Home Education or School? – Wales sees an increase in the number of pupils educated at home

October 21, 2015

• Topical

Although permitted by The 1996 Education Act, which states that school-age children must receive an education “either by attendance at a school or otherwise”, but is home schooling a plausible alternative for some children?

The number of parents choosing home schooling as the alternative of mainstream education is on the rise; as “more and more parents are finding that it is possible to provide a suitable, flexible and enriching education tailored to their child’s individual needs in a way that schools could not dream of providing,” says Mike Wood, who runs a website dedicated to home education.

According to the Welsh government, in the 2014-2015 academic year, 3.8 pupils out of 1000 were home educated, compared to 2010-2011, when only 2.4 out of 1000 were.

The parents argue that they are able to tailor their teaching so that it suits their children, which would be difficult in a large classroom. Bev Carr, a former school teacher, chose to withdraw her son Henry from school at the age of five after finding out her son was unhappy in school.

“Henry is dyslexic and struggles to write things down,” she said, “I feel I can offer him the time and space he needs to record things in a way that suits him.” The family has found a way for Henry to go to school three times a week and spend two days at home. Mrs.Carr feels that the three days he spends at school is vital for him to “be a sociable being”. “He’s learning to be a sociable thing. He belongs to a community and he’s making friends. That would be more difficult if he was at home all the time,” she added.

After twelve months of home schooling, it brought Henry’s confidence back enough for the family to consider sending him to school again.

What do the children think?

All four children from the Maurice family, from Caernarfon in Gwynedd, were all educated at home. The children underwent ‘seasonal education’, “where they worked indoors with books, worksheets and the internet during the winter and spent the summer outside, camping, walking and learning about nature,” said their mother Julie Maurice.

Their daughter, Eden Maurice said, “It was a really positive experience, I gained a lot out of it that I don’t think I’d have got in school.” She also commented later on saying, “Most of all, I think home education gives you a really strong relationship with your parents that I’m not sure I would have had if I’d gone to school.”

Her brother, Tao Maurice, also feels he benefited from the freedom of home schooling – “Having lots and lots of time to specialise was better for me than spending 20 hours a week doing religious studies and other stuff I’m just not interested in.”

However, many professionals worry that homeschooling would mean that

children are missing out on some important life skills. Wrexham-based education consultant John Morris says, “School is where you make friends but it’s also where you learn about the ups and downs of life and how to deal with them effectively. If you don’t have social integration, you don’t learn those coping skills and I think that’s a big issue.”

“Schools provide an atmosphere where children have to learn give and take, tolerance and a respect for the views of others, “agreed Dr Philip Dixon, director of education union ATL Cymru, “they are a major means of socialising us for the future,” he said.

The Welsh government tried to enforce regular monitoring for these families, but this angered many. Instead, Huw Lewis, the Education Minister is trying to bring in non-statutory guidance for local authorities, which recommends them to hold annual meetings with families to “consider evidence that a suitable education is taking place”. They emphasise that that officers don’t have the right to insist on this if families refuse.

This was supported by NSPCC Cymru/Wales, the spokesman tells the public, “Home educated children are at increased risk of becoming invisible to authorities,” he then added, “A small minority of families may potentially decide to home educate as a mechanism to conceal neglect and abuse. We feel the guidance needs to be strengthened to assist local authorities to fulfill their safeguarding responsibilities towards children who are educated at home.”

The parents responded, “Safeguarding is important but it’s not a home education issue.” Mike Wood explained that the reason they are against monitoring is that “it depends on how that local authority sees education, too often they employ ex-head teachers to oversee home education. We argue that they are often very poor at understanding how education works in the home environment.”

The Welsh government spokesperson said an analysis of the consultation responses will be published this autumn.

Resource from:

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-33979987

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