Those who educate their children at home are, by definition, not satisfied with schools. In my own case, the problem was simple; I find modern schools horribly inefficient and knew perfectly well that I could make a better job of teaching my child. I had no problem with schools as such. If the schools had been any good, I should have sent my daughter there to learn. I have a strong suspicion that the motivations of others for not sending their children to school are usually different from this.
So why don't people send their children to school? Sometimes, they have had bad experiences themselves and are naturally anxious to protect their own child from suffering in the same way. Other mothers simply do not wish to be deprived of their child's company. We all know the wrench that many mothers feel on the first day of their child's school. Some mothers just decide that they don't want to do this; they would rather keep the child with them. Sometimes this is a conscious dedication to attachment parenting, where children stay closer to parents and separate much later than is common in our society. Then again, there are those who send their children, but then change their minds. Their children change, become unhappy, perhaps are bullied. The simple solution is to take them out of school.
A lot of parents seem to have a problem with the very idea of school. Often it is school and not formal education as such. A lot of parents make great efforts to get their children into college to study at the age of twelve, thirteen or fourteen. They obviously don't mind full time education in a formal setting; their problem is with school alone. The poster which I did a piece about recently tied in with this feeling. School is a place where children are bullied and injured! They truant to avoid it wherever possible. One in six of them leave school functionally illiterate. This is what advertisers call "knocking copy". What these people are doing is not presenting a positive reason for home education, they are saying in effect, "School is such shit, how could I send my child there?" In other words, for many parents it seems less a case of home education being good, than that schools are bad.
I find this quite puzzling. I have never thought of schools as anything other than places where children are educated. They are like garages where work is undertaken on a car. If the garages in your area are slack and inefficient and you know a bit about cars yourself; you might prefer to service your own vehicle. This is pretty much how I saw the education of my daughter. There was no local establishment that I could rely upon to do the job, so I did it myself. I never felt the need to start a campaign denouncing garages and urging others to stop getting their cars repaired in garages! It was a purely pragmatic decision. In fact, if a man finds himself in this position of being unable to find a decent garage and then starts a movement which encourages others to boycott garages, then I would find it a little odd. It is after all a personal decision. It is not that there is anything wrong with garages, just that many are not very good.
This is how I view what one might term the orthodox home education movement in this country. A lot of it is concerned with how bad schools are, rather than how good they are themselves at educating their kids. Those on the HE-UK and UK lists will notice that every time a school governer, ofsted inspector or nursery worker is convicted of an offence involving children, there is satisfaction and posts saying, "There you are, that's schools for you. You can't trust them."
I would be curious to know how many parents don't send their children to school because they don't like the idea of school, as opposed to those who make a positive choice because they believe that they can educate their children better than a school could. I have to say that the present methods used in schools are very inefficient and so much time is wasted that it is a scandal. These things though seem to be seldom mentioned.
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Perhaps if I extend your garage analogy a bit, you'll see a vital piece of the puzzle that you're missing. Suppose the (fictional) National Union Of Mechanics doesn't like people changing their own oil - they're losing money, after all. They lobby their friends - the nanny state, who say they believe the best place for oil to be changed is in a garage - and the owner of a large chain of garages is commissioned to produce a report that shows that people can't be trusted to change their own oil. In fact, they're probably terrorists, drug dealers, child molesters, or something like that. The statistics backing this up are preposterous, but nobody really cares.
ReplyDeleteAn ill-considered law is rushed out, based on the recommendations in this report. People who want to change their oil without being convicted of a criminal offence will need to apply for a license, renew it annually, and can have it revoked for reasons which are not even defined in the law. Those who "do not cooperate" will have their cars towed to the nearest garage and their oil forcibly changed.
Do you still think it's odd that the Association of Home Oilchangers, as well as talking about the many benefits of doing it yourself, would feel obliged to point out some of the things that can go wrong when you entrust a garage to change your oil?
In real life, I do like to change my own oil - I do a better job of it, and I know it's been done. I don't care what everyone else does, but if someone tries to force me to do it their way I'll definitely start pointing out what's wrong with garages.
Finally, to answer the original question, we (and I mean as a family, I don't speak for anyone else) home educate primarily because we know we can do a better job, for the same reasons that you give, but there are also plenty other things about the school system we don't like.
Excellent analogy, Ciaran! I shall have to give this a bit of thought.
ReplyDelete"This is what advertisers call "knocking copy". What these people are doing is not presenting a positive reason for home education, they are saying in effect, "School is such shit, how could I send my child there?" In other words, for many parents it seems less a case of home education being good, than that schools are bad."
ReplyDeleteThat wasn't the reason behind the posters. The DfES said that home education was an anomaly not in line with the Every Child Matters agenda. The poster was an attempt to point out that the opposite is more usually the case - that each child matters, individually to home educators and school fail spectacularly to fulfil the Every Child Matters agenda. It wasn't a statement of the writers main reasons for home educating, it was a response to a specific criticism of home education. Here is the full text of the poster again:
"DfES calls Home Education an “anomaly” not in line with
the Every Child Matters agenda.
