Alan Harris-Reid |
PARENTS - TRUST YOUR CHILDREN. LET THEM BE. Alternative title - “Am I doing the right thing?”
So, you've decided to home-educate your children, you're thinking about doing it, or just interested in the subject. I won't go into numerous reasons why I think/know it is the right decision for the majority of children, but most parents making this large step on the journey of life have many doubts about this route. After all, if most parents still decide to send their children to school, surely it must be the best option around, isn't it? NO! There are many aspects of modern life where just because the majority of people do it, it doesn't mean it is right or the best option. Hopefully I can open-up some minds and show them that opting for this minority (at present) style of education (I prefer to call it 'living') benefits our children, families, lifestyle and, ultimately, society as a whole. This article is an amalgamation of thoughts and opinions that I've accumulated over the years, partly as a result of my own experiences as a home-educating father, but also from questions I am regularly asked in the street, in the local shop, in the library, on the telephone, by family, work colleagues, etc. I have often been asked "How do I...?", "What about...?", "I'm worried about...", "Is it true that...?" with respect to home-educating. I quite enjoy answering these questions, ‘spreading the gospel’ and hopefully at the same time enlighten and ‘educate’ whoever I am talking to.
I know it's easier to say it than do it, but don’t worry!
You've made a decision which is... So what are you worried about when it comes to home-educating your children? That they will not study hard/long enough? I will attempt to address some of these doubts, and hopefully allay some of those fears, apprehensions and reservations.
Let's take one step back and consider why this question is being asked in the first place. What are exams, what are they for, and most importantly, what use do they have? Exams show that someone had enough knowledge of a particular subject on a particular day to satisfy an examiner. Maybe the student was lucky and the right questions came up. Any other day they could easily have failed. Does that prove that the student knew their subject? Of course it didn't. Say the student has a photographic memory, or is good at cramming three days beforehand and forgets most of what they've learned within a few weeks (like most of us would). Do they really know the subject? No. What about the student who really knows their subject but has exam nerves, was ill on the day, or concentrated on the wrong areas? They will be deemed failures when they are obviously not. So what do exams prove? Nothing. They are a convenient and divisive way of providing 'success' statistics for government, local education authorities, OFSTED, schools, teachers, but, least of all, the student. Their main aim is to justify the (lack of) progress of the mainstream education system in this country. So why are we 'measuring' children at all in this way? What gives adults the right to put children through such an ordeal, usually against their will? If someone (child or adult) wishes to be tested, that’s fine, and even then it would only be if they were confident of passing, or to genuinely find out what they don't know about a subject. Unfortunately for most children in this country, they have to take exams at a fixed time in their life, whether they are ready or not, and are branded as failures or ‘low-achievers’ if they don't reach a certain standard in an exam that they hadn't themselves chosen to sit in the first place! It may sound strong, but in other aspects of life this could be seen as an abuse of human rights! It wouldn't be tolerated by adults, so why inflict it on children? How would we feel if we were expected to have a detailed knowledge of ten subjects and be tested on all of them within a three-week period (in June, of all the months to be stuck inside an examination room!). You may be now be thinking "OK, so if exams aren't the answer, how do you measure a child's knowledge of a particular subject?". Why is this measurement necessary at all? To justify the positions of those employed within the education system?
