The choice to homeschool

A number of people have contacted me recently as they are considering home schooling their children and would like to talk about it.

In many ways, it is difficult for me to talk about home schooling because people are often approaching it with a  ‘school’ mindset and have this perception that home schooling is school at home, like it was during the pandemic, or just a replication of school at home. 

But for us and many others in the home school community it is absolutely not that way. It is a lifestyle choice, a way of living that involves significant change, not least in how one works and pulls together as a family, but in conditioning, perception and indeed consciousness.

For us homeschooling was essential. Admittedly I had played around with the idea in my head since my eldest, Elijah, was in utero, as I already had a sense that he was not going to fit into the system, but Ewan and our extended family were not supportive of this, and in many ways it wasn’t practical then either.

So we followed the traditional route, but it was clear, quite quickly, that Elijah was not suited to the system. In Reception he couldn’t tolerate the playground and packed lunches, so our schedules and indeed lives changed to allow us to pick him up each lunchtime. I also started volunteering in his class as much as I could with reading, discovery zone, playing games, swimming, teaching yoga; doing all I could to ease the separation anxiety he was experiencing.

The leap from infants to juniors was a step too far and Elijah’s anxiety increased dramatically, to the extent that he wasn’t sleeping or eating properly and there was a ritual we had to follow each morning before school and endless questions and reassurance about what was happening next. Each drop off was a torturous affair of many tears and Elijah begging me to take him home, before being separated from me by an LSA.

It was mentally and emotionally exhausting and stressful, and caused us to reach out to a child psychologist for advice. The recommendation was to home school. So we did. We took him out of school the day before he turned 8 and began a six month unschooling and healing period, where we did no formal learning to allow his nervous system to settle. It took about 18 months for this to properly settle and overcome the separation anxiety.

It was the same with our youngest, Eben. He had also hated pre-school and school and like Elijah, suffered with separation anxiety. We were always told that if you take one child out of school, the other(s) will soon follow, but we persevered with Eben, because there was still a sense in the family that the school was best for him. But Eben had other ideas and towards the end of Year One he took himself out of school, refusing to go in and taking quite radical action to ensure he didn’t have to attend.

Thus my starting point for people taking their children out of school - does the child want to leave school? I loved school and thrived in that environment. Admittedly it conditioned me to see the world a certain way, and to take on some unhelpful core beliefs about myself and society, and it is an ongoing process to release that conditioning and shift those beliefs, but I was happy. If I felt my boys were happy and thriving in school, conditioning aside, I might not have taken them out of the system.

The stumbling block for people is how it might work financially. I hear you; it’s not easy. Fortunately though Ewan and I both work for ourselves, similarly to many in the home school community, so we have the flexibility to work our hours around the home schooling. Sometimes one of the parents might have a normal full time job and the other might not work at all to focus on the home schooling.

Either way, time is limited, and it is often a juggling act, with very little head space in the same way that one gets when the children are in school. There is often a financial sacrifice too but our whole perspective on finance has changed since we have been home schooling and we now view abundance in so many different ways, not just financial gain.

At the end of the day life is short. We don’t know how long we are here. It is perhaps arrogant to assume we will live into old age. Life doesn’t need to follow any particular course – we are conditioned to believe we need to get a ‘good’ education to get a ‘good’ job (earn as much money as we can, not least for perceived security but also society’s notion of ‘success’), meet a partner, buy a house, get married, have children, work hard (even if that means slaving for others), retire, get a pension, enjoy grandchildren, live to a good age.

Life doesn’t have to be lived this way. There is no rule book. There is only – from my side – the journey of the heart and soul. But so often people try to live according to society’s idea of how it should be lived and find themselves desperately unhappy. They may end up questioning what is wrong with them, without appreciating that it is merely that the society’s ‘system’, the ‘mainstream’, doesn’t fit for them – i.e. the system is flawed. It is the same for our children.

With home schooling there is a sense that while money helps, it doesn’t equal happiness, and that you cannot put a price on the health and wellbeing of your children, or indeed your family generally. Over time you begin to appreciate that abundance comes in different ways – you can’t put a price on the quality time spent with your children, those moments where you find yourself sitting on a deserted beach around a fire which your child has created, eating lunch out in the elements and watching your child explore the sea shore with other home schooled children, learning from curiosity.

Let alone the freedom to dictate your own schedule, to make the most of the seasonal shifts; blustery walks, tree climbing, wood collecting, mountain biking and scootering in the winter, and more time at the beach, swimming, rock pooling, paddle boarding and kayaking in the summer. There’s a certain joy that comes when holidays pass and other children are back at school and we can have the beaches and skate park to ourselves.  

Plus, one always finds a way. Ewan and I have had to repeatedly change our working schedules to accommodate the changing needs of the boys and the home schooling activities etc. Because that is the other thing with home schooling – it is organic and always changing, no term is lived the same, activities change, the needs of children change, life happens, sometimes we see a lot of a particular family and then not at all, one becomes more aware of the changing seasons and of the constant change this brings.

Because this is the other thing. You begin to realise that children learn best when they are interested and ready. You realise that so much of learning is learning for learning’s sake and productivity for productivity’s sake. That so much of what is learned in school is not relevant to daily life and is easily forgotten, unless relevant or of interest to that child.

So while most start out worrying about curriculum and whether one’s child is ‘keeping up’, you gradually let go of this the more you feel secure in your choices, the more you veer away from the education system, and the more you witness your child thriving. Furthermore, you might find yourself increasingly questioning your own education and societal conditioning around exams and perceived financial security.

You might begin to recognise how much pressure is placed on children to meet various standards, to get certain grades, to pass certain exams and the implications of the stress this creates on them, let alone you as the parent, trying to hold it all together and you might start to see/consider that there is always another way.