Every Child Matters
More than 360,000 children injured in schools each year
450,000 children bullied in school last year
At least 16 children commit suicide each year as a result of school bullying
An estimated 1 million children truant every year
Treasury statistics show more than 1 in 6 children leave school each year unable to read, write or add up
Every Child Matters?
Home Education
because EACH child matters, individually
"I never felt the need to start a campaign denouncing garages and urging others to stop getting their cars repaired in garages!"
As mentioned above, this was not the motivation for the posters. It was a response to a criticism that home education is an anomaly and schools are the best place for children. It was the DfES that started a campaign denouncing home education, not the other way round, and as Ciaran mentions above, they are doing the same again now.
"It is not that there is anything wrong with garages, just that many are not very good."
So not being very good at your prime purpose is an indication that there is nothing wrong?
Let's take your analogy a little further.
ReplyDeleteWe start out with little cars that are unable to move, have no idea where they are going, drip oil all over the place and belch exhaust fumes. They are messy and utterly useless.
Within a few years, however, they move around autonomously, they can find their way around with a few hints (they have built-in GPS navigation) and become largely self-servicing, requiring little more than a few hints and sometimes tools from their owners (contentious word). They know about interesting places and can take themselves (and sometimes their owners) there.
But at five (or earlier) the state decrees that they should spend most of their day in a garage being repaired and serviced, and this should continue until they are 18. During this time they have numerous collisions, their GPS and self-servicing mechanisms are disabled and by the time they've finished at 18, they are incapable of navigation, bashed about a bit and, quite frankly, ready for the scrap heap, although the state - like a used car salesman - has certified them as being roadworthy and in fine condition.
What a wonderful system.
"A lot of it is concerned with how bad schools are, rather than how good they are themselves at educating their kids."
ReplyDeleteI see those two factors as two halves of a single equation.
School 4/10, me 7/10 = better education at home, so suck it up and get on with it.
If, by some miracle, they open a new bilingual school within an acceptable commute from here and after doing some research, by working in it to see what it looks like from the inside out rather than the other way around, new fantasy school outperforms me...then he'll go there. Cos this whole HE gig is about what is the best option on the table for my son, not me.
Otherwise I'd have picked school and had a life to call my own.
Not to say there haven't been some really rather wonderful and utterly unexpected positive surprises over and above the increased quality and enthusiasm in terms of education that have come from HEing these last few months....just...I was kind of used to having more time to myself..and cleaning/keeping the zoo fed and watered/fending off pilgrims all with people under my feet, all the time, is driving me mad..I also miss working fullish time, although I reckon next ac. year, now I have a rhythm sorted out I'll be able to up my contact hours by a good chunk. Then papá can pick up some of the slack (glowers darkly at errant husband).
Well, I have spent my working life as a teacher, so I think it would be correct to say that I am broadly in favour of schools. (Actually I am in favour of education - and schools are the places where for most children, their education occurs!) Yet there are good schools and bad schools, and a lot of stuff in between. Most of my working life was spent in the independent sector; for 6 years I taught at a fairly well known, wealthy and successful school which was wonderful to teach in.... but I wasn't a parent myself then. I left when we married, but I am pretty sure that I wouldn't have sent my own child there now... too much opportunity for sin! I have also taught in a dreadful independent school (which eventually went bust) and a state school where the head was obsessed with minutae - the place was full of notices about the wearing of white socks (obsessive headteacher) whilst real issues were ignored.
ReplyDeleteWhy I have I home educated? - for the 2 children I have had at home I have no doubt that I could (and did) do a better job then a school. Why have I had some children in school?- a variety of reasons, partly ignorance of HE at the time, partly because we are in the priviliged position of have had a couple of children with scholarships to good independent schools which I am not sure I could have improved on... sometimes just because I was so tied up with fostering it was easier to stay with the status quo rather than remove a particular child.....
Julie, you have just demonstrated precisely why it is not possible to gather the information Simon is so interested in. Most people's reasons for home educating are complicated.
ReplyDeleteMost people's opinions about schools are complicated too. If you were to interview most home educating parents you'd probably hear multiple reasons for the choice which might even change as the years go on.
We initally made the decision to rescue a drowning child aged 5. 2 years later, we didn't even send her brother because it was going so well for us at home. A couple of years later, our reasons had changed again. By then, we'd become christians and found all kinds of benefits for our children's spiritual development for them to be HE'd. A couple of years after that, we had other reasons to be happy about HE'ing. It was a constantly evolving picture.
Sometimes, I get the feeling that you, Simon, somehow disapprove of parents who have not made the choice to HE for what you consider to be the purest reasons: 'I can do a better job of teaching/helping my child achieve GCSE's than my local school can.'
I might be wrong, but this seems to be the meta-narrative of this blog. There is only one good/pure/justifiable reason to HE. Anyone doing for any 'lesser' reason shouldn't really be doing it at all.
Mrs Anon
"Those who educate their children at home are, by definition, not satisfied with schools."
ReplyDeleteOr they are neutral, happy to offer their child either and give their children a choice? Maybe neutral is the wrong word - able to see that for some children, school might seem a preferable for various reasons. Didn't you give your older daughter the option to home educate but she chose to stay at school? I'm sure you mentioned this at some point. Some children do seem to thrive on the type of social life provided at school - the quality (or not) of the education on offer is not the only variable or consideration.
