any I've met. In my experience the majority of home educators like us, who have been 'forced' to HE for various reasons either had HE at the back of their mind already (so it was always an option) or find that it works so well for their child that they become converts to HE. In many cases, these converts are more enthusiastic about HE than those who chose it in the first place, possibly because they see it as having 'saved' their child/ren. The number of parents who choose to HE other and subsequent children as well as the child whose problems triggered HE suggests that this is the case.

    As Simon says, in his reply to your comment, it's LAs who have this mistaken impression. Simon has even commenting on the enthusiasm of converts in previous posts. Simon's understanding of this issue makes it even stranger that he wants LAs to have greater power over home educators. Why does Simon want LA staff who he believes hold unreasonable prejudices about a group of people more power over that group?

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  15. Something rather like this was certainly the case in our LA a few years ago - in terms of classification if not consequent monitoring. We requested copies of their procedures and guidelines and they sent us documents (which they did say were outdated and under review) that stated that home educators could be classified into groups like this. I can't remember the exact details now. I was quite astonished at the time as it seemed that the initial classification was very rough and unlikely to reflect the complexity of real life decision making. It also seemed to invite LA staff to make judgments about people that they had not discussed with those people at all - possibly offensive and almost certainly pretty useless IMO.

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  16. "Lancashire reply that their classifications do NOT relate to either “The philosophical ones are those who chose to educate their children, while the reactionary ones are those who took their kids from school because they felt they had no choice in the matter”"

    Well the word might be reactive rather than reactionary. Excuse me if I typed the incorrect word in haste on a private list!
    (Oh Simon if you must blog my comments from private lists can you ask me first?)

    Lancs give different info to different people depending on whether it's the safeguarding board whose minutes say they do CRB checks on HE parents (even though there is no evidence that they do) they denied this to HEers and the DFE.

    I think this is down to lack of effort rather than a deliberate effort to deceive though.

    If you (the anon who spoke to Lancs and all those other authorities, wow!!) happen to know any "known" Lancs HEers ask them about the initial questionnaire they fill out, it's designed to make those judgments?

    I do think some of the Anonymous posters on here are messing with your head though Simon.

    They are anonymous but they are not a secret group. They might be someone else entirely.

    Elizabeth

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  17. Gosh, you have been busy! Which local authorities were these and did you speak specifically to the departments involved with elective home education? I ask, because many are not back at work yet, following the traditional school holidays. Tell us which authorities these were and then we can check for ourselves.

    Do it yourself webb , then apologize.

    Three people using one VPN and IP Guard so keep believing your daft stats.

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