The third spike

There have always been two very popular times to deregister children from school in order to educate them at home. The first of these is in Reception or Year 1, soon after the child has started formal education in fact. The other favoured time is before or shortly after the transition from primary to secondary school. Of course, children are taken out of school at any and every age, but these two periods in the child's school career are the commonest ages at which to make the decision. Local authority officers have in recent years been talking of a third 'spike', round about the age of fourteen, just when the child is, or should be, settling down to serious study for examinations. This was mentioned by the local authority officers who had an informal meeting with members of the Children, Schools and Families select committee on November 4th last year.

Now it is pretty easy to understand why Reception and Year 1 would be common ages for deregistration. The parents have sent the kid to school, given enough time to see if the enterprise is working out and when it is plain that it is not, they deregister her and she becomes home educated. Similarly, it is not hard to see the significance of the change from primary to secondary school. Many children find this a stressful and somewhat unpleasant experience and it is not hard to imagine that a sensitive child might find it unbearable. Some parents, anticipating this, just don't send their children to secondary school. This is also a time when many primary school who have just moved to Year 7 first make the acquaintance of that delightful old English tradition of bullying. So in both of these 'spikes' on the graph, one can see the reason behind them without too much difficulty.

Looking now at the third 'spike', matters are a little more puzzling. These children have usually been at school for almost a decade. Presumably, their parents are not that mad keen on the idea of home education or they would have been teaching them themselves before this age. School phobia usually manifests itself a little earlier than fourteen or fifteen. It is rare for children suddenly to develop special educational need at this late stage and there is no particular reason why bullying should suddenly become a problem. And yet there it is; an increasing number of parents are pulling their kids out of school at thirteen, fourteen and fifteen. What can be behind this?

If we assume that the motive is educational, then we are faced with a real poser. These children are now gearing up for their GCSEs; the next couple of years are pretty crucial for them. Their parents have not wanted to home educate for the last decade and yet suddenly, they are taken out of school. What educational benefit could the child be receiving from this? It's a tricky question.

If, on the other hand, we forget about education completely and just look at the dynamics in a typical family containing a child of around that age, the thing becomes a good deal easier to understand. Now I am sure that many parents are genuinely concerned about the stress that studying for ten or twelve GCSEs might cause their children. It is quite possible that their concern for an overworked child might cause them to take drastic action. There is of course also the natural friction between parents and teenagers about homework and school. This often reaches a crescendo a year or two after puberty, right at the time in fact that these deregistrations are actually taking place. It must sometimes appear to parents that if school were removed from the equation, family life would become a lot easier and there would be less conflict between them and their children. No more insisting on early bedtimes, no more shouting at the child to get her up in the mornings, no more fights over homework, arguments about truancy; the advantages are clear, at least in the short term. It is impossible to state with certainty what motivates parents to deregister their children from school at this age, but it seems likely that self interest and the avoidance of trouble with their children often play at least some part in the decision.

Of course, this may not be the whole story. There may very well be perfectly sound educational reasons for leaving a child in school for ten years or so and then pulling her out before she sits her final exams. It's hard to think of the educational benefit here, but it may exist. It is curious though that when parents who have taken this extremely serious step post on the lists, they seldom seem to be doing so because they wish to share the academic advantages of this course of action with other home educators. Almost invariably, their main concern appears to be avoiding trouble with their local authority. This is not conclusive, but it is certainly suggestive.

Quite a few local authority officers are now worried about this trend and I would be grateful to hear from anybody who can explain the educational rationale behind such a move as this. Clearly, at least some of these parents must feel that this sort of thing will help their child's education, but it is hard to see how.