Otherways: Home Education Network

Welcome to the Home Education Network.

Our aim is to provide support and information for people wishing to educate their children from a home base.

To check this term’s Fun Stuff with Friends program click here
For bookings: use our online booking form

Please note HEN is a parent support group, not a business

Please note that whenever you contact someone at HEN, we are all volunteers. We are all keen to help other home educators find the information they need, put them in touch with the right person, book you into classes/events/camps, or post out things you have ordered and we strive to do so as quickly and efficiently as possible. The HEN team do an amazing job of supporting other home educators and are often so efficient that many people who contact us don’t realise we aren’t a professional organisation but please do keep in mind that all us are volunteers who do have children at home who need our attention. For this reason, we can’t always respond as quickly as you would expect from professionals.

Please bear with us, we are committed to helping, sometimes it just takes a little time.

Otherways 124 May-July 2010 Articles: Part Time School by Cynthia McStephen When Full-Time Schooling isn’t Working by Sue Minto Biodiversity: Building Skills by Garden Investigation by Jeanie Clark Araluen 12 years on – photo feature by Dora Berenyi Our Other Lives – photo feature by Dora Berenyi One Hundred and Thirteen Tomatoes by Rebecca Funk Science Resources for Teens by Susan Wight Home-ed: The Myths, The Magic, The Mayhem by Jess Pritchard NAPLAN for home educators? By Carol Goudie Joining the Camp Scene by Jess Pritchard Wildthings Camp - photospread by Sharee Cordes The Nature of Learning by Kylie Robertson Wildthings Camp Report by Pete Matthews Yay for Home - new column by Shae Reynolds Home Education: 40 Years Old by Rosanne Trevaskis Open House by Kathy Major

Plus our regular features… Purchase this issue for just $10 plus postage or join HEN and receive Otherways for just $40 per year Not sure if Otherways Magazine is for you? Download our free PDF back issue Back issues of Otherways are available from our Online Shop.

John Holt on DVD

click to enlarge

In 1981 John Holt came to Australia to give a series of lectures and workshops on home education. He spoke on a range of topics such as Schools vs Home Education, Socialisation and Time Management.

John Holt was a teacher who advocated for school reform with such books as How Schools Fail and How Children Learn (1970) which together sold a million and half copies. When John became convinced that school reform was never going to be a reality, he became convinced that the only way to truly get an education was to not go to school and he established the first homeschooling magazine, Growing Without Schooling. His last book, Teach Your Own fully advocated home education and helped launch home education as an alternative educational pathway.

This DVD shows the lecture John Holt gave at the Melbourne Zoo during his visit to Australia. It is a pleasure to finally see and hear this man whose ideas have been an inspiration to so many of us during our own home education journey.

You can purchase a copy in our shop for just $15 plus postage.

Home Education Network

Home Education Network is the home of Otherways magazine, one of the most widely read Home Education magazines in Australia today. We have articles that will inspire you, inform you, make you laugh and cry, but most of all help in one of the most important decisions in your life – Home Education is right for me! Our articles delve into all the things you wish to know about educating your own children. We have put selected articles only on this website, if you wish to subscribe and enjoy all the articles plus information on events, resources, classifieds and receive our regular network lists of home educating families, the cost is only AUS$40 per year.

Home Education Network is a voluntary, non-profit organisation that provides information and support for home educating (home schooling) families. We provide information through this website, by posting out free information sheets and we have a Free Online Home Education Information Service. This service is run by experienced home educators who will answer all your questions. Send an e-mail to editor@home-ed.vic.edu.au or phone 03 9517 7107 where you can leave your details and have a home educator call you back.

Through our website, we advertise local, interstate and overseas events.

Home Education (home schooling) is now a serious choice for many parents when contemplating the educational pathways for their children. Home education in Australia and world wide has grown threefold in the past few years due to the problems facing our public school systems and also from the outstanding results seen in home educated children and young adults in their academic, social and family lives.