There is in Britain a widespread, and wholly false, belief that parents are under some legal obligation to send their children to school at the age of five. In fact, the only requirement under the 1996 Education Act is that parents cause their child to receive efficient, fulltime education from that age, suitable to his age, ability, aptitude, and any special educational needs. This must be either ‘by regular attendance at school or otherwise’. It is that word ‘otherwise’ which permits in law parents to educate their children at home.
Before going any further, it might be as well to clear up one misunderstanding which many parents find confusing. When told that there is no legal requirement to send their children to school, they ask how it can be that parents are fined for taking their children on holiday during term time? Surely there is a contradiction there? The explanation is simple. No parent is obliged to register their child at a school, but having done so, they then incur a legal obligation to ensure that the child attends the school regularly. It is registering the child at school which creates this situation and if parents simply do not do so, then the question of attendance does not, and cannot, arise.
In 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic took hold in the UK, there were estimated to be around 60,000 children being homeschooled by their parents. It is believed that this figure has now doubled to roughly 115,000, and there is general agreement that the number is still increasing. For some professionals in the field of education, this is a cause for concern. But for those parents who refuse to send their children to school, it is a harbinger of things to come. After all, in the United States, more than five per cent of children are educated at home.
Speaking in general, teachers and Local Authorities disapprove of home education, while many parents are fiercely enthusiastic about it. What then are the pros and cons of not sending your child to school? From an educational perspective, the advantages are tremendous. One-to-one tuition in a relaxed domestic environment is more efficient than trying to cater for the needs of thirty children of wildly varying abilities, following a rigid and inflexible programme prescribed by the government. Under such circ*mstances, it is inevitable that slower children will be left behind, while the brightest are held back. To educate one child, it is not necessary to be a qualified teacher; all curricula and syllabuses are freely accessible online. Parents don't need to worry about any gaps in their own knowledge, either. Even specialist science or maths teachers tend to refresh their memories of different topics before teaching them to a class. Additionally, one can always find videos and websites explaining more complex topics to children.
On a personal note, I will mention here that I did not send my own child to school for a single day. There was no difficulty in her studying for, and taking, GCSEs, although of course we had to pay for her to sit the examinations. She achieved A*, as the highest grade then was, in all the subjects which she took, including the three sciences.
Whenever the subject of home education is raised, the chief objection has, surprisingly, nothing to do with education at all. It is rather the question of socialisation. It is suggested that children who are not sent to school fail to learn about ordinary, everyday life, and consequently will not know how to fit into society as adults. However, when looked at rationally, this is a frankly bizarre notion. How many of us, in our adult life, must seek the permission of our line manager at work in order to empty our bladders? Do any adults in ordinary life call their boss ‘sir’? What about being marched about and doing everything in the same squad of thirty people, whose age varies from your own by no more than a year? Reader, does any of this sound even remotely like life? The only places where this way of life might be observed are prisons and armies.
But what about the valuable lessons which children who are not at school miss out on when it comes to getting along with their peers? Surely, nobody could deny that schoolchildren learn all kinds of things from each other and that interactions in the classroom and playground lay the foundations for how to get on with people when they are adults? This objection, which is often raised when the topic of home education is discussed, is breathtakingly misplaced. Imagine the mother of a 12-year-old boy saying to her friend, "Gosh, Jimmy’s language has improved because of the children with whom he spends his days at school! His vocabulary is so much broader these days and he has picked up a beautiful accent." Is it common for parents to think that their offspring have learned wonderful new habits from their classmates or started behaving in a more civilised fashion?
The reality is that almost every parent bemoans the fact that his or her child is corrupted by the influence of other schoolchildren, often adopting swearwords and a variety of bad or offensive habits. As one home-educating mother quipped, “If I want my son to learn how to burp, fart, and swear, I’m quite capable of teaching him those things for himself!” The truth is, for most, if not all parents, that socialisation in school is anything but a positive experience. It is only when talk turns to home education that it is presented as a desirable learning opportunity for children.
Assuming then that there are no real disadvantages for the child’s development, is there not a risk that the enterprise will fail from an educational perspective; that a child will reach the age of 16 being unable to read, write, or carry out simple arithmetical calculations? Doubtless, this may be the case for some, but the same argument could be applied to schools. Just before the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020, statistics showed that in Britain, 100 thousand children left school each year without having achieved basic qualifications; that is to say five GCSEs at level 4 or higher, including mathematics and English. When, after 11 or 12 years of full-time schooling, one in five pupils in Britain does not emerge with the most basic set of qualifications, something is probably amiss. Most of us would agree that the country's educationalists should focus on this awful situation, rather than fretting about what is, in absolute terms, a modest number of pupils being home-schooled. There is no reason to suppose that the educational outcomes of the average home-educated child are any worse than those who attend school.
The real, though unspoken, opposition to and unease about homeschooling is that it produces individuals who think differently than the majority of society. This has led to speculation that it could create "parallel societies" of fanatical Islamists or dangerous revolutionaries who pose a threat to others. While this is a far-fetched notion, it is one which is seriously advanced by those who would like to see the government crackdown on the practice. There is little doubt that the thought of thousands of children growing up without being taught the correct, liberal, and left-wing view of matters ranging from religion to same-sex relationships is a disturbing one too many teachers, social workers, and local government employees. They feel instinctively that something should be done about such an unregulated state of affairs, with people teaching their children whatever they please. Fortunately, though, successive governments have left the situation as it has always been, with parental choice paramount. When all is said and done, children belong not to the state but to their parents, and it is they who should have the final say in matters such as education. This is the way it has always been in Britain and it is to be hoped that it will continue to be so for the foreseeable future.
