I fear my ability to home ed, not home ed itself

[IfIonlyhadsomesleep]

I feel that home education has so much going for it but I fear my ability to be with my children all the time. I am not amazingly patient, I find squabbles hard and I fear I would be too controlling as a home ed parent. That said, I feel that dd's school doesn't "get" her. She's achieving highly academically but is constantly in trouble for talking in class etc. I believe that she finds it hard to organise tasks and procrastinates. With support at home, she can do this and she is interested in everything and anything. I don't think that pleasing the teacher is enough of a motivator for her and the tasks at school are often repetitive and pointless.
Has anyone else feared being up to the job of home educating? Did it work out okay?

[completelybonkers]

We took my DS (Year 3) out of school at Easter so have only been Home Educating since then. You and I sound quite similar and I won't pretend there aren't any arguments! However, there is no question that DS has made great progress in many areas and is now challenged and stimulated; he definitely doesn't want to return to school so it can't be going too wrong.

What age is your DD and how big is the class she is in? She clearly has an enquiring mind but it sounds as if the school is not particularly interested in helping her in areas that she needs support. Nobody knows your DD as you do and no-one else will care as much about finding out what works best for her: my experience of schools is that they want to be able to tick all the boxes with the minimum of effort.

I can understand your fears of not being up to the job but that may well be partly due to not having tried it before. How about doing a week's trial for a couple of hours a day to see how it would pan out for you?

At my DS's level, I'm not finding it difficult at all: in fact, I've really enjoyed researching subjects and tailor-making worksheets/problems/tasks for him. I have help from my DH here and there which is reassuring. Also, we had a visit from the LA education consultant; she was very thorough, taking time to look at the work he's done at home. She was very complimentary so that boosted my confidence. Perhaps your council would be able to put you in touch with an EC to talk things through before making a decision.

There are some excellent workbooks around which are useful as a guideline and to fall back on when you are running out of ideas. I also take the view that there are tutors around if I get really stuck although I appreciate that that may not be an option for everyone due to the cost.

Are you thinking of HE just for your DD or other DC as well? Would you have practical support?

Good luck with the decision making and enjoy the sunshine!

[ommmward]

One of the biggest potential positives in HE is the opportunity our children have to create an independent relationship with each other. They may not end up friends, but they have the opportunity to learn to rub along.

In the interests of that, I do my absolute best NEVER to discipline my children when they are having/have been having an argument. I never apportion blame in arguments. I will physically protect anyone who needs it if it gets violent. But I don't try to resolve the dispute - I just stay quietly in the space until they've resolved it themselves (or I sod off into the garden and leave them to it...)

you CAN de-control-freak-ify yourself, I promise (try reading Deborah JAckson, Letting go as children grow, or anything by the wonderful Libby Purves)

[maggi]

I'm with BONKERS on the testing it out idea. I did some weekend work with my ds and then over a helf term and it worked so well we went with it and gave notice to the school.

That was a year ago now. We do argue. He is hard to motivate. He does try all sorts to put off doing anything. He doesn't yet take responsibility for his learning. Having said all that, he now has a lovely personality, has matured, has made good progress in areas he was stuck in developing and for all his complaining will suddenly surprize everyone by applying his knowledge in a real life situation without anyone pressing him to do so.