Home Education. UK answers only please.?

Question

I have removed my children from an abominable school. Subscribed to education city ( It's great) , but how many hours a day do you have to educate a Reception age and a year 1 child. At the moment it averages out to 6 hours a day , is this too little or too much? They are absolutely loving home ed. Soaking everything up like a sponge. we do English, Maths, Science, Phys. Ed, Religious studies, Rural Studies,even Spanish. But what if any records do you have to keep, we keep a daily diary but is this enough? we do have the local Education Rep. coming to visit.

Answer 1

You seem to be doing great but all you have to do is make the work harder when they need it to be.

Answer 2

There is no legal requirement, none at all. 6 hours honestly sounds too much BUT if they're enjoying it then what the heck :-)

You do not have to keep any records. The LA has no duty or right to monitor but since you've agreed to a home visit they'll get to see that an education suitable for your children's ages, aptitudes and abilities is taking place.

I suggest checking out the law and the government guidelines issued to LAs (@ the 1st line below) before the visit because LA officials have a nasty habit of telling you what they think you should do as if it were what you legally have to do. That is, they're often big fat liars.

You do not have to follow the National Curriculum and the Foundation Stage goals are rubbish. I read them and they're mostly about fitting in at school. Anyway it sounds like what you're doing already is WAY ahead of anything they'd be doing in school.

Answer 3

6 hours a day is the same as a school day, although that is including lunch breaks and play breaks etc. Sounds like you're doing really great. I am not sure about record-keeping, but the local educational rep will prob help you with that, I used to have a friend that home-schooled (we didn't fall out she moved away lol!), and she said that they're really helpful and want to make it work for you, rather than trying to catch you out and make you send the kids to school. I work with the foundation stage and aren't up to speed on the national curriculum so can't totally advise you on that, but if you go to http://www.standards.dcsf.gov.uk/eyfs/ you can download the Foundation Stage curriculum (the new version coming into force Sept but you can start using it now) and it has all the stepping stones and early learning goals for children up to the age of 5, that nurseries/schools use to observe and assess children against. Your education rep might be able to provide you with a hard copy though, and also hard copy of national curriculum guidelines for KS1 and 2 (Years 1-6).

Good luck!

Answer 4

I agree with Firebird and Stewart.

Yes, 6 hours does seem a lot, but if your children want to learn for that length of time, then fine!

Personally, I think the National Curriculum is naff.  I home-ed my 13 year old and whilst she does have "lessons" we have cut out a lot of c**p that she was being taught at school and replaced it with other things.  She also does not do any subjects that she dislikes such as geography or the three main sciences.  From my experience, if a child isn't interested in a subject, they are not going to learn it.  However, she does stuff like astronomy, gardening, Latin, needlework, ancient history and literature etc,  all of which she could not have done at school.

I think that rural studies is a great subject.  They used to do it at my daughter's old school but stopped it years ago which is a shame.  It's also great that you are doing Spanish as children do benefit  by learning languages early.  

Don't worry about the EHE officer visiting.  Our lady is brilliant and very helpful.  I assume though, you are aware that there is no legal requirement for you to see anyone from the LEA or show them examples of your children's work etc.  I do keep a sort of diary, but it is for our benefit and not the LEA's.  You do not have to keep any records and you can teach what you like.

Good luck!

Edit: To Vivian.  Your LEA has no right to insist that you keep a diary.  I only keep one to jog my own memory and I don't show it to anyone.  If you are in Scotland though, I think the rules may be different from England and Wales.

Answer 5

I agree 100% with firebird, and would add, definitely join Education Otherwise. They have local support groups where you can meet like-minded parents. Also, in my case, they sent an advisor to sit in with us at our first meeting with the local education people.

Answer 6

well the idea of home-schooling is so that it is different than they do it at school so your children must be ducated as much as they want to and learn only what they need and want to, you must not force subjects on to them that bore the h**l out of them just focus on subjects they like and dont give them a time table, i am home-schooled and my mum believes that making kids learn certain things like history, science, geogrephy and all that hoo har if they dont want to is a waste of time and as for keeping a diary, uhh noo wayy, me and my mum both hated that, it made me go crazy it was because the frikking LEA insisted it and i was under pressure and i got real stressed, i was having to look at things that i didnt give a frik about knowing just to please those stupid authorityies