One of the questions people always ask when they hear you are home schooling is “what are you going to do about exams?”. We are so conditioned as a society to think that exams are the ‘be and end all’ of life. Our sense of security is intrinsically linked into this. People are always surprised and no doubt judgemental when we don’t have an answer for them. And really, what concern of theirs is it anyway. 

The irony is, neither Ewan or I need a single one of our educational qualifications, no GCSEs, no A-Levels, no degrees, not even our professional qualifications to do the jobs we do to earn the money we need to support our family. So we know how much of an illusion it is that you need exams to survive in this world. The added bonus is we actually love what we do too.

Incidentally I am not suggesting that the boys won’t gain qualifications, only that it is not our primary motivation and we are keen for any qualifications to be relevant to their interests and what they might next like to do in their life - which of course will always no doubt change.

Home schooling is a process in many ways, an unveiling of more of your deeper self, as you increasingly strip away the years of conditioning. You realise how much of your choices are based on caring what others think, and caring then what others think of the choices you are making for your children too.

Ewan, especially, had some resistance from friends because home schooling is very much out of their comfort zone. When this happens – when you make life choices that are out of the ordinary – people make you wrong, to allow them to still be ‘right’ in the choices they are making (or lack of choice they are making, merely following mainstream) because it is too much for them to consider changing their world view, to recognise that they have more choice in their life than they realise, to take greater responsibility for their experience of life too.

Others are interested by home schooling. Often, in shops, people will ask if the children are on holiday, and I will respond that they are home schooled, and many are immediately challenged by that, while others might ask further questions, but generally you get the sense that you are viewed as ‘different’.

I’m OK with that, but I know that others, when starting out, feel as if they are doing something wrong, and that can make them question their choices, but you learn to be stronger in your certainty the more home schooling is embedded in your life – this is when it becomes a lifestyle choice, not that you realise that potential when you first start out.

In Guernsey, parents have the legal right to home educate children aged 5–16, provided they deliver full-time education suitable to the child's age, ability, and special needs GOV.GG. While no specific curriculum is required, parents must notify the States of Guernsey Education Department if withdrawing a child from school and accept visits from an Education Officer, typically twice a year, to ensure progress. 

Key Aspects of Home Education in Guernsey:

• Legal Duty: Under the Education (Guernsey) Law 1970, education must be efficient, full-time, and suitable.

• Notification: If a child is currently registered at a school, you must notify both the school and the States of Guernsey in writing when withdrawing them.

• Monitoring: The Education Department will assign an officer to visit, usually twice a year, to review the educational provision and support the process.

• Flexibility: There is no requirement to follow the National Curriculum, use specific methods, or take school exams.

• Special Needs: If a child has special educational needs (SEN), these must be met through the home education provision.

• Support: Groups like Living Education Guernsey on Facebook provide support and advice for home-educating families. 

The LEG site is really helpful. There are increasing numbers of people home schooling on the island for a myriad of reasons. Some always had the intention to home school and some are replicating school at home, while others take a more flexible and child-led approach, some take their children out of school, like us, because it is clear they are not thriving in mainstream, and tap into local tutors who can help with the basics, like English and maths. Others choose to register their children to online schools and this is increasingly popular in secondary aged children.

There are various home school activities available, some are free, but generally you pay for learning, unless you intend to do it yourself.  We pay for the boys to see an amazing maths teacher once a week, one on one for 45 minutes. She has instilled a love of maths in the children and they actually look forward to their lessons. They also see a dyslexia teacher one to one once a week too, as both of them are dyslexic.

We are part of a nature group, who meet fortnightly for Children’s Fire, learning about all things nature; how to forage, how to light fires, how to wood craft, noting the changing seasons etc. They are also working towards the John Muir award and getting to know a certain part of Guernsey’s coastline very well.

The boys have private swimming lessons, attend an afterschool arts class, study music with SOPM, make the most of the Sailing Trust where Elijah is working through the power boating qualifications. They spend time with my parents, both ex-teachers, who teach them so many things simply through life, and the same in many ways with Ewan and I and Ewan’s family too, who also happen to be ex-teachers.

They also learn from their iPads. Elijah in particular, being that much older at 12 and perhaps because of his autistic tendency towards factual information, will get obsessed about certain subjects such as boats or planes and learn all he can about them. Eben is less self-motivated towards learning, but he is only 9, his time will come.

People always worry about the socialising aspect of home schooling but for us this has never been a problem. Admittedly both boys don’t like being in groups, perhaps it’s the autism as they find the energy too much, but we meet for playdates with other home school families and they catch up with schooled friends at the weekends too, they’re certainly not missing out on the school enforced socialising.

Despite the intensity of home schooling at times, and the financial and ‘head space’ sacrifice, we wouldn’t have it any other way. We can see how the boys are learning through life experience and thriving. Elijah especially, is a totally different child to the anxious and insecure child he was when he left school four years ago. I dread to think what would have happened to him if we had kept forcing him into the system.

Because this is the thing. For us it is so important to respect our children’s soulful direction in life. For many, that means school, but for many others, there is another way. And the greatest lesson I have learned especially, is the more you let your children guide the way, and the trust and have faith in the process, the more you find a new way for yourself too, that offers far more potential and a far deeper connection with your own soul – and other soulful people - then you ever knew was possible. It’s like they give you permission to be more of yourself too and live increasingly authentically in the process. Again, you can ‘t put a price on this.

If you do have questions, if you need some support, then do reach out – emma@beinspiredby.co.uk. Please just be aware that I don’t have time to meet for a chat, but I can try and put you in contact with others who might. But really the LEG site is the best place to go for more information and home school connection.

 Love Emma x