Thread: Can we do it?

My OH and I have agreed to home school our son Freedom for now. He was in day care from 1 year till a few months ago. Mainly to play and for the social aspect, I was worried with him being an only child (I'm the youngest of 5) he would grow up with a chip on his shoulder or something. Anyway with OH's work he travels a lot, Freedom and I often go with him so we are not apart for too long.
The nursery Freedom was in started to make comments about his attendance, or lack of it, saying that now Freedom is 3, he was in the Nursery School section and it would be more beneficial for him to attend regularly. This made us think we were not happy with a) such a formal and structured routine at this stage b) having our lifestyle restricted and c) meaning that OH would be away from our son for longer periods of time.
My OH hated school he had a very short attention span and ended up leaving school early. I always did very well at school but I remember being bored a lot of the time, I found the work easy and I just wanted to peruse my interests.
So were thinking that we might be better of home schooling Freedom. My mother thinks it's a ridiculous idea and he will end up just running wild and being very precocious. And in laws totally disagree; well MIL is an elementary school teacher. hehe
So far we have just been going with the flow and anything he takes interest in or asks about we peruse. He can spell his name and count to 50, and is very good with math in general.
I'm not too worried at this stage as he has only just turned 3, but what about when he's 5/6, should we get certain books? Follow a certain route?
Sorry about this long winded message and maybe stupid questions, but this is all new to me.

i've not done home schooling, so cant really comment on that. but at the age of three i wouldnt worry about any formalised structured schooling. he's already ahead of a lot of six year olds in what you say he can do.

enjoy his youth, let him be a baby, he'll be tied up in education for long enough once he gets there, is my opinion.

welcome to the site.

Sienna, hi

I agree that you can follow his lead now and not worry about formal education until much later. You can, in fact, avoid formal education entirely, autonomous education, aka unschooling (well, the idea's very similar) is all about following the child's interests and supporting them in learning in their own pace and way. Of course that's not the only way of home-edding! As for the 'should' question, well there are no shoulds, of course, it's all about what works best for your family overall. If you're in the UK you might find more information if you search for home-education. Home-schooling, or 'school at home' tends to refer more to using a set curriculum and having sit-down lessons at home, where in the US homeschooling is more of an umbrella term for all kinds of home-based education.

HTH a bit!

Hi Sienna,
We're 'unschooling' our children Mia 2yrs 6mnths and Tarka 7 months. We are letting Mia do whatever interests her and don't plan to follow any structured learning...I think it's a lovely positive idea and it's a myth that school is the only, or best place for children to make friends. My MIL thinks we're mad too, but we're quite used to being seen as the wierd hippy element by our families anyway!!

There's a book called 'The Unschooling Handbook' by mary Grifiith you might find interesting too.
HTH
Gina***

Thanks for your replies. I'm not worried about anything formal now, more when he's older. My sister keeps saying 'are you sure this is what you want to do?' 'And maybe you should put his name down for a school just in case.' She isn't being judgmental just worried that I don't know what I have let myself in for, so this is why I am trying to find out information.
He is bright (I know I’m biased) but OH and I have never pressured him to do anything it's always just happened. OH is now teaching him to play Piano.

Gina, following their interests sounds great for now, but do you worry about when they are 18? This is my worry, that Freedom will not be able to take any formal exams.

There are always was of taking formal exams if that's what the child wants to do, and/or if they need it, which isn't always the case. And heck, 18 is a long way away for you, I'm not thinking about 18 yet and my eldest is 11, lol. Home education isn't an all-or-nothing thing either, school places are found, children are deregistered, it can ebb and flow.