Most adults claim that exam results are the passport to a successful life. As long as our society places more importance on GCSE and A-level passes than real skills which are of use in the real world, that will remain the case, but look at the harm this attitude doing to our young people meanwhile, and the pressure they are being subject to. What good is it doing? The system is geared towards testing, more testing, exams and more exams. Crazy! It's SKILLS that make the world go round, not pieces of paper saying you have 4 GCSEs at grade C. There are (and probably always will be) potential employers and places of further-education which insist on paper qualifications, but the balance is changing and in many places skills and experiences are now being recognized just as much as exam passes. If a child of (eg.) 13 is more interested in motors and engines than any lesson they are 'fed' at school, why can't it be arranged so that (s)he pursues that interest in a garage as an apprentice mechanic? They wouldn't 'get in the way' (a horrible phrase used by adults who don't enjoy the company of young people), they could just observe, or get some practical experience stripping-down a disused engine, and even get paid if they were productive towards the business. If a child really loves art or music they could be out in the real-world learning about script-writing, back-stage electronics or how to make guitars. It's never too young to start if the child is interested, but can they do it within the current schooling system and its extremely narrow (and boring) National Curriculum? Either way, the experience gained is far more valuable than any exam certificate. Too little thought is given to the question "Are we preparing our children to be motivated, responsible, happy and looking forward to a life which they are in control of, and not ending up in a low-paid, dead-end job which they hate, but are doing just to 'pay the bills'?". Our children deserve better than that. It may have been more the case in the past that exam passes led to a higher probability of obtaining a 'better job' (whatever that means), but thankfully that attitude is changing now, albeit slowly. Training staff costs money, so once someone has even the most basic of skills that can be built upon, paper qualifications soon become irrelevant. If you were a potential employer, who would you chose? The applicant with 5 GCSEs and an A level, or the applicant who has done rock-climbing, has taught themselves to speak Spanish, belongs to the local chess club, knows a bit about car mechanics and designs websites for hobby and profit? If children want to take exams (without coercion from adults - we do NOT know better) in the subjects that THEY are interested in, let them do it in their own time, when they are ready. Look at the number of people choosing to go to evening-classes, college or university later in life. They have a keen attitude towards studying because it is their choice, and children should not be treated any differently. Why the hurry to get so many subjects crammed-in before they are 17? Most of them still have 80% of their lives still to go! Many adults acknowledge they learned more about 'real-life' in the five years since leaving school than the 12-14 years they spent at school! It is currently estimated that around 20% of school-leavers at 16 do not have a 'basic grasp of the fundamentals of the English language and mathematics which would be reasonably expected of a person of that age'. Whatever these standards are (and I personally believe there should not be any dividing-line in this case - each child is unique) is irrelevant, but if a child has been subject to 15,000 hours of schooling, what has been going on during that time? The school has failed in its legal duty to provide an education for each child in accordance with their age, aptitude and ability. Anyone fancy suing them?
Above all, you are giving your children the opportunity to be themselves, make decisions for themselves, learn for themselves, make mistakes for themselves. If an autonomous approach has been followed, and with supporting adults to help make their wishes happen, and to fall-back upon if things go wrong, children who haven't been through the school 'conveyor belt' (and hence been moulded as products rather than individuals) will flourish accordingly. If you are thinking of future education or employment prospects, educational institutes and employers are usually looking for interesting people who they think can complete the course or do the job, not robotic pupils who have been 'fed' all the knowledge they have, forced to learn it parrot-fashion and regurgitate it for an exam, then forget it all. Because of the more independent and customised type of education that home-educated children have had, they are often more resourceful and entrepreneurial than their school counterparts. Useful fact - the 50 top earners in the UK today have very few formal qualifications between them (Alan Sugar started off with a market stall, Richard Branson started with a van delivering records). They got out there and did what they wanted to do, despite their lack of qualifications. Non-schooled children often have a confidence and different outlook on life which their schooled counterparts don't have. This partly results from the fact that they have not been continuously tested to satisfy someone-else's agenda, not constantly measured against others, not regarded as backward or below-average in any way, been encouraged to follow their interests and have, on the whole, been treated respectfully as regards what they do and don’t want to do in life. They see their future as more under their own control than predetermined by others. Life is seen as something to look forward to - not a chore. Because they haven't been subject to the socialisation restrictions that schoolchildren experience (see elsewhere in this article), and if they have been brought-up in a loving and respectful environment in which they are not 'shouted-down' and suppressed by adults, they are not so ‘scared’ of authority and find it easier to relate to all people, not just those of their own age.
