The Home Ed Blog

I wanted to kick off by sharing who we are, why we home educate and give a little sneak peak into what our home education journey has looked like over the past 10 years!

We are a family of 3. So there is me, Lyndsay, who is the main home educator in the family. Then there is my hubby, Simon, who works full time (shifts) but gets involved in the home education as and when he can. Lastly, there is LL who is currently 14 years old and has been home educated since we took her out of school at the end of her first term in Reception. We live in the North West of England.

Before I became a mum I was a primary school teacher, but I had become very disillusioned with the state education system and had decided to leave the profession when I got pregnant. I absolutely loved teaching when I was allowed to just get on and do what worked for the children in my class, but all the government intervention and constant unrealistic targets meant that rarely happened.

I had no idea that home education was even a “thing!” I think it has only really become a widely known education option in the past few years, before that it feels like it was a well kept secret. When LL was in her first term of Reception I spotted an old school friend posting on Facebook about home educating her son (who was the same age as LL) but I didn’t think much of it at first, however once she started struggling with the classroom environment I decided to look into home education.

I love doing research and so I researched the heck out of home education for about 6 weeks; watching YouTube videos (the first time I’d ever come across YouTube – this was 2017 – I was a little behind the times) and reading blog after blog (I miss the days of long form writing). After numerous conversations between hubby and I we planned that if things didn’t improve for LL in school by the end of the summer term we would give home education a go from the September of her Year 1 year. Life doesn’t always go as planned and come the end of the Christmas holidays we had seen our sparky little girl returning, even if she did have awful chickenpox, and I just couldn’t send her back to school in the January. So, hubby bravely trusted me, we deregistered LL and we haven’t looked back since!

It hasn’t always been easy, but it definitely has been worth it!

LL is autistic with a PDA profile, has ADHD and low muscle tone/hypermobility. Whilst these were the main reason for removing her from the school system, and a large reason why we continue to home educate they aren’t the only reason now. Seeing LL able to explore topics she wouldn’t get the opportunity to in school, and developing passions in subjects that most schools don’t cover (not unless you have the money to send your child to a prestigious private school) has been a driving force in continuing with home education into the secondary years.

Our home education has looked so different over the years. There haven’t been two years that have looked exactly the same, sometimes not even two terms have looked the same in a single year. However, what has remained constant throughout is our commitment to giving LL the best education possible, and one that meets her where she is at.

Whereas in the early days we spent a lot of time outside exploring our local nature spots, visiting museums, at park meet ups, reading endless books, carrying out kitchen science experiments and enjoying discovering mathematical concepts through manipulatives and hand on activities. More recent years have seen us stepping into the world of online classes (not an online school, and they probably only account for about 20% of our learning time) and GCSE preparation.