The idea was that S would be educated autonomously (love that word) at home until around 7 years, unless she decided otherwise. Because we're secretly massive hippies! So at some point in the future she will enter the state school system as, and here's the immediate exclusion from all home-ed groups, we genuinely believe that the system we have in the UK ain't that bad.
Yes, schools do seem to focus on targets for funding rather than the individual needs of the child. And yes, being in one place 8 hours a day for a minimum of 11 years is too much for a child. But seriously, creating a supportive home life is surely more important than making a political statement through children? And is holding off 'formal' education a better idea than starting them on targets from age 3? Shouldn't children enter the system once they're articulate enough to discuss their educational interests/problems and are already aware that their parents are passionate about their education. That's one of the main reasons we'd like to home-ed until 7, S can find her own interests and begin to see how they fit together for day-to-day life. So I'm questioning whether adding some loose structure will help her adjust to school when she starts, or to simply lay off the structure and concentrate on facilitating a desire to learn. A bug bear of mine is that children are 'taught' rather than they 'learn', I think there's a big difference between the two. Being taught something doesn't mean that a child will have an interest or be able to apply it to life (think calculus..) but if they learn they surely you are truly empowering a child to want to know more, to expand and challenge. We don't seem to like challenges in society today, it always comes across as too much effort! One size fits all teaching... doesn't fit. And so I'll end my quandary blog post, albeit rather abruptly, with a talk by Ken Robinson...
And of course I'll update on our direction within our home-ed journey.
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