Laziness is a term often used to describe the fact that the recipient is not doing what someone thinks they should be doing. Doing 'nothing-in-particular' is an important part of life. Playing games can be beneficial (I have found if you let children regulate themselves, they usually don't spend excessive hours in front of a screen). Sleep is especially important - medical experts suggest most teenagers don't get enough! We can't spend all of our waking hours concentrating, learning, busy, active, etc.. So home-educated children may not be up at 7.30am, so what? They would probably go to bed later as well, so they wouldn’t be deprived of sleep. More importantly, they would be waking when their body was ready, not when an alarm clock or shouting parent breaks their peaceful sleep 5 days a week. It's unnatural and we have no right to force this regime on our children when it is not necessary. Our children don't tell us when to get up or when to go to bed, so what gives us the right to tell them? Allowing them to regulate their own body-clock is just one of the many ways in which they can take control over their life. Most adults know how wonderful it is to have a lie-in at the weekends, that's probably because we've pushed our bodies so much during the week. We would function a lot better if we listened to our bodies more.
This shows a 'stuck in the past' mentality, where childhood is controlled by adults and geared towards the end goal of 'getting a job'. Besides, we are moving ever-closer towards a 24-hour society, so having to 'get up early' to go to work is becoming less relevant. Sure we all need money, and for most of us this means working for it, but is it right to pressurize our children further by placing yet more expectation upon them? They are not children for long, so why spoil their childhood with the "If you don't study hard, you’ll end up on the dole queue." threat?. If our children have vocations in life, following their own interests via their own motivation will far more likely lead them there than studying subjects they have no interest in because someone thinks that's where the employment prospects are. If they can earn money from something they are interested in, that’s a welcome bonus. 'Getting a good job' should not be the be-all and end-all of life. There is probably not enough conventional employment to go around anyway, so an increasing number of us will have to look around for alternative ways of making a living.
Because they haven't been restricted by the numerous constraints that school imposes, non-schooled children have a different, often much more positive outlook on life, and are motivated by themselves to take an interest in subjects, activities, etc. to a level which suits themselves, and, because of the time available, often to a higher level than they could ever achieve at school. Children who have the freedom to set their own agenda and timetable of life are far more likely to do what they think is interesting and relevant to their lives. They often have a different concept of what education is and do not see it simply as knowledge that is 'spoon-fed' between the hours of 9am to 3.30pm. It is absorbed by living and experiencing as well as via studying. They have the opportunity of looking-forward to all 7 days of the week, not just weekends and holidays.
Another myth to dispel. Home-educated children are rarely at home
all day everyday. Parents who have taken the decision to home-educate
are usually responsible enough to realise that mixing with others
is an important part of a child's development. The school playground and classroom culture is not an ideal environment for making meaningful friendships. What with the taunting, bullying, gang culture, etc. that goes on in schools (from adults as well as children), we can do without most of the socialisation that goes on there. It is also important to remember that children must have the option NOT to socialise if that is their wish. We all sometimes find ourselves in social situations in which we'd rather not be. Children must have the freedom to withdraw from such situations if they feel uncomfortable. It's analogous to forcing someone to eat something they don't want to, or study something they don't want to, or being forced into saying “Thanks for the wonderful present” when it was awful. It is wrong and disrespectful.
