How Do They Turn Out?
Many people think that home education sounds all very well… but how do the kids turn out? Will they be wild, unsocialised, unemployable? Not at all. Read these articles for an insight into what grown home learners are like.
Meet Dr Chan, High Achiever with a PhD at 21
by Adam Morton / The Age
© The Age. Reproduced by Permission.
March 8, 2006
It figures: after completing year 12 subjects at 10, mathematician Yao-ban Chan has now become Melbourne University’s youngest-ever PhD graduate.
WHEN he was 10, while his peers swung from monkey bars and charged around with rugby balls, Yao-ban Chan sat year 12 exams in statistics and calculus. He scored 91 and 90.
It is such a mind-boggling accomplishment that it almost makes his latest achievement seem commonplace.
Home Ed is a Success
By Levina and Geoff Snow
We chose to home educate our two children after the kindergarten experience for our elder child was a disaster - bullying and being excluded by the other children and being overlooked by the teacher. The choice initially was to home educate for a few years - then for primary school - then for lower secondary. As it turned out our children each only attended full time school for one year - Year 12.
When Home Ed Kids Grow Up
by Katharina Russell-Head, Templestowe, Vic
Why has the Victorian government suddenly become concerned with regulating home education? Who has brought up objections to the existing legislation? What is the problem that they want to solve? What fears are being expressed? Are they afraid that children outside the public school system will be uneducated? That they will be unable to read, or write, or be mathematically competent? That they will know nothing of the world? That they will be neglected, or exploited, or isolated? Does the government fear that what it cannot control is therefore out of control?
Other Ways
By Dindy Vaughan, Ringwood Victoria
Not every child is happy at school.
Some struggle along grudgingly, some fight the system, some opt out and refuse to achieve; and mostly their parents worry.
In many cases it comes down to ’school refusal’. The state of Victoria currently has not hundreds, but thousands of school-age children who are simply refusing to go. The majority are not rabble-rousers and delinquents; they tend to be quiet, somewhat withdrawn and, one guesses, depressed. They sit at home, they play computer games, they socialize a little with a few friends; and again; mostly their parents worry.
A child who is not happy at school is not necessarily a ‘misfit’. Schools are full of excellent dedicated teachers doing all they can to present the best programs available, but not all children can fit the pattern.
So what do you do with a child who is not happy?
When my five-year-old daughter exhibited extreme distress after one term of school I acted swiftly. I took her out.