Friday 30th April 2021
All of these views are the views of my own and my family’s. We do not expect them to reflect those of all of our readers. We do not judge those that choose a more traditional route of education (heck we did until recently) nor do we expect you to judge us.
Eleven years ago when I started my parenting journey I honestly thought home educating, (well home schooling as I thought then, as I was unaware of the differing terms) was for hippies and was damaging to children. I thought it was more about the parents who couldn’t let their children grow up and make their own decisions. Who weren’t allowed to grow and be who they were meant to be and were not allowed to independently explore their world. Gosh how small minded, judgemental and very, very wrong I was. Well apart from the hippy thing, (apparently me not all home educators) as I legitimately think I am turning into one and believe I am going to fully embrace it!
The school my children currently attend is one of the better ones in the area. It has in the last few years had a new headteacher who really does give a damn and is doing his best to make it a school to be proud of with a real community feel, which is how I know now that it won’t matter which school my kids attend. It is school as an institution that does not work for them. I mean that’s not to say I don’t have my concerns about the school and my children’s safety and well being because I wouldn’t be pulling them if everything was hunkydory.
As my babies have gone through their school career it has become clearer year on year that the school can not cope with their physical, mental and emotional needs. Their disabilities get brushed aside as if they are an inconvenience, or worse made up (I was informed that Samantha’s needs were all due to my disabilities) and Riley’s medical needs are most of the time forgotten about and care plans lost., It turned out for an entire year they didn’t know he was asthmatic and were surprised when I asked for his inhaler back (yes there was a care plan) at the end of the first covid term. There have been injuries not reported to us, bullying not addressed and medication withheld and that is without going too deep into it all. It is not until you stop and take account of it all that you realise just how bad things have been and how badly the children have been failed and that’s before you even start looking at the actual academic side of school, you know the bit they are meant to be good at.
The children are both badly behind in school and always have been. They get very little additional support and none of it is official. I have asked several times for something more official to be put into place but am told either it is not needed, in Samantha’s case or they are working on it, in Riley’s case and then hear no more about it. To give you some idea, Samantha is 11 and has a writing age of 7 and Riley who is 8 has a reading age equivalent to a child in reception and they cannot quantify his writing age. Both of the children constantly tell us how ‘stupid’ and less than their peers they feel and this is due to the lackof support they are given to succeed. The school system has repeatedly let us down as a family, promising us the world and giving us an out of date A-Z.
The last straw really came for us this week when I pulled the learning mentor to one side to speak to her about something unrelated, but happened to mention Riley’s school refusal. She immediately started to bend over backwards to help, telling me it wasn’t OK he felt this way, that school wanted to do everything they could to help him feel better about coming into school, that she would phone me on Wednesday to discuss it and then arrange a meeting with SENCO. That all took place on Monday, today is Friday and I have heard nothing from her and the worst of it, the real kicker, a letter was published by the school on Tuesday morning, the school is due a visit from OFSTED ‘any day now’. Ah OK I get it, you need to look good for OFSTED and they are going to take one look at my kids file and see you are failing him and you are going to be up poop creek, that is the only reason after four years, FOUR YEARS, you want to help him, amazing.
We are done. We are going to let them finish up this school year, as there are only nine more ‘working’ weeks left and it is Samantha’s last year, but then we are beginning our home educating journey.
And yes we realise that Samantha will be going off to a new school in September, but in all honesty, same poop different building. Whilst doing her first transition days, we have just found out that her new school relies heavily on a behaviour points scheme. Points are earned or lost based on behaviour and awards are issued based on the points earnt. These types of systems are archaic and damaging. Regardless of my views on them, these reward charts, which no matter how you dress it up, are what these systems essentially are, shut Samantha down, she cannot cope with the pressure of them and rebels against them. Not good.
Then there is still the fundamental problem that she hates school as a concept, as there are just too many demands and the lack of personal control that she requires. She is emotionally too young to cope with secondary school (this is painfully clear already amongst her peers) and with all her additional needs, not to mention her physical size, we are desperately concerned for her personal safety from bullies.
Looking back at it all now it’s a wonder I haven’t come to this decision before. Neither child has ever had the ability to sit still or conform. Samantha at toddler group aged 18 months, was a demon and it was here I first realised we had problems, she just couldn’t stay still not even for a second. While she is able to now, this is entirely due to the fact that her spirit, her drive has been knocked out of her. They were and still are outdoor children.
We didn’t know we had any other choice, home education was for weird hippies that had feral children (I’m sorry, I was uneducated). We are taught school, not education, is compulsory and we will be criminally prosecuted if we deviate and or miss more than a few days. This includes allowing time for our child to recoup mentally and emotionally. As adults, if personal circumstances become too fraught, we can be signed off sick from work by the doctor on grounds of mental health, yet we are not told this is an option for children, we are told we will be taken to court.
We are taught/told we can not learn efficiently unless we are in the correct uniform, perfect carbon clones of our peers with no sign of individuality.
We spend the first 3-5 years teaching our kids to learn through play, to break moulds, to explore their surroundings, to touch, to develop ideas, ask questions and be themselves. We then send them to school to be forced to sit, conform, to accept what they are being told. To not question it and to learn in a very regimented, uniformed way.
We want our children to live their true life and the reality is they can’t and don’t in school. They hide who they really are, mask themselves. We learnt during the lockdowns who they really are and they are wonderful, happy, fun loving humans and we can’t wait to see more of them. We don’t ask them to hide their autism, in fact quite the opposite, we tell them it is part of who they are and they do not need to hide it to fit in.
On a more personal note I feel they spend too much time in school and certainly since the lockdowns I have seen it more and more. Riley needs later starts to the day. He struggles to get to sleep most nights, (we can’t get help we have tried) and needs extra time for his body to recoup from the hypermobility and urticaria, so he really struggles with the early school starts. We also do not have enough time on school days to enrich the children with sensory play, which they not only crave but need to self regulate especially the youngest one. If he does not get enough sensory input then it is very apparent in the decline of his behaviour. I miss them and although this in itself is not a good enough reason to home educate (as it is in my best interests not the children’s) when you take everything else into consideration it just reinforces my decision that I am making the right choice, I am having my children’s best hours wasted at school and we are being handed empty shells of children back.
Do I have concerns? Hell yeah, I would be a bad parent if I didn’t. I have several chronic illnesses, one of which can leave me sofa bound with limited mobility for days, however on those days we will utilise games on the laptop, we will watch documentaries, we will take rest days with movies, not only because I need them but because so will the children. Riley has joint problems as well, meaning he has to have easy days and both children have autism, meaning some days they are sensory overloaded and need to recoup, at the moment we can’t do that, when we home educate we can.
The freedom of lockdown learning (the first time round when we were in control, not virtual learning the second time) showed us what the children were capable of when given the opportunity. So we can only imagine what the true freedom of home education will give them and I don’t just mean from an educational and academic standpoint but from an emotional and life skill stance as well. I can not wait to watch these babies fly.
Right now we still think that finishing this school year is the right thing for them and we are hoping that it will show them the joy and sense of achievement in taking something to the end, certainly for Samantha as it is the end of an era for her, but we are watching the whole situation very closely, any sign of any serious deterioration in their mental health and we will pull them early. We are really looking forward to the next stage in our journey and we hope you will join us for it, as even if it all goes up in flames it should be one hell of a ride.