This doesn't really come under the heading of a reservation that the potential home-educator may concerned about, but I think it is very important to reassure parents that their children are very special in many ways, and that by taking them out of school (or not sending them in the first place) they are giving their children a much greater opportunity to flourish in whatever area(s) of life they choose. I believe that every child has the capability of excelling in one or more aspects of life (social, academic, commercial, sport, entertainment, etc.) to a standard which most of us would regard as outstanding or exceptional. Most of us don't attain this, even if we would like to, and often this is due to the way we were treated at school and by our parents. Due to the way they were brought-up, some parents don't have the confidence in their children to believe that they are anything other than 'ordinary', and are destined to be 'nothing special' in life. And so the negative cycle goes on. Thankfully there are also many parents who are determined to ensure that their children do not have the restrictions that they themselves had, and so the cycle is broken and (hopefully) we move towards a better society for all of us. If a child is good at sport but hates dancing, or loves computers but not maths, music but not art, etc., let them follow what they enjoy to a level they are comfortable with. Pushing and challenging themselves is far more productive than being coerced by well-meaning parents or teachers who think it would be 'for their own good'. We should help the child who is mad about machines and appears to be interested in nothing else by going to the local second-hand shop, getting an old radio, dismantling it and trying to rebuild it. It doesn’t matter what the outcome is, just consider all the skills that may have been picked-up during the process! Maths, physics, reading (instructions and manuals), dealing with people (the local electrical retailer for advice, spare parts shops), electronics, learning to use tools, gaining the confidence that comes with the satisfaction one achieves by building something that (hopefully) works and is valued by others, and (eventually) getting rewarded by payment for something that they enjoy doing. Similarly, a child's love of music could lead them to instrument making (art, craft, design, maths), playing (study, memorising, reading), performing (socialisation), recording, etc.. Any child's loves, however narrow they might seem at first, will usually lead to other skills which could be useful in later life (and if they aren’t, so what?). Whatever they decide to do (with support and praise from us) I'm sure that they will eventually get the balance of skills which is right for their lives. The most important thing we as adults can do is to allow them to follow their chosen path.
Most schools today are still loosely based on the way they were in the Victorian times, when the opportunity to learn to read, write, etc. was first made available to all children, not just those from wealthy families. Unless you knew someone particularly knowledgeable in a certain subject, teachers and books were the only way children could learn about life beyond their own family and locality. Today things are totally different. Knowledge can be obtained from so many sources (books, newspapers, radio, television, libraries, internet, etc.) that if one wanted to learn about anything, school is probably the last place one would think of! Teachers are no longer the 'font of all knowledge' that they were regarded as. Their job now is to control a group of children of differing abilities and interests for around 50 minutes, before passing them onto another teacher to do the same, and so on until the school day comes to an end. If some knowledge is absorbed by the children during that time, that will be a bonus. It is a glorified child-minding service. The vast majority of learning takes place outside of the classroom. Education and knowledge is obtained by attending the longest lesson of all. It’s called living. School fails most children most of the time. They cannot cater for anyone but the 'average' child, who of course does not exist, because all children are unique. In its current structured, institutionalised and inflexible format schools cannot cope with their individual requirements, interests and abilities. Those with more ability and/or interest in a particular subject are held back by others in the class. Those who find the subject difficult, but are still interested, may require more individual help, which they can't get. Those who are not at all interested in the subject may disrupt the others, and shouldn't be there in the first place. No-one wins. Children should not be forced or coerced into attending lessons of subjects they are not interested in - their time would be far better spent doing something they were interested in. I am not suggesting that we abolish schools altogether. There are many children who have such a poor home life (not necessarily financially, but from the point of view of love, respect, stimulation, etc.) that for them to spend a few hours a day away from that environment would probably be beneficial. I am not suggesting that we knock all schools to the ground. Keep the buildings, open them up to children and adults of all ages, change the name from school to resource or community centre, keep the resources they have, especially those not found in the average home (sports, science, music, art, etc. equipment), change the staff title from teacher to assistant or facilitator, and, above all, let the children take what they want, when they want, from what is on offer. Don't have compulsory attendance or exams, don't have narrow, prescriptive, uninteresting curricula. In other words, give the children a REAL CHOICE. If a child wants to do carpentry all day, why shouldn't they? If they just want to go there to meet with their friends - why not? By taking control of their own lives, I'm sure that far more children would enjoy going, and it would not be seen as the 'prison' it has become for so many.
