Why We Chose To Home Educate

 Home education - I am hearing it more and more at the moment as more families are taking the same path as ourselves! I am going to delve into why we chose to home educate, how it is working for us and if we feel it is something we can sustain long term.

During Covid like all other parents the choice to send our children to school was no longer an option. Before then I had not had any thought on home ed or had any experience of it, in fact I was shamefully in that mindset of assuming people who home educated were "hippies" who couldn't of been providing the standard of education that schools could. How wrong was I?! So Covid hit, the schools shut and the responsibility of education fell on us as parents. My daughter was in year 3 and my son was due to start primary school, all of a sudden it was down to me to learn about phonics and the latest methods of learning. If you had asked me previous to that time how I would feel being in that situation I would have said daunted, maybe overwhelmed?! However once the responsibility was on me and leaning could be done with our twists and interests I absolutely fell in love with it. That time with the children, leaning about new things together and tailoring their learning to ways I knew would spark their interest made me realize my own capabilities and could not believe how well we all flourished!

When the days came for schools to reopen I can honestly say I was devastated! I had loved that time with them so much and my daughter longed for home education to continue. At the time I also felt such a longing to continue but I had no knowledge of the process of de-registration and if i'm honest I was worried what people would think and if I would regret the decision so they both returned to school. Both children got on reasonably well at school and last year in 2024 my daughter started secondary school, it was at this time I realized she was spending 7 hours a day becoming completely burnt out, much time of which was doing things she had absolutely no passion or interest in! Homework was piling up and each week seemed to be another batch of assessments, her quality of life seemed to be going downhill along with her mental health. She had always continued in her wanting of home education and jumped at the chance to be de-registered in January 2025 and my son followed shortly after.

It is often argued that home educating is taking your child out of "the real world", but actually we find it the complete opposite, the UK education system feels to us very far behind the times now, AI is constantly progressing forward, MANY of the jobs school is deigned to set you up for just wont exist or have demand in the future. The ideologies in school are just wild to us and it was genuinely really concerning us that they were in these negative environments for 6/7 hours a day, I do however feel this applies slightly less in primary education.

Travel is also a huge factor for us as we have begun our journey to leave the UK, we still have a long way to go in terms of that however the time we just spent in Bali recently was filled with the most fantastic and educational moments for the children and had they still of been in education we would of received a hefty fine for the pleasure of world educating our children instead of them being at school spending much of the time making Easter decorations! This then boils my blood when they then want to charge anywhere between hundreds to thousands for THEM to take your children away on trips! It is un-affordable for many families when so many just want a little holiday with their children that is affordable to them in term time.

I am pleased to say home education so far is everything we had ever hoped for, the children are so happy and content, I have seen a huge shift in my daughter, not trying to keep up with others and enjoying what makes her happy without the pressure to keep up with the latest dramas and trends at school. For my son his self confidence has skyrocketed! He is no longer in an environment where he is being left out or called names every day. In terms of school work we are able to smash our way through their less favorable subjects in short concentrated bursts, we can mix up the learning settings such as a coffee shop or the park! My biggest enjoyment of it all is having the freedom to explore their interests further, they spend a great deal of time cooking, are able to study languages of their choice which they are passionate about and can tweak subjects to ways in which I know will interest them.

Of course not ever day goes without a blip there is always odd days where one of the children just isn't feeling it and finds doing the work taxing but that is the beauty of home education we can take a break, get into the garden for a kick about or nip to the park, take a refresh then come back to things with a clear mind and altered attitude to their work.

Do I think we can sustain home educating our children long term? Absolutely! Will the future always be easy, possibly not, but we take each day as it comes. The amount of learning resources online is incredible, there are also many fantastic home education companies if the prospect of teaching your children alone worries you.

The children still enjoy time with their friends, attend groups, clubs and are enjoying meeting new friends on our travels. They are spending so much more time with their Dad now as his time off usually fell when the children were at school which often meant not seeing him for days on end which definitely impacted them negatively.

Home education is of course a personal choice and every family which chooses this path will have their own reason why they chose to embark on the journey. Never hesitate to contact me on our social media if you ever need any help or advice as I know how daunting it was for us, especially in those early days.

Hannah x