School At Home
By Tony Scanlan
Issue 6 of Father and Child encouraged fathers to be involved with their children’s education. The article suggested fathers spend time in the classroom and help the teacher.
It didn’t however suggest fathers should be the teachers.
I spoke to two fathers and their partners who have done just that, assuming total responsibility for their children’s education – home-schooling. I asked them why and, as both fathers work, how involved in the teaching the fathers are.
Rick is married to Brenda, they now have six kids. Two years ago they only had four, with two in school and two toddlers. Rick would drop the kids off at school and hang around for a while in class (as our earlier article suggested.).
He noticed the teacher spent a lot of time struggling with discipline. After school he would ask the kids what they did in school that day.
“Stuff.” was the reply.
“Learnt anything new?” “No.”
Rick felt that his son Dennym was actually learning more from his peer group than from the teacher.
” Dennym was more interested in playing than learning.” says Rick, “I’d read about kids falling through the cracks in the education system, and I’d also read about homeschooling. I’d researched what they did at school, and I thought we could do a better job ourselves.
However Brenda wanted a couple of months to “think about it.”
”I’d heard about others doing it and I thought that we do everything else, so why not teach spelling, etc.” says Brenda.
The next step, once the decision was made, was to apply for exemption from the Ministry of Education. Anyone seeking to educate their own children must first convince the government that they are capable of the job and have a suitable curriculum.
Their biggest problem was convincing friends and family they hadn’t gone mad. In fact all the extended family were against it at first. Most asking how much teaching experience they had. Most are now impressed with their efforts.
As with the majority of homeschoolers, the day’s set lessons last for about three hours, with Brenda doing most of the teaching.
Rick’s job is to introduce new stuff, and to back Brenda up with the ricky explanations.
“I explained fractions with a pie we were eating one time, and to explain ‘day and night’ I used a tennis ball and the light in the garage.”
When daughter Chalice was nearly five, she asked to go to school. She had a school visit and decided against it.
“She did’nt want to miss out on the fun we were having,” remembers Brenda.
The children now seem to be enjoying the learning, with the older ones helping the younger kids.
“They mob me, when I come home from work, to show me what they’ve learned, Sometimes arguing over who goes first.”
Rick is trying to get his hours changed at work, so he can spend more time with the kids during the day. “The guys at work can’t believe I actually want to work nights.”
Brenda :”Ours is a lifestyle choice, the kids are our life; if we get time to ourselves, it’s a bonus.
“Rick’s ‘timeout’ is at the gym, not that he’d call it that.”
The children have private tuition in subjects that Brenda and Rick aren’t confident in handling. Daughter Jade loves music. “I’m trying to learn music, so I can teach her,” says Rick,”but at the moment she goes to a tutor.”
Dennym, the oldest, is now nine and is planning on going to High School.
‘We’ll see what happens, he might get in with the wrong crowd. I don’t really want our close family to drift apart. I want to stay friends with the kids when they grow up and not hear “oh, thats just mum and dad.”
The other parents I spoke to were Damon and Nicky. They have just started homeschooling and have two children, Jonathan, eight and Elijah, three.
Jonathan got on well at school, he was well socialised and good at schoolwork, although he didn’t really enjoy it.
Their decision to homeschool had more to do with relationships, than with problems with school. Nicky felt Jonathan had too separate a life from the rest of the family.
“His contribution to the home was becoming less and less. It was schoolfriends-food-t.v.-bed.. We wanted to work Jonathan back into the flow of the house.”
It was more Nicky’s decision, but Damon was quite happy with it.
“Nicky is getting a better dose of the kids now, and Jonathan is helping more with Eli. The house is less of a hotel.”
Nicky-” I’m not anti-school, it’s just time for a bit of one on one. He may go back, but if kids don’t enjoy learning, there must be something wrong with the environment.”
Damon: “We want Jonathan to learn different ways of looking at things. I believe kids need to learn how to learn.” Damon’s main concern with school is the uncontrolled Influence of other children. “People think good socialisation for kids is lots of kids all together. Kids teach kids at school.
I think it’s better to socialise with adults. Kids on kids can be quite aggressive,dog eat dog. I see it as my job to be there with him to cope with secondary socialisation.”
Nicky and Damon are keen to learn to teach. Damon, like Rick, works full time, so Nicky does most of the teaching.
“I’m looking forward to learning with Jonathan, things like geometry.” At the moment Damon teaches the ” scientific stuff “.
Damon: “I’m keen to teach Jonathan stuff I’m into, like drumming and dancing. I found it hard to get inspired by Jonathan’s school projects, I felt quite detached from school.”
Nicky: “Our hours are more flexible now. Damon could take a day off and we’d go to Quail Island (in Lyttelton Harbour -ed.) as a family group. Bedtimes are not such a big issue. Jonathan can stay up to midnight, reading, if he wants to.”
Damon is enjoying not being such an authority figure now.
“It’s a challenge for parents not to use age as authority, to listen to kids’ idea of how something should be done.”
Like Dennym, Jonathan may reenter the school system later.
Nicky: “It’s great having him home for a bit, he’ll probably go back later.”
“I reckon we should use schools like the doctors, only go when you really need to.” says Damon with a rascally grin.