It is only a risk in the same way that any big life decision is a risk. Think how much more you risk to your child’s emotional health by placing them in an environment which does not respect their individual needs and stifles their learning abilities and talents. Most parents take great care over selecting child-minders, baby-sitters, nannies, etc., but think nothing of placing their child into the hands of strangers for 200 days a year for 12 years in the hope that they may get an education? And if it goes wrong, they blame the schools and the teachers that they selected and approved of in the first place!
It's strange - we have a state education system in this country that so many people regard as failing, yet there is one obvious solution staring the authorities in the face - the promotion of home-education as a viable, valid, and successful alternative! But that would mean admitting failure, which would be very embarrassing considering the promises made by politicians and the huge amount of money being pumped into the system. For every home-educated children at present (in 2001), the government is saving about £2,400 per child per year. That's a lot of money that could be re-distributed to home-educators in the form of tax rebates or resources which we currently have to pay for ourselves! Even if parents do know that education doesn't have to take place at school, here are a few reasons why they don't do it... * Even if one or both parents are in favour of home-education,
lack of support (even hostility) from other family members and friends
prevent them from taking it further.
I can hear many readers (if they get this far) saying (maybe shouting) "What an opinionated bigot! Who does this person think they are? I have children in school and they seem perfectly happy. What does (s)he know about my children and their lives?" Well, if it is totally the child’s choice (non-forced or coerced) to be in school, good luck to you/them and I hope they really are as content as you make out, but if you have sent your child to school, it implies that it is not the child’s decision, so how do you know (s)he is really happy?” What do I know about school? I have lived it, I see it, I read about it, I listen to other parents and children and about their problems with the system. I have enough experience and knowledge of home-education to confidently stand by my opinions in this article. I appreciate that there are differences between state, private and so-called 'free' schools, and that many of my statements are generalisations which (by definition) will not apply to every school, adult, parent or child, but I stand by them in that they apply to the majority. It is the so-called 'normal' society that I would love to see changed and hopefully we are sowing the seeds of change. Of course there are well-balanced and happy children who have been through the schooling system, and 'come out the other end' to lead contented lives, but that does not detract from the fact that I believe that more children should (and could) be given the choice as to how their futures are determined. I don't just mean a nod to choice in the form of selecting 4 out of 10 GCSE subjects, I mean the true choice of whether they want to study any subjects at all, whether they go to any place of work or study, whether they go to bed (or wake up) early or late. Those are true choices in life. I suspect many people reading this article will think (and the people that asked me the questions at the beginning of this article have said) "This is all fine in theory, but I bet it doesn't work in practice." Please believe me - it does. If only more parents would give it a chance. I don't want to appear patronising, nor force my opinions down other peoples' throats (that usually has the opposite effect of the aim one is trying to achieve), but if this article makes people think a little more about their children and their future and happiness, it will have served its purpose. Within the confines that life imposes (time, money, etc.) I try to give my children as much freedom and choice as possible. My children (2 boys, 10 and 15, never been to school) often tell me when they think I'm wrong and I sometimes think "If they have the confidence to disagree so forcefully when they believe that something is so wrong, then I must have done something right." Life is far from perfect, I make mistakes, I know I can do better, and I'm trying.
Take the plunge! Do it! Thousands have done so successfully. I've yet to meet any ex-school family who said that moving to home-education was the wrong decision. There cannot be failures, since there is nothing to fail. The best you can do for your children is to help them to get what they want from life and get where they want to go. Remember, they are real people with real ideas, real aspirations and real experiences. Just because they haven't got the same 'experience of life' (whatever that means) that adults claim to have, their views and opinions are just as valid and adults have no right to trample all over those decisions just because they are adults. Older does not mean wiser - look at all the problems in your street, locality, country and the world. How many of them are caused by children? Wherever they are going in life, let's help them on their way, not get in their way. We need to let them go, observe, listen, help and guide when asked. The future of childrens’ happiness, self-confidence and life-fulfilment is in their hands, but only if we, the parents, trust it to happen.
Alan Harris-Reid Copyright Alan Harris-Reid, January 2002 |
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