"I have to say that the present methods used in schools are very inefficient and so much time is wasted that it is a scandal. These things though seem to be seldom mentioned."
Where are you expecting to see it mentioned? In what context? I've seen it mentioned quite often in none home education forums when people ask why someone has chosen to home educate but I agree it's not often discussed in home-ed forums, probably because it's an accepted fact that doesn't required much discussion there. It seems so obvious once you think about and are happy to home educate so what is there to discuss? The only reason I can see for someone wanting to discuss the issue is when they are trying to persuade others that they have made a logical choice for good reasons. Why would we need to persuade other home educators of this?
One of the main reasons we home educated was because we felt we could achieve at least as much as school educationally in a fraction of the time whilst our children hopefully retained their love of learning and also have the time and space to enjoy their childhood and follow their interests as much as they wished. We had enjoyed living and learning together as a family and with friends and couldn't see any advantage in changing this at 4/5.
a preferable *option* for various reasons
ReplyDeletenon-home educating forums
Must start proof reading before hitting that button.
You say Anonymous, " The only reason I can see for someone wanting to discuss the issue is when they are trying to persuade others that they have made a logical choice for good reasons. Why would we need to persuade other home educators of this?" .
ReplyDeleteActually, people on the HE lists often discuss their reasons for taking a child out of school. It just seems that this never relates to the quality of the education being received by the kid.
It is not, Mrs. Anon, that I think that mine is the only true and pure reason for home educating. It is just that I have seen countless people give their reasons for this course of action and hardly any of them seem to mention education as such. I do not recollect seeing anybody saying for example, "I really had no choice but to deregister my son. The methods that they were using to teach mathematics were simply atrocious." Or perhaps, " The teaching of grammar at my daughter's school was lamentable. I couldn't leave her there."
Instead, the reasons relate to bullying, special educational needs and a hundred and one other things. Education seems seldom to be given as a reason for taking a child out of school. I find this a little odd and worth drawing attention to.
Ah, I think that people do actually take their children out of school for 'educational reasons'. I hear that when people say, 'My child was under-performing/not doing as well as I think she can/not being sufficiently stretched/was bored and had started to play up'. Also, when they say 'My child wasn't getting the attention they need/the assistance they need etc'
ReplyDeleteI don't understand why you think that the SEN issue isn't exactly on point, of being able to do a better job than the schools were doing with a child.
Also, when a parent responds to the child's unhappiness at school, that is what they may focus on initially. 'Why did you take her out of school?' Ans: 'Because she was so unhappy.' However, did a little deeper and you will discover the reasons behind the unhappiness: the nasty, bullying teacher, the incompetent head's stupid decisions relating to support, the odd reading strategy which had produced a child terrified of letters on the page, the lunch time antics of older children, any number of things. 'My child was unhappy' covers them all.
With no background in education, it's unlikely a parent would object to a less effective method of learning long division, or perhaps even notice it. What they might notice is that their child's instinctive joy at learning has been eroded since starting full time education. An unhappy child who'd lost their spark - that would prompt some parents to HE. What's wrong with that?
The result may well be the same no matter what the impetus to HE: a happy teenager, who enjoys learning, ready to engage fully with the world in his adult life. I'm in the fortunate position of knowing dozens of those kids now that my youngest is 'graduating' from HE. His peer group are a delightful bunch, not a NEET among them, all well educated to the extent their abilities allow, and their parents had all chosen to HE for a fascinating assortment of continually changing reasons.
I really think you should stop worrying about *why* people choose this course of action Simon, and put your not inconsiderable talents to work figuring out how to help them with their task!
Mrs Anon
The reason that it is important Mrs. Anon, is this. If the primary reason that people home educate is that the school is not tackling some problem, whether bullying, special needs, or whatever, then this has profound implications. Simply by improving the schools and making proper provision for special needs, a zero tolerance policy on bullying and so on; then far fewer parents would remove their children and educate them at home. If on the other hand, the motive is that a parent feels that she can teach her child better at home, then improving things like special needs provision will make no difference. It does matter greatly why people are taking their children from school. It could make a difference as to whether home education continues to increase exponentially or whether the growth is halted and then reversed.
ReplyDelete"Actually, people on the HE lists often discuss their reasons for taking a child out of school. It just seems that this never relates to the quality of the education being received by the kid."
ReplyDeleteAhh, I was thinking of people who chose to home educate rather than those who were pushed into it through circumstances. Obviously those people are much more likely to choose HE for reasons other than education or they would have chosen HE from the beginning. However, I think many become converts to the educational benefits too, once they have been HE for a while.
"It is just that I have seen countless people give their reasons for this course of action and hardly any of them seem to mention education as such."
But the negative reasons for taking a child out of school will impact on the education the child receives at school. If you are being bullied or your SEN needs are not being met you are not going the get the best out of any education being provided. Children learn much better if they are happy and feel safe so even if the education provision at home is 'worse' in some measurable way than the education they would get at school, it could still result in a better educated child because the home environment enables them to learn.